defect

Pluraldefects

Formsdefects, defecting, defected

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A fault or malfunction in something, especially one that affects how well it works.

   A manufacturing defect caused the brakes to fail.

   Inspectors flagged several defects in the bridge supports.

   Similarfault, flaw, imperfection, malfunction

   Note

   The Latin behind it is defectus, "a failure, lack", from deficere, built from de- and facere, "to do". At root, a defect is something undone. The noun takes in for physical things (a defect in timber, in the eye) and of for faculties and qualities (a defect of memory or judgment). Macaulay's "personal defects" (1856) uses the plural for flaws of body or character.

2. 2
   verbintransitive

   To abandon a group such as a political party or military force, switching one's loyalty to the opposing side.

   Two senior officials defected to the opposition during the campaign.

   Soldiers who defect risk severe punishment if they are caught.

   Similardesert, switch

   Note

   Grammatically the verb stands alone. It is intransitive, so a person defects but never defects something. The side abandoned follows from, and the side joined follows to: members defect from their party, officials defect to the opposition. Sarah Lyall's 2013 report shows the bare form in Nigel Farage's invitation to "unhappy Tories to defect."

3. 3
   verbintransitive

   To flee one's own country and seek asylum in another, usually to escape danger or persecution.

   The diplomat defected and requested asylum at a foreign embassy.

   Several athletes chose to defect while competing overseas.

   Similarflee, escape

   Note

   In this legal sense, defecting can be a formal act with paperwork attached. Choe Sang-Hun's "A North Korean Defector's Regret" in The New York Times (2015) describes a woman submitting a handwritten statement agreeing to defect, a condition for North Korean refugees to enter the South. The person who does this is a defector, the noun the headline itself uses.

4. 4
   verbintransitive

   To desert one's own army and flee from combat without permission.

   Hundreds of troops defected during the long winter siege.

   Men who defect in wartime are often hunted down by their own side.

   Similardesert

   Note

   A soldier's word for walking away from the fight. In this military use the soldier simply leaves combat and need not join anyone. Keep it apart from joining the enemy army, where the soldier crosses over and fights for the other side. Context usually settles which is meant, and adding "to the enemy" makes the crossing explicit.

5. 5
   verbintransitive

   To leave one's own side and take up arms with the enemy's army.

   A whole regiment defected and took up arms with the invaders.

   Spies who defect to the enemy bring valuable intelligence with them.

   Similardesert

6. 6
   nouncountable

   The quantity or amount by which something falls short of a required or expected total.

   Auditors calculated the defect between projected and actual revenue.

   A defect in the harvest left the village short of grain for the winter.

   Similarshortfall, deficit, shortage, deficiency

   Oppositesurplus, excess

   Note

   Here the word measures a gap rather than naming a flaw, which keeps it close to the Latin sense of "lack" behind the "fault" meaning. Its natural verb is supply. Lydia Sigourney's Sketch of Connecticut (1824) praises the application with which people "supplied the defects of early culture", meaning they filled what was missing rather than repairing what was broken.

7. 7
   nouncountable

   The part by which a figure or quantity is deficient or falls short of a reference value.

   The angular defect at each vertex measures how far the surrounding angles fall short of a full turn.

   Summing the defects across all vertices of a convex polyhedron always totals 720 degrees.

   Note

   Mathematicians treat the shortfall as a number to compute. The best-known case is the angular defect of a vertex: the amount by which the face angles meeting there fall short of a full turn. Unlike the everyday "flaw" sense, nothing is wrong here. The defect is a measured difference from a reference value, and it can be added up across a whole figure.

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