vain

vain 1 Vain, nugatory, otiose, idle, empty, hollow are comparable when they mean devoid of worth or significance.

Something vain (see also FUTILE) is devoid of all value, either absolutely because worthless, superfluous, or unprofitable or relatively because there are other things which are of infinitely greater value, greater necessity, or greater profitableness

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vain pleasures of luxurious life, forever with yourselves at strife— Wordsworth

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unless the forces of destruction ... are brought under control, it is vain to plan for the future— Attlee

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vain pomp and glory of this world— Shak.

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Something nugatory is trifling or insignificant or, especially in legal use, inoperative

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in the decorative arts, the freedom given to the individual is rendered nugatory by the absence of cultural recognition of the innovator— Mead

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a literary work . . . likely to be despised as ephemeral and nugatory—J. W. Clark

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limiting the right to pass laws for the execution of the granted powers, to such as are indispensable, and without which the power would be nugatory— John Marshall

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the book is so one-sided that as a constructive contribution it is nugatory—Times Lit. Sup.

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Something otiose has no excuse for being or serves no purpose and is usually an encumbrance or a superfluity

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mummified customs that have long outlasted their usefulness, and otiose dogmas that have long lost their vitality— Inge

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it ought to be comparatively easy to decide . . . what kinds of criticism are useful and what are otiose—T. S. Eliot

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you were drastic .... A firm hand pruned your lines; a sharp ear tested their music. Nothing soft, otiose, irrelevant cumbered your pages— Woolf

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Something idle has no solidity, either being baseless or groundless or being incapable of having any worthwhile effects or result (idle theorizing)

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idle dreams

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there is nothing that can control speculation, and preserve legitimate theory from idle fancy, but a strict adherence to the essential principles of science— Dingle

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it is idle to illustrate further, because to those who agree with me I am uttering commonplaces and to those who disagree I am ignoring the necessary foundations of thought— Justice Holmes

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Something empty or hollow is destitute of substance or reality and is only apparently or deceivingly sound, real, worthwhile, genuine, or sincere

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empty threats

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a hollow victory

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in itself unreal, empty, of no importance, and discardable overnight— Wouk

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empty profundities to which no operational meaning can possibly be attached— Huxley

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they were married with the bright hollow panoply attending such military affairs— Styron

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Analogous words: worthless, valueless (see affirmative nouns at WORTH): ineffectual, *ineffective, inefficacious: fruitless, bootless, *futile, abortive

Contrasted words: effectual, *effective, efficacious

2 *futile, fruitless, bootless, abortive

Analogous words: *ineffective, ineffectual, inefficacious: trivial, trifling, puny, *petty, paltry: delusive, delusory, *misleading

3 proud, vainglorious (see under PRIDE n)

Analogous words: self-satisfied, self-complacent, *complacent, priggish, smug: conceited, egoistic, egotistic (see corresponding nouns at CONCEIT)

Contrasted words: *humble, meek, modest: diffident, *shy, bashful