Definition of "vapor"
vapor
noun
countable and uncountable, plural vapors
The gaseous state of a substance that is normally a solid or liquid.
Quotations
Surprisingly, this analysis revealed that acute exposure to solvent vapors at concentrations below those associated with long-term effects appears to increase the risk of a fatal automobile accident. Furthermore, this increase in risk is comparable to the risk of death from leukemia after long-term exposure to benzene, another solvent, which has the well-known property of causing this type of cancer.
2013 July-August, Philip J. Bushnell, “Solvents, Ethanol, Car Crashes & Tolerance”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name)
Something insubstantial, fleeting, or transitory; unreal fancy; vain imagination; idle talk; boasting.
Quotations
The previous question had turned the attention to life as something peculiarly frail, and as of such a nature that no calculation could be based on its permanence. This expression gives a reason for that, to wit, that it is a mere vapor.
1875, Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the General Epistles of James, Peter, John, and Jude, page 80
Here we can explain only in these broad outlines why the asking of the question of being is in itself through and through historical, and why, accordingly, our question as to whether being will remain a mere vapor for us or become the destiny of the West is anything but an exaggeration and a rhetorical figure.
1999, Martin Heidegger, An Introduction to Metaphysics, page 50
(dated) Any medicinal agent designed for administration in the form of inhaled vapour.
Quotations
Sulphurous fumes have also been recommended, as well as diffusing a variety of vapors in the apartment of the patient; on their beneficial or injurious effects we are unable to speak.
1836, Pierre Charles Alexandre Louis, Henry Ingersoll Bowditch, Charles Cowan, Pathological Researches on Phthisis, page 287
Hence the vapor, so useful in expanding the compressed tissues and enabling the air to permeate and expand the contracted parenchyma in consumption, causes a sensation of great fatigue in asthma.
1854 November, Samuel A. Cartwright, “The Case of a Lady in a sugar-house, with Aphonic, Haemorrhagic, Tubercular Phthisis in the Softening State”, in Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, volume 51, number 14, page 275
Professor Matthews has at length the pleasure, after much unaboidable delay, of respectfully announcin to the Faculty, that he is prepared to fill their prescriptions by any practicable formula, in the use of his new method of applying medicinal vapors to the lungs, air-passages, & c., by means of the Multiform Fumigator .
1861, Charles Mathews, On fumigation of the lungs, throat, &c, page 1
(archaic, in the plural) Hypochondria; melancholy; the blues; hysteria, or other nervous disorder.
Quotations
She made several gulps and controlled her breath. She released her grip on Podson and stared at him without recognition. Podson went on patting her reassuringly, relieved from administering first aid to an attack of the vapours.
1938, Norman Lindsay, Age of Consent, 1st Australian edition, Sydney, N.S.W.: Ure Smith, published 1962, page 188
(obsolete) Wind; flatulence.
Quotations
The surcharge of the stomack from a gross vapour, and from the poise of some outward weight, are alike
1605, Francis Bacon, “(please specify |book=1 or 2)”, in The Twoo Bookes of Francis Bacon. Of the Proficience and Aduancement of Learning, Diuine and Humane, London: […] [Thomas Purfoot and Thomas Creede] for Henrie Tomes, […]
verb
third-person singular simple present vapors, present participle vaporing, simple past and past participle vapored
(intransitive) To use insubstantial language; to boast or bluster.
Quotations
He felt he would start vapouring with devotion if this went on, so he bruptly took his leave with a cold expression on his face which dismayed her for she thought that it was due to distain for her artistic opinions.
1978, Lawrence Durrell, Livia (Avignon Quintet), Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 513