Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
adjective
- serving utilitarian purposes only; mechanical; practical: architecture that was more banausic than inspired.
adjective
- merely mechanical; materialistic; utilitarian
“merely mechanical,” coined 1845 from Greek banausikos “pertaining to mechanics,” from banausos “artisan, mere mechanical,” hence (to the Greeks) “base, ignoble;” perhaps literally “working by fire,” from baunos “furnace, forge” (but Klein dismisses this as folk etymology and calls it “of uncertain origin”).
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