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▪ I. degradation1|dɛgrəˈdeɪʃən|
[a. F. dégradation (14th c. in Hatzf.), ad. med.L. dēgradātiōn-em, n. of action f. dēgradāre, to degrade: see -ation.]
The action of degrading.
1. Deposition from some rank, office, or position of honour as an act of punishment; esp. the depriving of an ecclesiastic of his orders, benefices, and privileges, of a knight, military officer, etc., of his rank, of a graduate of his academical degree.
In Eccl. Law, two kinds of degradation are recognized: see quot. 1885.
a1535More Wks. 624 (R.) Vpon..hys degradacion, he kneled downe before the byshoppes chauncellour..& humbli besought him of absolucion fro the sentence of excommunicacion. 1586Exam. H. Barrowe in Harl. Misc. (Malh.) II. 35 Since his excommunication and degradation by the Romish church. 1647Clarendon Hist. Reb. i. (1843) 22/2 He saw many removes and degradations in all the other offices of which he had been possessed. 1726Ayliffe Parergon 206 Degradation is commonly used to denote a Deprivation or Removing of a Man from his Office and Benefice. 1779–81Johnson L.P., Halifax, An..active statesman..exposed to the vicissitudes of advancement and degradation. 1885Catholic Dict. 253/2 Degradation is of two kinds, verbal and real. By the first a criminous cleric is declared to be perpetually deposed from clerical orders, or from the execution thereof, so as to be deprived of all order and function..and of any benefice which he might have previously enjoyed..Real or actual degradation is that which, besides deposing a cleric from the exercise of his ministry, actually strips him of his orders, according to a prescribed ceremonial, and delivers him to the secular arm to be punished. 1898Westm. Gaz. 15 Jan. 5/1 Madame Dreyfus..sends to the Press a letter from her husband..written the day after the degradation.
2. Lowering in honour, estimation, social position, etc.; the state or condition of being so lowered.
c1752Johnson in Boswell (1887) IV. 382 note, A Table of the Spectators, Tatlers, and Guardians, distinguished by figures into six degrees of value, with notes, giving the reasons of preference or degradation. 1794S. Williams Vermont 152 This degradation of the female was carried to its greatest extreme. 1833H. Martineau Brooke Farm v. 70 They would complain of the degradation of obtaining their food by rendering service. 1878Jevons Prim. Pol. Econ. 85 Enough ought to have been saved to avoid the need of charity or the degradation of the poor-house.
3. Lowering in character or quality; the state or condition of being degraded morally or intellectually; moral debasement.
1697Locke 2nd Vind. Christ. (R.), The lowest degradation that human nature could sink to. a1716South (J.), So deplorable is the degradation of our nature. 1856Sir B. Brodie Psychol. Inq. I. iii. 77 Nothing can tend more to every kind of..degradation than the vice of gin-drinking. 1866G. Macdonald Ann. Q. Neighb. xxvii. (1878) 473 She would not submit to the degradation of marrying a man she did not love.
4. a. Reduction to an inferior type or stage of development. Also attrib.
1850H. Rogers Ess. II. iv. 169 The vocabulary would be for the most part retained, and the grammatical forms undergo degradation. 1871Tylor Prim. Cult. I. 34 The progression-theory recognizes degradation, and the degradation-theory recognizes progression, as powerful influences in the course of culture.
b. spec. Biol. Reduction of an organ or structure to a less perfect or more rudimentary condition; degeneration.
1849Balfour Manual of Bot. §649 There is thus traced a degradation, as it is called, from a flower with three stamens and three divisions of the calyx, to one with a single bract and a single stamen or carpel. 1872Mivart Elem. Anat. 39 ‘Degradation’ is a constant character of the last vertebræ in all classes of Vertebrates. Ibid. ii. 59 The maximum of degradation and abortion of the coccyx is in the Bats.
c. Structural Bot. A change in the substance of the organized structures of plants, resulting in the formation of products (degradation-products) which have no further use in the building up of new cell-walls or protoplasmic structures. In wider use in Biochem. and Chem.: a simplification of the structure of a molecule, brought about either naturally or artificially, in which it loses some constituent atoms or is broken up into a number of simpler molecules.
