Goldbergian
Americanadjective
Etymology
Origin of Goldbergian
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
They’re created with complex engineering, and they’re populated by heroes—whether toys, humans, monsters, or feelings—who are inventors, Rube Goldbergian geniuses, or, as in “Inside Out,” diligent functions of the human brain.
From The New Yorker ● Jul. 9, 2015
One of the film’s dystopian curiosities, the Billows Feeding Machine, invented by Mr. J. Widdecombe Billows, has a distinctly Rube Goldbergian quality to it — this is likely no coincidence, as Goldberg and Chaplin were friends.
From The Verge ● Apr. 22, 2015
What they came up with was a Rube Goldbergian system that strips out personally identifiable information from the databases at Facebook, Datalogix, and the major retailers while still matching people and their purchases.
From Slate ● Mar. 20, 2013
During the 2011 Venice Biennale, he organized 40 children to create a Goldbergian plant-watering device in the shade of the Greenhouse at the Venice Giardini.
From New York Times ● Jan. 6, 2012
The Bijou offered entertainment of the cigar-box tramp variety, interspersed with trick bicyclists, soubrettes in slightly soiled pink, trained seals, and Family Fours with lumpy legs who tossed each other about and struck Goldbergian attitudes.
From Cheerful—By Request by Edna Ferber
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
