What's the difference between fail and flop?

Fail


Definition:

  • (v. i.) To be wanting; to fall short; to be or become deficient in any measure or degree up to total absence; to cease to be furnished in the usual or expected manner, or to be altogether cut off from supply; to be lacking; as, streams fail; crops fail.
  • (v. i.) To be affected with want; to come short; to lack; to be deficient or unprovided; -- used with of.
  • (v. i.) To fall away; to become diminished; to decline; to decay; to sink.
  • (v. i.) To deteriorate in respect to vigor, activity, resources, etc.; to become weaker; as, a sick man fails.
  • (v. i.) To perish; to die; -- used of a person.
  • (v. i.) To be found wanting with respect to an action or a duty to be performed, a result to be secured, etc.; to miss; not to fulfill expectation.
  • (v. i.) To come short of a result or object aimed at or desired ; to be baffled or frusrated.
  • (v. i.) To err in judgment; to be mistaken.
  • (v. i.) To become unable to meet one's engagements; especially, to be unable to pay one's debts or discharge one's business obligation; to become bankrupt or insolvent.
  • (v. t.) To be wanting to ; to be insufficient for; to disappoint; to desert.
  • (v. t.) To miss of attaining; to lose.
  • (v. i.) Miscarriage; failure; deficiency; fault; -- mostly superseded by failure or failing, except in the phrase without fail.
  • (v. i.) Death; decease.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Intrathecal injection of zopiclone potentiated morphine antinociception, while the intracerebroventricular injection of zopiclone failed to enhance morphine antinociception and the intracerebroventricular injection of flumazepil to antagonize the intraperitoneal-zopiclone-induced increase in morphine antinociception.
  • (2) However, ticks, which failed to finish their feeding and represent a disproportionately great part of the whole parasite's population, die together with them and the parasitic system quickly restores its stability.
  • (3) The inquiry found the law enforcement agencies routinely fail to record the professions of those whose communications data records they access under Ripa.
  • (4) It is suggested that the normal cyclical release of LH is inhibited in PCO disease by a negative feedback by androgens to the hypothalamus or the pituitary, and that wedge resection should be reserved for patients in whom other forms of treatment have failed.
  • (5) Endoscopic retrograde cholangiography failed to demonstrate any bile ducts in the right postero-lateral segments of the liver, the "naked segment sign".
  • (6) Several efforts to extradite Polanski to California have failed.
  • (7) Administration of aminonucleoside and daunomycin produced proteinuria but did not cause a decrease in lipid P. Anticollagen and anti-lymphocyte sera that attached to the basement membrane but failed to produce proteinuria, also failed to affect the phospholipid content.
  • (8) An official inquiry into the Rotherham abuse scandal blamed failings by Rotherham council and South Yorkshire police.
  • (9) Amid the acrimony of the failed debate on the Malaysia Agreement, something was missed or forgotten: many in the left had changed their mind.
  • (10) Four of the nine patients failed to show any clinical or hematological improvement.
  • (11) In cases in which CT was also performed, it revealed corresponding hypodensities in two infarctions, but failed to reveal the foci of gliosis (or noncavital infarction), demyelination, or brain cyst.
  • (12) Even in the failed cases, 25-42% of subjects considered the treatment as good.
  • (13) Dzeko he has failed to hold down a starting berth since his £27m move in January 2011.
  • (14) Prothrombin isolation on DEAE Sephadex failed to separate the abnormal population (prothrombin Clamart) from the normal one.
  • (15) The starting point is the idea that the current system, because it works against biodiversity but fails to increase productivity, is broken.
  • (16) Other than failing to get a goal, I couldn’t ask for anything more.” From Lambert’s perspective there was an element of misfortune about the first and third goals, with Willian benefitting from handy ricochets on both occasions.
  • (17) In contrast, albino rats and rabbits failed to succumb to overt disease by subcutaneous and intraperitoneal routes of inoculation.
  • (18) It was recently demonstrated that MRL-lpr lymphoid cells transferred into lethally irradiated MRL- +mice unexpectedly failed to induce the early onset of lupus syndrome and massive lymphadenopathy of the donor, instead they caused a severe wasting syndrome resembling graft-vs-host (GvH) disease.
  • (19) In the controlled wound care group, only three ulcers in three patients achieved complete healing; the remaining 24 ulcers in 20 patients failed to achieve even 50% healing in the stipulated 3-month period.
  • (20) The former Stoke City manager Pulis had reportedly been left frustrated by the club failing to push through deals for various players he targeted to strengthen the Palace squad.

