non-happeningn.
/nɒnˈhap(ə)nɪŋ/, /nɒnˈhapn̩ɪŋ/, U.S. /nɑnˈhæp(ə)nɪŋ/ 1. Non-occurrence, esp. of an event.
ΚΠ
1850 Edinb. Rev. July 4 The non-happening of an event is itself an event.
1883 Mind 8 43 The happening of an event, the truth of an assertion, stand on one side of the opposition intended, as contrasted with..the non-happening of an event, the untruth of an assertion.
1892 W. James Coll. Ess. & Rev. (1920) 319 Our conscious states are temporal events,..the conditions of whose happening or non-happening from one moment to another, lie certainly in large part in the physical world.
1959 S. Sambursky Physics of Stoics 136 These things which are the causes for the opposite things to happen according to fate are also the causes for the non-happening of the things themselves.
1979 P.N. Rev. 9 3/1 Nothing at all ‘Happened’—enough in this Non-happening to cap What Scripture says of the Fall.
2002 Asia Afr. Intelligence Wire (Business Line) (Nexis) 8 Apr. The performance of the wagering agreement must depend upon the happening or non-happening of an uncertain event.
2. A non-event.
ΘΚΠ
the world > existence and causation > occurrence > [noun] > uneventfulness or failure to happen
failure1643
eventlessness1852
uneventfulness1878
non-event1936
non-happening1968
1968 Gainesville (Florida) Sun 13 Feb. The [TV] medium's extraordinary ability to suggest that a true happening resides in a non-happening.
1995 Yale French Stud. No. 88. 137 It would by definition be a non-happening, a non-event.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
<
n.1850