Word of the Day: Tenuous

ten-u-ous / ˈten-yə-wəs

adjective

1. lacking substance; very flimsy or weak

The same thing that makes friendship so valuable is what makes it so tenuous: it is purely voluntary.

from ‘We Learn Nothing’ by Tim Kreider, ?-

2. very thin

As we drove out of Louton and the road began a series of sweeping curves that climbed up the mountain, the tenuous thread of vile grew stronger.

from ‘Demon’s Dance’ by Keri Arthur, ?-

3. not very stable

World economics are always so tenuous, and we are subject to so many losses in life, but a compassionate attitude is something we can always carry with us.

Dalai Lama, 1935-

4. rarefied

A large-scale magnetic field extending through a highly conducting tenuous fluid may become distorted on a small-scale as a consequence of slow small-scale shuffling of the magnetic lines of force at the boundaries of the tenuous fluid.

from ‘Magnetic Reconnection in Space and Laboratory Plasmas’ by Edward W. Hones, ?-

5. vague

As children, we have a tenuous idea of love; we often try to quantify it with how much we feel seen and heard.

Adora Svitak, 1997-