Flop


Definition:

  • (v. t.) To clap or strike, as a bird its wings, a fish its tail, etc.; to flap.
  • (v. t.) To turn suddenly, as something broad and flat.
  • (v. i.) To strike about with something broad abd flat, as a fish with its tail, or a bird with its wings; to rise and fall; as, the brim of a hat flops.
  • (v. i.) To fall, sink, or throw one's self, heavily, clumsily, and unexpectedly on the ground.
  • (n.) Act of flopping.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) 3) Just as lipids do not flip-flop, proteins do not rotate across the membrane.
  • (2) And it was here, several years later, that I came looking for an answer to a question which has baffled many cynical film critics: how did a low-key prison drama, which was considered a box-office flop on its initial release, become one of the most popular movies of all time?
  • (3) The presence of the flip-flop phenomenon in an I-131 Hippuran renal study suggests the existence of some degree of collecting system obstruction that has persisted long enough to result in renal parenchymal damage.
  • (4) Peter Travers, film critic at Rolling Stone, offered a simpler explanation: "Why is The Lone Ranger such a huge flop at the box office?"
  • (5) Telomeres were generated from both arms of the substrate with equal efficiency, and contained the characteristic "flip" and "flop" sequence inversions observed in vivo.
  • (6) This value is similar to that obtained for the transbilayer "flip-flop" of phosphatidylcholine molecules in a similar system (Kornberg and McConnell, 1971).
  • (7) This suggests that generalizations on the kinetics of nonmediated flip-flop of membrane-intercalated amphiphiles may not be justified.
  • (8) Her agony and her rapture stay interior, and they flip-flop like nerves in this beautiful, grave black-and-white movie.
  • (9) The story of the transfer window is the story of a flip-flop by the English elite – the Premier League was initially the driving force behind the idea of a transfer window, but by the time it was introduced it was firmly in the "no" camp.
  • (10) He kept smiling, but he let his arm go limp, his hand flopping from the wrist in a clear signal of non-compliance.
  • (11) It is a plausible claim, judging by the cacophony of trumpets, cymbals, drums and violins erupting from classrooms, corridors and the courtyard: hundreds of children aged six to 19, some in trainers, others in flip-flops, individually and collectively making music.
  • (12) In April, Quentin Tarantino's revenge western Django Unchained was withdrawn from cinemas minutes into its first screening; it reopened a month later with three of the goriest minutes missing and flopped.
  • (13) Four models were proposed to analyze the experimental data: (A) two independent and nonequivalent subunits; (B) a single active subunit (subunits presenting absolute "half-of-the-sites reactivity"); (C) alternate functioning of the subunits (flip-flop mechanism); (D) random functioning of the subunits with half-of-the-sites reactivity.
  • (14) Pharmacokinetics of the depot antipsychotics are unclear and mainly depend on releasing from the depot site (according to a "flip-flop" model).
  • (15) Many people you talk to will label Twitter Music as a flop: its iPhone app flew high briefly in the App Store, then sank swiftly.
  • (16) The contrast with the relaxed Holland squad – spotted wandering around upmarket Sandton in flip-flops with their wives as they made their way to the final – was instructive.
  • (17) Another time I kissed this boy wearing flip-flops, and she said his toenails looked like quavers.
  • (18) We would love to continue to work with Gordon but it would be on a project-by-project basis.” Ramsay, said to be lining up a project for ITV , was among the C4 talent shoehorned into 2012’s reality flop Hotel GB, along with Gok Wan, Phil Spencer, Mary Portas (unlike Ramsay she remains on an exclusive C4 deal) and others.
  • (19) And I would have enough confidence in my argument to wait for events to vindicate it, rather than flopping around with each new set of figures.
  • (20) But Walt Disney has now warned that the film could instead go down as one of the year's biggest flops, predicting losses of almost $200m.