What's the difference between edify and improve?

Edify


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To build; to construct.
  • (v. i.) To instruct and improve, especially in moral and religious knowledge; to teach.
  • (v. i.) To teach or persuade.
  • (v. i.) To improve.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) The fact that the BBC does the popular ratings-chasing things as well as the edifying things has always been a key part of the public service brief.
  • (2) Yesterday Andy Murray finally won Wimbledon and climbed into the players' box to celebrate; Saturday on Centre Court was less edifying.
  • (3) 8.49pm GMT The New Yorker's Ryan Lizza has written a profile of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor that's sure to edify any serious Washington watcher.
  • (4) In the leader's office mistakes have been made, processes not followed, people excluded and details left unattended, and everyone will have their consequent un-Edifying moment, from bacon butties to posing with a copy of the Sun.
  • (5) Maybe it's guilt at our destruction of their habitats, the proliferation of internet-related animal cuteness or because there are parents keen to give their children something more edifying than Iron Man 3 .
  • (6) Mr Osborne's hero, a self-pitying, self-dramatising intellectual rebel who drives his wife away, takes a mistress and then drops her when his wife crawls back, will not be thought an edifying example of chivalry.
  • (7) The construction of clinical reality in German practice is distinctive and edifying for a cross-cultural understanding of medical systems of knowledge and praxis.
  • (8) The grisly spectacle of Muammar Gaddafi's death and posthumous career as Misrata's most popular body art exhibit may not have been very edifying, and news that the deposed dictator of Libya has been quietly buried at a secret desert location has to be welcome .
  • (9) In Nereis pelagica, graft of dorsal or ventral parts of a regenerate edified in the absence of nerve cord (=aneurogenic) on the ventral or dorsal face of a normal host demonstrates a completely dorsal nature of the body wall in these special regenerates.
  • (10) There’s Britishness and there’s Britishness, all of it authentic, much of it contradictory, not all of it edifying.
  • (11) Albania had entered the pitch to a predictable chorus of howls, whistles and things far less edifying – “Kill, kill the Albanian” and “Fuck, fuck Albania” were the soundtrack to the opening stages and a command-and-response routine of “Kosovo!” “Serbia!” between the east and west stands occupied much of the warm-up.
  • (12) But there is the less edifying explanation for why I'm here, which is that I looked at the list of past speakers, a remarkable list of the giants of global journalism – not just British hacks – with the series having been inaugurated by the legendary Ben Bradlee – and I could not resist being seen in their august company.
  • (13) Turkish history, however, is not littered with many edifying precedents.
  • (14) The opening scenes – the ones that made early news bulletins – were the least edifying.
  • (15) The vision of a prime minister, a future king and England's most recognised footballer prostrating themselves before Fifa's pseudo-papal state was never going to be edifying.
  • (16) The consequences of the three first-half pitch invasions that led to the match briefly being suspended will surely be less edifying.
  • (17) I agree with those who say that civil servants ought to be accountable if they make major blunders, but there has been nothing edifying about the way in which Ms May assigned culpability to officials before they had a chance to put their case.
  • (18) Frank admissions of loathing are always more edifying than PR guff for the credulous about brotherly love.
  • (19) It is certainly a less edifying view of the politicians involved, but it's a true view.
  • (20) The former chancellor told the Week in Westminster on BBC Radio 4: “The prime minister wouldn’t last 30 seconds if he lost the referendum and we’d be plunged into a Conservative leadership crisis which is never a very edifying sight.” The intervention by Clarke, whose frontbench career was revived by Cameron a year before the 2010 general election, will be seen by No 10 as particularly unhelpful.

Improve


Definition:

  • (v. t.) To disprove or make void; to refute.
  • (v. t.) To disapprove; to find fault with; to reprove; to censure; as, to improve negligence.
  • (v. t.) To make better; to increase the value or good qualities of; to ameliorate by care or cultivation; as, to improve land.
  • (v. t.) To use or employ to good purpose; to make productive; to turn to profitable account; to utilize; as, to improve one's time; to improve his means.
  • (v. t.) To advance or increase by use; to augment or add to; -- said with reference to what is bad.
  • (v. i.) To grow better; to advance or make progress in what is desirable; to make or show improvement; as, to improve in health.
  • (v. i.) To advance or progress in bad qualities; to grow worse.
  • (v. i.) To increase; to be enhanced; to rise in value; as, the price of cotton improves.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) These data indicate a steady improvement in laboratory performance over the last 10 years.
  • (2) Use of the improved operative technique contributed to reduction in number of complications.
  • (3) With UVB treatment clinical improvement was achieved, and a less pronounced decrease in epidermal LC was noticed.
  • (4) This clinical improvement was also associated with a decrease of erythrocyte sedimentation rate (p less than 0.001), decrease of C-reactive protein (p less than 0.0001) and with improvement of anaemia (p less than 0.05).
  • (5) In order to control noise- and vibration-caused diseases it was necessary not only to improve machines' quality and service conditions but also to pay special attention to the choice of operators and to the quality of monitoring their adaptation process.
  • (6) Symptomatic improvement was obtained in 14 of the 15 hands, and sensory-evoked response improved in 13 hands.
  • (7) McDonald said cutting better deals with suppliers and improving efficiency as well as raising some prices had only partly offset the impact of sterling’s fall against the dollar.
  • (8) Systemic corticosteroids (i.e., prednisone, prednisolone or methylprednisolone) have improved the survival rate of patients with moderate and severe ulcerative colitis.
  • (9) The active agents modestly improved treadmill exercise duration time until 1 mm ST segment depression (3%), and only propranolol and diltiazem had significant effects.
  • (10) A segment of vas deferens was transplanted to the contralateral deferens with the intention of improving treatment for certain cases of infertility caused by obstruction.
  • (11) Blood pressure control was marginally improved during the study and it is thought possible that better patient compliance might explain this.
  • (12) Since interferon alfa-2b (Intron A) is useful as a single agent, it is important to determine if interferon can be combined with standard chemotherapy to improve both response and survival in patients with cancer.
  • (13) Patients had improved sitting balance and endurance after surgery.
  • (14) However, further improvement of culture systems is needed for active replication of HBV in vitro.
  • (15) Symptoms, particularly colicky abdominal pain, improved during the period of chelation therapy.
  • (16) Her muscle weakness and hyperCKemia markedly improved by corticosteroid therapy, suggesting that the diagnosis was compatible with polymyositis (PM).
  • (17) An intact post-injury marriage was associated with improvement in education.
  • (18) A review is presented concerning the development of new neuroimaging techniques in the last decade which have improved the diagnostic exploration of patients with spinal cord injuries, including studies of possible sequelae.
  • (19) Akinetic symptoms were improved in 7 of 10 patients.
  • (20) What we’re doing is designed to improve people’s lives.” "I don't see race, colour or creed, and neither do my children," he added.