Malevolent
adjective
Wishing to do evil or harm to others.
He had a malevolent desire to cause harm
Often appears as...
- malevolent force
- malevolent spirit
Usage tips
Disapproving
adjective
Displaying a desire to cause harm or suffering; enjoying others' suffering.
A malevolent grin spread across his face as he watched her struggle.
Often appears as...
- malevolent energies
- malevolent mind
Usage tips
Formal, Disapproving
Literary
adjective
Wishing to do evil or harm to others.
He had a malevolent desire to cause harm
Often appears as...
- malevolent force
- malevolent spirit
Usage tips
Disapproving
adjective
Displaying a desire to cause harm or suffering; enjoying others' suffering.
A malevolent grin spread across his face as he watched her struggle.
Often appears as...
- malevolent energies
- malevolent mind
Usage tips
Formal, Disapproving
Literary
Definition 1 of 2
Pro Tip 1/3Negative Tone
Malevolent has a strong negative tone, signaling harmful intentions or evil.
The malevolent glint in his eyes foretold trouble.
Pro Tip 2/3Strong Emotion
Use 'malevolent' to describe deep and intense ill will or maliciousness.
The dictator's malevolent rule caused the people great suffering.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Petty
'Malevolent' is more serious than simply being unkind or petty.
The malevolent witch cursed the entire kingdom.
Pro Tip 1/3Negative Tone
Malevolent has a strong negative tone, signaling harmful intentions or evil.
The malevolent glint in his eyes foretold trouble.
Pro Tip 2/3Strong Emotion
Use 'malevolent' to describe deep and intense ill will or maliciousness.
The dictator's malevolent rule caused the people great suffering.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Petty
'Malevolent' is more serious than simply being unkind or petty.
The malevolent witch cursed the entire kingdom.
Pro Tip 1/3Negative Tone
Malevolent has a strong negative tone, signaling harmful intentions or evil.
The malevolent glint in his eyes foretold trouble.
Pro Tip 2/3Strong Emotion
Use 'malevolent' to describe deep and intense ill will or maliciousness.
The dictator's malevolent rule caused the people great suffering.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Petty
'Malevolent' is more serious than simply being unkind or petty.
The malevolent witch cursed the entire kingdom.
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Video examples
Safari Live - Day 186 PIPE...
did have a brief view of Tandy just a little bit further east of where we are now so basically to the front to the car where she walked off and then she came and peered around a bush from malevolently and then laid down but she's in the long grass and I said I said we would like to
Video examples
What will humans look...
astronomer royal of Great Britain. And one of his favorite sayings is the universe is 100 percent malevolent. So what does that mean? It means if you take any one of your bodies at random, drop it anywhere in the universe, drop it in space, you die. Drop it on the Sun, you die.
Video examples
Why does the universe...
The deity isn't all-good and all-powerful. It might be instead 100 percent malevolent but only 80 percent effective, which pretty much describes the world we see around us, I think. So I would like to propose that the resolution to the mystery of existence
Video examples
Skulls Found in "Evil"...
people don't let their children play near there and there's a lot of beliefs around this cenote having sort of evil forces or malevolent forces associated with it cenotes are sinkholes then they're important because the main access to the
Video examples
The mystery of chronic...
nervous system get this so wrong how can the nervous system misinterpret an innocent sensation like the touch of a hand and turn it into the malevolent sensation of the touch of the flame well you probably imagine that the nervous
Video examples
How fire shapes...
a malevolent presence in a built landscape what's missing in all of these what's missing is some image or narrative of ourselves in that scene as constructive agents using fire to make a more habitable world so let's go back to
Video examples
Can we build AI without...
Now, this is often caricatured, as I have here, as a fear that armies of malicious robots will attack us. But that isn't the most likely scenario. It's not that our machines will become spontaneously malevolent.
Video examples
On being wrong PIPE Kathryn...
and are actually pretty smart, then we move on to a third they know the truth, and they are deliberately distorting it for their own malevolent purposes. So this is a catastrophe.
Video examples
On being wrong - Kathryn...
a third assumption they know the truth and they are deliberately distorting it for their own malevolent purposes so this is a catastrophe this attachment to our own rightness
Video examples
How to get a word added...
“Dictionary:” noun, “a malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of a language and making it hard and inelastic.”
Video examples
Safari Live - Day 186 PIPE...
did have a brief view of Tandy just a little bit further east of where we are now so basically to the front to the car where she walked off and then she came and peered around a bush from malevolently and then laid down but she's in the long grass and I said I said we would like to
Video examples
What will humans look...
astronomer royal of Great Britain. And one of his favorite sayings is the universe is 100 percent malevolent. So what does that mean? It means if you take any one of your bodies at random, drop it anywhere in the universe, drop it in space, you die. Drop it on the Sun, you die.
Video examples
Why does the universe...
