lax
1not strict or severe; careless or negligent: lax morals;a lax attitude toward discipline.
loose or slack; not tense, rigid, or firm: a lax rope;a lax handshake.
not rigidly exact or precise; vague: lax ideas.
open, loose, or not retentive, as diarrheal bowels.
(of a person) having the bowels unusually loose or open.
open or not compact; having a loosely cohering structure; porous: lax tissue;lax texture.
Phonetics. (of a vowel) articulated with relatively relaxed tongue muscles.: Compare tense1 (def. 4).
Origin of lax
1Other words from lax
- lax·ly, adverb
- lax·ness, noun
- o·ver·lax, adjective
- o·ver·lax·ly, adverb
- o·ver·lax·ness, noun
Words Nearby lax
Other definitions for lax (2 of 2)
lacrosse: To handle my course load, I know I have to cut back on extracurricular activities, but no way am I giving up lax.
Origin of lax
2Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use lax in a sentence
Critics say FERC’s standards to determine the merit of permits for export pipelines are especially lax, incorporating such easily met benchmarks as whether projects will generate taxes and jobs.
It’s His Land. Now a Canadian Company Gets to Take It. | by Lee van der Voo for ProPublica | October 1, 2020 | ProPublicaReported data breaches are rare, but some scribe companies have lax security, said Cliff Baker, CEO of the health care cybersecurity firm Corl Technologies.
Time-crunched doctors are relying on remote-working scribes to take notes via video call | lbelanger225 | September 30, 2020 | FortuneHahn emphasized the role of science in the development process as the agency has come under scrutiny for potentially lax standards for a vaccine.
Where the 4 major coronavirus vaccine candidates currently stand | Sy Mukherjee | September 23, 2020 | FortuneIt’s just the latest in a series of actions by the coalition that has targeted Facebook over its lax policing of its service.
Kim Kardashian, Katy Perry, and Leonardo DiCaprio plan one-day Instagram boycott. Here’s why | Danielle Abril | September 15, 2020 | FortuneWyoming has particularly lax business transparency laws, and Platinum Advertising appears to be a shell corporation.
Federal Prosecutors Have Steve Bannon’s Murky Nonprofit in Their Sights | by Yeganeh Torbati | August 24, 2020 | ProPublica
At best, his administration appeared exceptionally lax, and at worst, it willfully obstructed justice.
Conservatives have attacked the lax security under Obama, even straining to tie the threat to ISIS.
Obama, the Coffee Salute, and the Dementia on the Right | Sally Kohn | September 25, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTIn the age of the Internet and in our lax regulatory environment, there are more quacks than ever before.
The Strange, True Tale of the Old-Timey Goat Testicle-Implanting 'Governor' | Penny Lane | September 16, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThe relatively lax immigration policy of the early 20th century gave way to rabid nativism in the 1920s.
Superman Is Jewish: The Hebrew Roots of America's Greatest Superhero | Rich Goldstein | August 16, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTGeorgia is one of several states whose lax gun laws result in a continuous flow of illegal guns into New York and other cities.
Brooklyn Shooting Hits Close to Bill de Blasio’s Park Slope Home | Michael Daly | July 1, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThe country had never altogether recovered from the reaction of lax indifference into which it had fallen after the Restoration.
The English Church in the Eighteenth Century | Charles J. Abbey and John H. OvertonThere is a general idea that the medical training is lax, and the doctors, as a rule, are not highly considered.
Spanish Life in Town and Country | L. Higgin and Eugne E. StreetOf all classes it may be said that their manners are, on the whole, good, and their morals generally lax.
Spanish Life in Town and Country | L. Higgin and Eugne E. StreetSuch a division of authority makes lax expenditure and bad management.
The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. | E. Farr and E. H. NolanMr. Mitchell was nominally a Unitarian in his religious creed, but he held very lax notions of this theology, and verged to Deism.
The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. | E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
British Dictionary definitions for lax
/ (læks) /
lacking firmness; not strict
lacking precision or definition
not taut
phonetics (of a speech sound) pronounced with little muscular effort and consequently having relatively imprecise accuracy of articulation and little temporal duration. In English the vowel i in bit is lax
(of flower clusters) having loosely arranged parts
Origin of lax
1Derived forms of lax
- laxly, adverb
- laxity or laxness, noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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