What's the difference between potential and pusillanimity?

Potential


Definition:

  • (a.) Being potent; endowed with energy adequate to a result; efficacious; influential.
  • (a.) Existing in possibility, not in actuality.
  • (n.) Anything that may be possible; a possibility; potentially.
  • (n.) In the theory of gravitation, or of other forces acting in space, a function of the rectangular coordinates which determine the position of a point, such that its differential coefficients with respect to the coordinates are equal to the components of the force at the point considered; -- also called potential function, or force function. It is called also Newtonian potential when the force is directed to a fixed center and is inversely as the square of the distance from the center.
  • (n.) The energy of an electrical charge measured by its power to do work; hence, the degree of electrification as referred to some standard, as that of the earth; electro-motive force.

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) Fibulin is a potential mediator of interactions between adhesion receptors and the cytoskeleton.
  • (3) The Na+ ionophore, gramicidin, had a small but significant inhibitory effect on Na(+)-dependent KG uptake, demonstrating that KG uptake was not the result of an intravesicular positive Na+ diffusion potential.
  • (4) Assessment of the likelihood of replication in humans has included in vitro exposure of human cells to the potential pesticidal agent.
  • (5) The outward currents are sensitive to TEA and their reversal potentials differ.
  • (6) With NaCl as the major constituent of the bathing solution (potassium-free pipette and external solutions) the reversal potential (Er) of the noradrenaline-evoked current was about 0 mV.
  • (7) Theophylline kinetics, as an in vivo probe for the potentially toxic cytochrome P-450I pathway of drug metabolism, were studied in 11 healthy volunteers and 11 patients with calcific chronic pancreatitis at Madras, South India.
  • (8) Interleukin-4 (IL-4) is a cytokine, with potential anti-neoplastic effects.
  • (9) Another interested party, the University of Miami, had been in talks with the Beckham group over the potential for a shared stadium project.
  • (10) In the presence of insulin, a qualitatively similar pattern of increasing responses to albumin is observed; the enhancement of each response by insulin is, however, only slightly potentiated by higher albumin concentrations.
  • (11) The following is a brief review of the history, mechanism of action, and potential adverse effects of neuromuscular blockers.
  • (12) Hoursoglou thinks a shortage of skilled people with a good grounding in core subjects such as maths and science is a potential problem for all manufacturers.
  • (13) This modulation results from repetitive, alternating bursts of excitatory and inhibitory postsynaptic potentials, which are caused at least in part by synaptic feedback to the command neurons from identified classes of neurons in the feeding network.
  • (14) The results show that endolymph is extremely inhomogenous with respect to calcium potentials.
  • (15) Bradykinin also stimulated arachidonic acid release in decidual fibroblasts, an effect which was potentiated in the presence of epidermal growth factor (EGF), but which was not accompanied by an increase in PGF2 alpha production.
  • (16) As prolongation of the action potential by TEA facilitates preferentially the hormone release evoked by low (ineffective) frequencies, it is suggested that a frequency-dependent broadening of action potentials which reportedly occurs on neurosecretory neurones may play an important role in the frequency-dependent facilitation of hormone release from the rat neurohypophysis.
  • (17) This was unlike the action of the calcium channel blocker, cadmium, which reduced the calcium action potential and the a.h.p.
  • (18) An initial complex-soma inflection was observed on the rising phase of the action potential of some cells.
  • (19) The HTCA is promising as a potential tool for studying the biology of tumors.
  • (20) Moreover, in DCVC-treated cells the mitochondria could not be stained with rhodamine-123, indicating severe mitochondrial damage and loss of membrane potential.

Pusillanimity


Definition:

  • (n.) The quality of being pusillanimous; weakness of spirit; cowardliness.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) It is a pusillanimous, jargon-ridden, self-perpetuating proof of Parkinson's law .
  • (2) Is there any Eurosceptic in this pusillanimous cabinet with the guts to speak his mind and put principles and country before personal ambition?” the Mail asks.
  • (3) To be a bystander when one's discipline does offer insights and methods of value discernment is pusillanimous.
  • (4) He was the government’s top Europe adviser at David Cameron’s side throughout Britain’s EU renegotiation, where some accused him of pusillanimity in the face of Brussels intransigence .
  • (5) Result: the normally admirable Mr Grieve risked seeming a pusillanimous ministerial jobsworth unwilling to let the public learn the full truth about our foolish and meddling heir to the throne.
  • (6) But to make that a reason to abandon the policy would be pusillanimous in the extreme.
  • (7) This may be just what ministers' friends say to appease backbench plotters feeling betrayed by the apparent pusillanimity of cabinet failure to jump after Purnell.
  • (8) The Mail made clear its frustration: “Is there any Eurosceptic in this pusillanimous cabinet with the guts to speak his mind and put principles and country before personal ambition?” But while the Times called Boris Johnson “right”, the Sun is expected to take a far tougher line on a man the paper has already outed, along with Michael Gove, as being on the side of in.
  • (9) Britain and France, Europe's two military heavyweights, took the lead on the Libyan intervention in the teeth of outright opposition from Germany and pusillanimity in Washington.
  • (10) Why aren’t these faithless, pusillanimous people retaliating as they should, by surging towards Ukip with cries of revenge against all Muslims?
  • (11) For some, Wapping planted a decisive nail in the coffin of what Andrew Neil, a former Murdoch editor, has described as "all that was wrong with British industry: pusillanimous management, pig-headed unions, crazy restrictive practices, endless strikes and industrial disruption, and archaic technology".
  • (12) But only nine days into his administration, Clinton found himself at a press conference explaining “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, an awkward (and many thought pusillanimous) compromise to permit gays and lesbians to serve in the military.
  • (13) The British government – pusillanimous as ever – thinks it is too sensitive a subject for us to ask the US why it is flouting an international agreement.
  • (14) The question then is, is this pusillanimity on his part?
  • (15) The pusillanimity of the remain campaign’s failure to counter these claims was indefensible.
  • (16) Amid so many humanitarian emergencies, it would be callous of Mr Cameron to pursue this nomination and pusillanimous of the secretary general to accept it.
  • (17) Heads should roll," he wrote on his website, "Isn't it really about time we decent, nice, liberal people stopped being so pusillanimously terrified of being thought 'Islamophobic' and stood up for decent, nice, liberal values?"

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