[syn: neuter, sexless]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Neuter \Neu"ter\, a. [L., fr. ne not + uter whether; akin to E.
whether. See No, and Whether, and cf. Neither.]
1. Neither the one thing nor the other; on neither side;
impartial; neutral. [Archaic]
[1913 Webster]
In all our undertakings God will be either our
friend or our enemy; for Providence never stands
neuter. --South.
[1913 Webster]
2. (Gram.)
(a) Having a form belonging more especially to words which
are not appellations of males or females; expressing
or designating that which is of neither sex; as, a
neuter noun; a neuter termination; the neuter gender.
(b) Intransitive; as, a neuter verb.
[1913 Webster]
3. (Biol.) Having no generative organs, or imperfectly
developed ones; sexless. See Neuter, n., 3.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
neuter \neu"ter\, v. t.
To render incapable of sexual reproduction; to remove or
alter the sexual organs so as to make infertile; to alter; to
fix; to desex; -- in male animals, to castrate; in female
animals, to spay.
[PJC]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Neuter \Neu"ter\, n.
1. A person who takes no part in a contest; one who is either
indifferent to a cause or forbears to interfere; a
neutral.
[1913 Webster]
The world's no neuter; it will wound or save.
--Young.
[1913 Webster]
2. (Gram.)
(a) A noun of the neuter gender; any one of those words
which have the terminations usually found in neuter
words.
(b) An intransitive verb.
[1913 Webster]
3. (Biol.) An organism, either vegetable or animal, which at
its maturity has no generative organs, or but imperfectly
developed ones, as a plant without stamens or pistils, as
the garden Hydrangea; esp., one of the imperfectly
developed females of certain social insects, as of the ant
and the common honeybee, which perform the labors of the
community, and are called workers.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
neuter
adj 1: of grammatical gender; "`it' is the third-person singular
neuter pronoun" [ant: feminine, masculine]
2: having no or imperfectly developed or nonfunctional sex
organs [syn: neuter, sexless]
n 1: a gender that refers chiefly (but not exclusively) to
inanimate objects (neither masculine nor feminine)
v 1: remove the ovaries of; "Is your cat spayed?" [syn: alter,
neuter, spay, castrate]
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
91 Moby Thesaurus words for "neuter":
Laodicean, alter, animate, anythingarian, apathetic, asexual,
capon, castrate, castrated, centrist, change, cold, common gender,
contemplative, cool, cut, desex, desexualize, do-nothing, doctor,
dormant, emasculate, emasculated, epicene, eunuchize, eunuchized,
even, feminine, fence-sitter, fervorless, fifty-fifty, fix, frigid,
frustrated, geld, gender, half-and-half, halfhearted, idle,
immobile, impartial, impotent, inactive, inanimate, independent,
indifferent, inert, laissez-aller, laissez-faire, lukewarm,
masculine, meditative, midway, moderate, motionless, mugwump,
mutilate, neutral, nonaligned, noncommitted, nonpartisan,
nothingarian, on the fence, paralytic, paralyzed, passive,
perfunctory, procrastinating, quiescent, quietist, quietistic,
sexless, spay, stagnant, stagnating, standpat, static, stationary,
tepid, third force, third world, third-force, third-world,
uncommitted, uninvolved, unsex, unsexed, unsexual, vegetable,
vegetative, zealless