Adjacent Words

Impalpable definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

IMPAL'PABLE, a. [L. in and palpo, to feel. [See Palpable.]
Not to be felt; that cannot be perceived by the touch; as an impalpable powder, whose parts are so minute that they cannot be distinguished by the senses, particularly by feeling.
1. Not coarse or gross.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: incapable of being perceived by the senses especially the sense of touch; "the intangible constituent of energy"- James Jeans [syn: intangible, impalpable] [ant: tangible, touchable]
2: imperceptible to the senses or the mind; "an impalpable cloud"; "impalpable shadows"; "impalpable distinctions"; "as impalpable as a dream" [ant: palpable, tangible]
3: not perceptible to the touch; "an impalpable pulse"

Merriam Webster's

adjective Date: 1509 1. a. incapable of being felt by touch ; intangible <the impalpable aura of power that emanated from him — Osbert Sitwell> b. so finely divided that no grains or grit can be felt <rock worn to an impalpable powder> 2. not readily discerned by the mind <impalpable evils> • impalpability noun • impalpably adverb

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. 1 not easily grasped by the mind; intangible. 2 imperceptible to the touch. 3 (of powder) very fine; not containing grains that can be felt. Derivatives: impalpability n. impalpably adv. Etymology: F impalpable or LL impalpabilis (as IN-(1), PALPABLE)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Impalpable Im*pal"pa*ble, a. [Pref. im- not + palpable: cf. F. impalpable.] 1. Not palpable; that cannot be felt; extremely fine, so that no grit can be perceived by touch. ``Impalpable powder.'' --Boyle. 2. Not material; intangible; incorporeal. ``Impalpable, void, and bodiless.'' --Holland. 3. Not apprehensible, or readily apprehensible, by the mind; unreal; as, impalpable distinctions.

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Intangible, very fine, delicate, attenuated, not palpable, not to be felt, not perceptible by the touch. 2. Imperceptible, shadowy, indistinct, inapprehensible, unsubstantial.

Moby Thesaurus

airy, asomatous, astral, atomic, bodiless, branny, chalklike, chalky, comminute, comminuted, corpuscular, crushed, decarnate, decarnated, detrital, detrited, discarnate, disembodied, disintegrated, dusty, efflorescent, embryonic, ethereal, evanescent, extramundane, farinaceous, fine, flaky, floury, furfuraceous, germinal, ghostly, gone to dust, granular, grated, ground, immaterial, imperceptible, imponderable, inappreciable, incorporate, incorporeal, indiscernible, infinitesimal, insensible, insubstantial, intangible, invisible, levigated, mealy, microcosmic, microscopic, milled, molecular, nonmaterial, nonphysical, nonsubstantial, occult, otherworldly, pestled, phantom, powdered, powdery, psychic, pulverant, pulverized, pulverulent, reduced to powder, scaly, scobicular, scobiform, scurfy, shadowy, sharded, shredded, spiritual, subatomic, supernatural, tenuous, thin, transmundane, triturated, ultramicroscopic, unapparent, unappreciable, unconcrete, unearthly, unembodied, unextended, unfleshly, unobservable, unperceivable, unphysical, unseeable, unsolid, unsubstanced, unsubstantial, unworldly, weightless