mirage
an optical phenomenon, especially in the desert or at sea, by which the image of some object appears displaced above, below, or to one side of its true position as a result of spatial variations of the index of refraction of air.
something illusory, without substance or reality.
Mirage, Military. any of a series of supersonic, delta-wing, multirole French fighter-bombers.
Origin of mirage
1Other words for mirage
Words Nearby mirage
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024
How to use mirage in a sentence
The moment was a mirage of the kind of glory that Wall and the Wizards wanted to achieve.
John Wall gave the Wizards their last great memory. Then it all fell apart. | Jerry Brewer | December 3, 2020 | Washington PostVirtual reality innovator Jaron Lanier thinks the early dream of free information was a mirage and that making everything free, in exchange for advertising, would lead to a manipulative society.
This may surprise some people who assume all of the gains are a mirage.
Whoever wins the election will face one of the most challenging market environments to start a presidential term in history | Ben Carlson | November 3, 2020 | FortuneMeanwhile, a “red mirage” could happen elsewhere on the map, specifically those states like Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan that are processing and counting ballots much later.
There are landmarks and there are mirages, and the mirages need maps most of all.
Fast-Food Buffets Are a Thing of the Past. Some Doubt They Ever Even Existed. | MM Carrigan | September 29, 2020 | Eater
I found it beckoning, almost like a mirage, in the form of the Vino Volo wine bar.
In Turkey the Qataris flew French mirage jets, not exactly cutting edge equipment but still formidable.
Those goals are like a desert mirage, and the sooner everyone realizes it the better the medium will be.
Gamers Want to Game: Video Games Aren't Blockbuster Movies | Alec Kubas-Meyer | August 28, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThe ER—at least on the surface—is a mirage to many of these inconveniences.
‘Code Black’: An M.D. on How to Fix Our Emergency Room Crisis | Ryan McGarry | June 20, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThis week they got Mike Tyson and Razor Ruddock over at the mirage, where the fake volcano blows up every twenty minutes.
The Stacks: Harold Conrad Was Many Things, But He Was Never, Ever Dull | Mark Jacobson | March 8, 2014 | THE DAILY BEASTThe vision of the universal happiness seen by the economists has proved a mirage.
The Unsolved Riddle of Social Justice | Stephen LeacockSee that white blot, far out to the east, rising in the evening mirage,—it must be Fort Riley!
A Fortune Hunter; Or, The Old Stone Corral | John Dunloe CarteretHe longed for and sought his desires always, to see them vanish like a mirage just as they seemed within his grasp.
The Hidden Places | Bertrand W. Sinclairmirage or no mirage, you must not too implicitly trust your eyes in the fantastic atmosphere of the high plains.
The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce | Ambrose BierceIt is apart from my purpose to explain the mirage scientifically, and not altogether in my power.
The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce | Ambrose Bierce
British Dictionary definitions for mirage
/ (mɪˈrɑːʒ) /
an image of a distant object or sheet of water, often inverted or distorted, caused by atmospheric refraction by hot air
something illusory
Origin of mirage
1Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Scientific definitions for mirage
[ mĭ-räzh′ ]
An image formed under certain atmospheric conditions, in which objects appear to be reflected or displaced or in which nonexistent objects seem to appear. For example, the difference in the index of refraction between a low layer of very hot air and a higher level of cold air can cause light rays, travelling down from an object (such as the sky or a cloud) and passing through ever warmer air, to be refracted back up again. An observer viewing these light rays perceives them coming up off the ground, and thus sees the inverted image of the object, which appears lower than the object really is. In this way the sky itself can be reflected, resulting in the mirage of a distant lake.
The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
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