ether

The substance formerly supposed to fill the upper regions of the atmosphere above the clouds, in particular as a medium breathed by deities.

On Wings the Birds through Æther glide, / And Fiſhes cut with Fins the Tide.

Of the mysterious world, that come to me From the elements of Fire and Earth and Water, And the all-nourishing Ether!

The substance formerly supposed to fill the upper regions of the atmosphere above the clouds, in particular as a medium breathed by deities.

Take a snapshot of the conflicts around the world: Sunnis vs. Shiites, Israelis vs. Palestinians, Serbs vs. Kosovars, Indians vs. Pakistanis. They seem to be driven by religious hatred. It’s enough to make you wonder if the animosity would melt away if all religions were suddenly, somehow, to vanish into the ether. But James Carse doesn’t see them as religious conflicts at all. To him, they are battles over rival belief systems, which may or may not have religious overtones.

In barely the blink of an eye, the perfectly healthy Judy entered a permanent vegetative state. […] What haunted me was the idea that one moment you’re gazing at your 2-year-old in her playroom and the next, you, the mother, have been whisked off into the ether forever.

Often as aether and more fully as luminiferous aether: The hypothetical substance permeating space, functioning as a medium for electromagnetic waves to propagate through, and which does not exert resistance to the movement of matter; its e

I ſuppose this æther pervades all groſs bodies, but yet ſo as to ſtand rarer in their pores than in free ſpaces, and ſo much the rarer, as their pores are leſs. And this I ſuppose (with others) to be the cauſe, why light incident on thoſe bodies is refracted towards the perpendicular; […] I ſuppose the rarer æther within bodies, and then denſer without them, not to be terminated in a mathematical ſuperficies, but to grow gradually into one another; […]

Having ſhewn how the Æther cauſes a great part of the Phænomena of Nature, it may be aſked, whence this general material Cauſe has its great Activity and Power? […] This Cauſe muſt be either Matter or Spirit, there being nothing in the Univerſe, which we know if, beſides theſe two. But this Cauſe cannot be Matter: for Matter is in own Nature inert, and has not any Activity in itſelf; and conſequently cannot communicate any Power to the Æther. And therefore the Cauſe, which gives the Æther its Activity and Power, muſt be Spirit. Spirit, which intercedes the Particles of Æther, and gives them a repulſive Power, and ordains and executes the Laws, by which Æther and Bodies act mutually on one another, muſt be preſent in all Parts of Space, where there is Æther.

The atmosphere or space as a medium for broadcasting radio and television signals; also, a notional space through which Internet and other digital communications take place; cyberspace.

H. P. Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness He held some friendly chat with Pabodie over the ether, and repeated his praise of the really marvelous drills that had helped him make his discovery.

Now we are liberal with our innermost secrets, spraying them into the public ether with a generosity our forebears could not have imagined. Where we once sent love letters in a sealed envelope, or stuck photographs of our children in a family album, now such private material is despatched to servers and clouds operated by people we don't know and will never meet.

A particular quality created by or surrounding an object, person, or place; an atmosphere, an aura.

The luminous æther of his life was not obſcured by any ſhade dark enough to be denominated a defect.

To viciously humiliate or insult.

The battle rapper ethered his opponent and caused him to slink away in shame.

HS Coach Gets Ethered By Girlfriend On FB, Resigns Amid Investigation [article title] […] On Monday, a woman living in Bowling Green, Ky., used her Facebook page to unleash one of the coldest, boyfriend-crushingest Dear John letters you'll ever read.

Alternative form of edder.

Ether and Ethers (rhyme to whether)—the operation of running a line of hazle or other flexible wands intertwiningly along the top of a hedge, to keep it more firmly within the hedge-stakes. "Mind you ether it right strong." To "bond" a hedge has the same meaning.

In the edition of 1760 of "The Complete Angler" there is a curious quotation from Bowlker, who was a great authority on fish-ponds, in which he recommends:— "When you intend to stick a pool with carp or tench, make a close ethering hedge across the head of the pool about a yard distance of the dam, and about three foot above the water, which is the best refuge for them I know of, and the only method to preserve pool-fish; […] "