1875Bennett & Dyer Sachs' Bot. 628 The substances which cause lignification, suberisation, or cuticularisation are also probably the result of a partial degradation of the cellulose of the cell-walls. 1883Syd. Soc. Lex., Degradation products, a term applied to such compounds as gum in plants. 1884Bower & Scott De Bary's Phaner. 511 The transformation or degradation of the alburnum into duramen takes place in some [trees] gradually, in others suddenly. 1900Jrnl. Chem. Soc. LXXVIII. i. 650 (heading) Synthesis and degradation in the coumarone series. 1937Jrnl. Biol. Chem. CXVIII. 781 The general conception has been that the enzymatic degradation of proteins proceeds in two distinct stages; i.e., the proteinases cleave the true protein into polypeptides and..the polypeptidases and dipeptidase complete the degradation to amino acids. 1938L. Small in H. Gilman Org. Chem. II. xii. 1027 The cyanogen bromide degradation..often succeeds with compounds that resist the Hofmann degradation... Other vigorous degradations are often employed to determine the fundamental structures present. 1949Nature 15 Jan. 94/2 The identification of this degradation product affords support for the view that one point of attachment of the disulphide grouping in gliotoxin is via a carbon atom directly linked to the indole nitrogen. 1954Biochem. Jrnl. LVIII. 392/1 The terminal monoribonucleotide..was obtained by stepwise degradation of the polynucleotides listed in Table 1. 1958[see degrade v. 5 d]. 1966Morrison & Boyd Org. Chem. (ed. 2) iv. 139 We may carry out a degradation: break the molecule apart, identify the fragments, and deduce what the structure must have been. 1968Times 24 Oct. 7/8 Organic materials that accumulate in deep waters in the sea are relatively resistant to degradation by micro-organisms. 1970[see degrade v. 5 d].
d. Physics. The conversion of (energy) into a lower form, i.e. one which has a decreased capability of being transformed.
1871B. Stewart Heat §384 When mechanical energy is transmuted into heat by friction or otherwise there is always a degradation in the form of energy. 1876Tait Rec. Adv. Phys. Sc. vi. 146 A certain amount of degradation (degraded energy meaning energy less capable of being transformed than before).
e. Soil Science. (See quot. 1958.)
1927C. F. Marbut tr. Glinka's Great Soil Groups 95 Holes made by burrowing animals were found filled with a brownish mass on which one could see the evidences of the later degradation which took place under the influence of the acid forest humus. 1958Yearbk. Agric. 1957 (U.S. Dept. Agric.) 756/1 Degradation (of soils), the change of one kind of soil to a more highly leached kind, such as the change of a Chernozem to a Podzol. 1965B. T. Bunting Geogr. Soils xiii. 157 Invasions of populus on to chernozemic soils in Canada have caused degradation to gray wooded soils.
5. A lowering or reducing in strength, amount, etc.
1769Strange in Phil. Trans. LIX. 55 This plant was in the first stage of putrefaction..hence its degradation of colour. 1776Adam Smith W.N. i. v. (1869) I. 36 The degradation in the value of silver. Ibid. i. xi. I. 243 This degradation, both in the real and nominal value of wool. 1883Syd. Soc. Lex., Senile degradation, the gradual failure of the mental and bodily powers due to age. 1889J. M. Duncan Lect. Dis. Women xvi. (ed. 4) 127 Producing as its only great indication, degradation of the general health, and a hydroperitoneal collection. 1958Engineering 21 Mar. 358/1 The picture degradation normally experienced between successive generations of facsimile pictures is largely eliminated with the..machine. 1958Times Rev. Industry June 26/1 Chemical reagents employed may easily lead to the degradation of the silicon. 1959W. S. Sharps Dict. Cinemat. 89/1 Degradation, the degree to which the quality of the film image at any stage is inferior to the original scene, or to the image at some previous stage. 1966Electronics 17 Oct. 103 Indication to the aircrew of the amount of degradation of functions to allow assessment of mission capability.
