degeneration

From French dégénération, from Latin degeneratio.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪˌdʒɛnəˈɹeɪʃən/
• Rhymes: -eɪʃən
• Hyphenation: de‧gen‧er‧ation

degeneration (usually uncountable, plural degenerations)

1. (uncountable) The process or state of growing worse, or the state of having become worse.
   • 1913, B. H. Carrol, An Interpretation of the English Bible:

     The modern cry of "more liberty and less creed" is a degeneration from a vertebrate to a jellyfish.

2. (uncountable) That condition of a tissue or an organ in which its vitality has become either diminished or perverted; a substitution of a lower for a higher form of structure.

   fatty degeneration of the liver

3. (uncountable) Gradual deterioration, from natural causes, of any class of animals or plants or any particular organ or organs; hereditary degradation of type.
4. (countable) A thing that has degenerated.
   • Sir Thomas Browne

     cockle, aracus, […] and other degenerations

• (process or state of growing worse): decline, degradation, debasement, degeneracy, deterioration
• (gaming slang): nerf

• degenerate