Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Free of bias and self-interest; impartial.
- adjective Not interested; indifferent.
- adjective Having lost interest.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Free from self-interest; unbiased by personal interest or private advantage; acting from unselfish motives.
- Not influenced or dictated by private advantage: as, a disinterested decision.
- Synonyms Unbiased, impartial, unbought, incorruptible, unselfish, dispassionate, magnanimous. Disinterested and uninterested are sometimes confounded in speech, though rarely in writing. A disinterested person takes part in or concerns himself about the affairs of others without regard to sell-interest, or to any personal benefit to be gained by his action; an uninterested one takes no interest in or is indifferent to the matter under consideration: as, a disinterested witness; an uninterested spectator.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Not influenced by regard to personal interest or advantage; free from selfish motive; having no relation of interest or feeling; not biased or prejudiced.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective unaffected by self-interest
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word disinterested.
Examples
-
He had never till now called upon me to make the shadow of a return for all his disinterested love -- _disinterested_, ah, was it so?
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 53, No. 327, January, 1843 Various
-
The first of these defines aesthetic appreciation as _disinterested interest, _ gratuitously identifying self-interest with the practical pursuit of advantages we have not yet got; and overlooking the fact that such appreciation implies enjoyment and is so far the very reverse of disinterested.
The Beautiful An Introduction to Psychological Aesthetics Vernon Lee 1895
-
By the term disinterested I mean detached from ulterior objects.
The Unity of Civilization Various
-
Boyd had looked away, his expression disinterested.
The Will Reed Arvin 2000
-
Boyd had looked away, his expression disinterested.
The Will Reed Arvin 2000
-
Moreover, Mr Webb's point about what he calls disinterested management -- that is to say, the management of banks by officers whose remuneration bears no relation to the profit made on each piece of business transacted -- is one of the matters in which English banking seems likely at least to be modified.
War-Time Financial Problems Hartley Withers 1908
-
-- Hence the value we attach, in the exercise of all the affections, to what we call disinterested conduct, -- to him who does good by stealth, or who performs acts of exalted justice, generosity, or forbearance, under circumstances which exclude every idea of a selfish motive, -- or when self-interest and personal feeling are strongly and obviously opposed to them.
The Philosophy of the Moral Feelings John Abercrombie 1812
-
Congress has shown itself to be serially disinterested is such matters.
-
What we call disinterested, however, super-cats might call aimless.
This Simian World Clarence Day 1904
-
What we call disinterested, however, super-cats might call aimless.
This Simian World Clarence Day 1904
oroboros commented on the word disinterested
Incorrectly used as uninterested.
March 29, 2008
atapizdun commented on the word disinterested
it's not incorrect to use it in the sense of uninterested. It's just not a preferred meaning nowadays...
check here for explanation:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disinterested
November 7, 2011
mohitanand commented on the word disinterested
unbiased; neutral
The potential juror knew the defendant, and therefore could not serve on the jury, which must consist only of disinterested members.
October 11, 2016