blindness

[blahynd-nis]

noun

1. the inability to see; the condition of having severely impaired or absolutely no sense of sight.

   Patients are first asked if their blindness is congenital or the result of injury or disease.

2. an unwillingness or inability to perceive or understand; lack of judgment; ignorance.

   Your blindness to this behavior has allowed his anxiety to worsen.

blindness

1. A lack or impairment of vision in which maximal visual acuity after correction by refractive lenses is one-tenth normal vision or less in the better eye. Blindness can be genetic but is usually acquired as a result of injury, cataracts, or diseases such as glaucoma or diabetes. In Asia and Africa, trachoma is a common infectious cause of blindness.

Word History and Origins

Origin of blindness¹

First recorded before 1000; blind ( def. ) + -ness ( def. )

Example Sentences

Travellers are being warned that even small amounts of methanol can cause blindness or death within 12 to 48 hours.

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Because that cowardice and blindness, that failure of imagination, are signs of impending doom.

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“It’s easy for moral certitude and blindness to be one,” Mr. Jackson writes in condemning a century of American foreign interventions, but his book itself is open to a similar critique.

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Glaucoma, a major cause of irreversible blindness in older adults, often goes undiagnosed until significant vision loss has already occurred.

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Bunger regularly sees a specialist for an eye condition and may in the future require surgery to avoid blindness.

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Related Words

• defect 
• myopia