6. a. Geol. The disintegration and wearing down of the surface of rocks, cliffs, strata, etc., by atmospheric and aqueous action.
1799Kirwan Geol. Ess. 327 Those of siliceous shistus are most subject to this degradation and decomposition. 1802Playfair Illustr. Hutton. Th. 156 The great degradation of mountains, involved in this hypothesis. 1853Phillips Rivers Yorksh. i. 11 The chalk..yields rather easily to degradation. 1875J. Croll Climate & T. xvii. 268 Old sea-bottoms formed out of the accumulated material derived from the degradation of primeval land-surfaces. 1898[see aggrade v.]. 1909W. M. Davis Geogr. Ess. xviii. 408 ‘Degradation’..is more properly associated with those leisurely processes..in which a graded slope is reduced to fainter and fainter declivity, although maintaining its graded condition all the while. 1922C. A. Cotton Geomorphol. N. Zealand vi. 61 When..a stream cuts downward to establish or maintain grade, it is said to degrade; and the process is termed degradation.
b. transf. Wearing down of any surface.
1849Ruskin Sev. Lamps vi. §17. 179 The materials to be employed are liable to degradation, as brick, sandstone, or soft limestone. 1861F. Nightingale Nursing 62 There is a constant degradation, as it is called, taking place from everything except polished or glazed articles.
▸ Deterioration of the quality of an environment or ecosystem, esp. involving a decrease in its biodiversity, or its capacity to support life. Cf. sense 4e.
1937Jrnl. Royal Afr. Soc. 36 22 The extra pressure upon the area, brought about by an increase in population, will result in an accelerating degradation of the forest. 1957M. Banton W. Afr. City iii. 43 The primary cause of the degradation of the Escarpment and the Nimini-Dodo-Kambui Hills regions is farming on land topographically unsuitable. 1984A. C. Duxbury & A. Duxbury Introd. World's Oceans xiv. 464 Alaskan salmon fisheries are experiencing difficulties due to the degradation of the salmon's freshwater environment. 2003Independent 27 Oct. i. 8/7 A growth in international trade and the continued degradation of the countryside could combine to make Britain even more vulnerable to alien invaders.
▪ II. degradation2|ˌdiːgrəˈdeɪʃən|
[In sense 1, a. F. dégradation (Molière, 17th c.), ad. It. digradazione, f. digradare to come down by degrees. Sense 2 may also be from It.; but cf. gradation.]
1. Painting. The gradual lowering of colour or light in a painting; esp. that which gives the effect of distance; gradation of tint; gradual toning down or shading off. ? Obs.
1706Art of Painting (1744) 33 Perspective..regulates..the degradation of colours in all places of the Picture. 1762–71H. Walpole Vertue's Anecd. Paint. (1786) II. 231 There is great truth and nature in his heads; but the carnations are too bricky, and want a degradation and variety of tints. 1817Coleridge Biog. Lit. 212 Colours..used as the means of that gentle degradation requisite in order to produce the effect of a whole. 1881C. A. Young Sun 250 Vogel's observations show a much more rapid degradation of the light.
†2. Diminution (in size or thickness) by degrees or successive steps; the part so reduced. Obs.
1730A. Gordon Maffei's Amphith. 285 The internal Degradation of the Wall. Ibid. 406 The Retiring of the Wall..proceeds by a Degradation above that Stone..and more largely in the Degradation of the second Story; so that the third is reduced to a small Thickness. Ibid. 407 There being no Marks of Vaults on the Degradation of the Wall. |