The deity isn't all-good and all-powerful. It might be instead 100 percent malevolent but only 80 percent effective, which pretty much describes the world we see around us, I think. So I would like to propose that the resolution to the mystery of existence
Video examples
Skulls Found in "Evil"...
people don't let their children play near there and there's a lot of beliefs around this cenote having sort of evil forces or malevolent forces associated with it cenotes are sinkholes then they're important because the main access to the
Video examples
The mystery of chronic...
nervous system get this so wrong how can the nervous system misinterpret an innocent sensation like the touch of a hand and turn it into the malevolent sensation of the touch of the flame well you probably imagine that the nervous
Video examples
How fire shapes...
a malevolent presence in a built landscape what's missing in all of these what's missing is some image or narrative of ourselves in that scene as constructive agents using fire to make a more habitable world so let's go back to
Video examples
Can we build AI without...
Now, this is often caricatured, as I have here, as a fear that armies of malicious robots will attack us. But that isn't the most likely scenario. It's not that our machines will become spontaneously malevolent.
Video examples
On being wrong PIPE Kathryn...
and are actually pretty smart, then we move on to a third they know the truth, and they are deliberately distorting it for their own malevolent purposes. So this is a catastrophe.
Video examples
On being wrong - Kathryn...
a third assumption they know the truth and they are deliberately distorting it for their own malevolent purposes so this is a catastrophe this attachment to our own rightness
Video examples
How to get a word added...
“Dictionary:” noun, “a malevolent literary device for cramping the growth of a language and making it hard and inelastic.”
Example 1 of 10
Quote examples
Michael Specter
American Journalist
The most blatant forms of denialism are rarely malevolent; they combine decency, a fear of change, and the misguided desire to do good - for our health, our families, and the world. That is why so many physicians dismiss the idea that a patient's race can, and often should, be used as a tool for better diagnoses and treatment.
Quote examples
Jean Kennedy Smith
American Diplomat
As I've grown older, I have begun to marvel... at how much of my life I have spent among ghosts. These are no malevolent presences... Rather, they are such restless spirits as only the strange twentieth-century cocktail of celebrity, technology and collective memory could produce.
Quote examples
Willa Cather
American Author
When kindness has left people, even for a few moments, we become afraid of them as if their reason had left them. When it has left a place where we have always found it, it is like shipwreck; we drop from security into something malevolent and bottomless.
Quote examples
Michael Shannon
American Actor
If you don't believe there's some organising principle, or somebody up in the sky pulling the strings, then it can be very stressful. And nature itself is very arbitrary - it's not malevolent or benevolent; it doesn't even know we're here.
Quote examples
Saul Bass
American Designer
In 'Age of Innocence,' the opening flowers, that's a metaphor for the film, the Victorian veneer with the malevolence beneath it. We attempted to show that with flowers that start as sweet and then slowly become malevolent.
Quote examples
Michael Korda
English Novelist
In Eastern Europe, the past is not only always hovering over the present, it is not even passed. It waits, like some malevolent caged beast, ready at any moment to escape and bring back all the horrors.
Quote examples
Fethullah Gulen
Turkish Activist
My core belief is to seek peace in the world, helping people eliminate certain malevolent attitudes through education as much as possible.
Quote examples
Mason Cooley
American Writer
Seeing my malevolent face in the mirror, my benevolent soul shrinks back.
Quote examples
Matt Smith
English Actor
Spiders - the way they move freaks me out. It's so malevolent.
Quote examples
Plautus
Roman Playwright
For nobody is curious, who isn't malevolent.
Quote examples
Michael Specter
American Journalist
The most blatant forms of denialism are rarely malevolent; they combine decency, a fear of change, and the misguided desire to do good - for our health, our families, and the world. That is why so many physicians dismiss the idea that a patient's race can, and often should, be used as a tool for better diagnoses and treatment.
Quote examples
Jean Kennedy Smith
American Diplomat
As I've grown older, I have begun to marvel... at how much of my life I have spent among ghosts. These are no malevolent presences... Rather, they are such restless spirits as only the strange twentieth-century cocktail of celebrity, technology and collective memory could produce.
Quote examples
Willa Cather
American Author
When kindness has left people, even for a few moments, we become afraid of them as if their reason had left them. When it has left a place where we have always found it, it is like shipwreck; we drop from security into something malevolent and bottomless.
Quote examples
Michael Shannon
American Actor
If you don't believe there's some organising principle, or somebody up in the sky pulling the strings, then it can be very stressful. And nature itself is very arbitrary - it's not malevolent or benevolent; it doesn't even know we're here.
Quote examples
Saul Bass
American Designer
In 'Age of Innocence,' the opening flowers, that's a metaphor for the film, the Victorian veneer with the malevolence beneath it. We attempted to show that with flowers that start as sweet and then slowly become malevolent.
Quote examples
Michael Korda
English Novelist
In Eastern Europe, the past is not only always hovering over the present, it is not even passed. It waits, like some malevolent caged beast, ready at any moment to escape and bring back all the horrors.
Quote examples
Fethullah Gulen
Turkish Activist
My core belief is to seek peace in the world, helping people eliminate certain malevolent attitudes through education as much as possible.
Quote examples
Mason Cooley
American Writer
Seeing my malevolent face in the mirror, my benevolent soul shrinks back.
Quote examples
Matt Smith
English Actor
Spiders - the way they move freaks me out. It's so malevolent.
Quote examples
Plautus
Roman Playwright
For nobody is curious, who isn't malevolent.
Example 1 of 10
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