do nothing meaning: definition, etymology and quotations

do-nothing

adjalso spelled do-nothing

Etymology Essentially deverbal in nature, albeit not from a unitary phrasal verb, but from the phrase do nothing, which English expresses as a verb phrase containing a complement.

Doing nothing, not taking any action.

It became clear that a chronic do-nothing approach to the problem's management would no longer suffice.
Manchester needs more railway capacity. Just how that is provided until the new platforms are built for HS2 and Northern Powerhouse Rail, I will leave for the experts, but a do-nothing approach is not going to be helpful and quite justifiably will create more arguments that the North is being ignored.2020 April 22, “Letters: Open Access: Castlefield conundrum”, in Rail, page 31:

do-nothing

noun

Etymology Essentially deverbal in nature, albeit not from a unitary phrasal verb, but from the phrase do nothing, which English expresses as a verb phrase containing a complement.

A lazy person.

Derived terms: do-nothingism, do-nothingness
Related terms: know-nothing

do nothing

verb

To not take any action; to fail to do or accomplish something.

"That colour does nothing for you" "Argh! And you do nothing but complain bout everything!"
The new zero tolerance rules did nothing to make the school safer and improve its atmosphere; in fact, these rules may have made the school less safe and less desirable instead.

1 more example

But doing nothing is not an option. Our railway has been drifting, leaderless, for a couple of years. Sunak should also ponder as he panders.2023 May 31, Nigel Harris, “GBR now! We have no Plan B”, in RAIL, number 984, page 3:

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — authors: page histories for do-nothing and do nothing.