mitigate
(verb) make less severe or harsh; “mitigating circumstances”
extenuate, palliate, mitigate
(verb) lessen or to try to lessen the seriousness or extent of; “The circumstances extenuate the crime”
Source: WordNet® 3.1
mitigate (third-person singular simple present mitigates, present participle mitigating, simple past and past participle mitigated)
(transitive) To reduce, lessen, or decrease; to make less severe or easier to bear.
(transitive) To downplay.
Particularly used as mitigate a problem or flaw. Contrast with ameliorate (“make better”).
This word is often misused to mean “operate” or “influence”. For this meaning, the correct word is militate, followed by “against” or “in favour of”. Mitigate is never followed by these expressions.
• (to reduce or lessen): alleviate, check, diminish, ease, lighten, mollify, pacify, palliate
• (to reduce or lessen): aggrandize, aggravate, exacerbate, incite, increase, intensify, irritate, worsen
• ameliorate
Source: Wiktionary
Mit"i*gate, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Mitigated; p. pr. & vb. n. Mitigating.] Etym: [L. mitigatus, p.p. of mitigare to soften, mitigate; mitis mild, soft + the root of agere to do, drive.]
1. To make less severe, intense, harsh, rigorous, painful, etc.; to soften; to meliorate; to alleviate; to diminish; to lessen; as, to mitigate heat or cold; to mitigate grief.
2. To make mild and accessible; to mollify; -- applied to persons. [Obs.] This opinion ... mitigated kings into companions. Burke.
Syn.
– To alleviate; assuage; allay. See Alleviate.
Source: Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary 1913 Edition
10 January 2025
(noun) the act of combining one thing at intervals among other things; “the interspersion of illustrations in the text”
Espresso is both a coffee beverage and a brewing method that originated in Italy. When making an espresso, a small amount of nearly boiling water under pressure forces through finely-ground coffee beans. It has more caffeine per unit volume than most coffee beverages. Its smaller serving size will take three shots to equal a mug of standard brewed coffee.
