vacuous

[vak-yoo-uhs]

adjective

1. without contents; empty.

   the vacuous air.

2. lacking in ideas or intelligence.

   a vacuous mind.

3. expressing or characterized by a lack of ideas or intelligence; inane; stupid.

   a vacuous book.

4. purposeless; idle.

   a vacuous way of life.

vacuous

/ ˈvækjʊəs /

adjective

1. containing nothing; empty

2. bereft of ideas or intelligence; mindless

3. characterized by or resulting from vacancy of mind

   a vacuous gaze

4. indulging in no useful mental or physical activity; idle

5. logic maths (of an operator or expression) having no import; idle: in (x) (John is tall) the quantifier (x) is vacuous

Other Word Forms

• vacuously adverb
• vacuousness noun
• nonvacuous adjective
• nonvacuously adverb
• nonvacuousness noun
• unvacuous adjective
• unvacuously adverb
• unvacuousness noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of vacuous¹

1645–55; from Latin vacuus “empty”; -ous

Word History and Origins

Origin of vacuous¹

C17: from Latin vacuus empty, from vacāre to be empty

Example Sentences

Vice President JD Vance, when asked the same question, gave an equally vacuous answer: “The legal authority is there are people who are bringing — literal terrorists, who are bringing deadly drugs into our country.”

From Salon

It’s vacuous to say we’re in a historic political crisis, but that somehow the voters bear no moral responsibility.

From Salon

As for the music itself, while it was enough to convince some fans, the lack of actual human creative input made it sound "vacuous and pristine", she says.

From BBC

For Lamar, the decadelong rap battle stems from his lifelong disdain for gangster cosplay and the vacuous monetizing of Black culture.

From Los Angeles Times

The show was looking for his female counterpart, someone they originally envisioned as “a yummy mummy cupcake blogger who’s vacuous and drives a Range Rover,” Brooker says.

From Los Angeles Times