retard

A case in point is a bill on New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s desk that would retard artificial intelligence in the name of protecting public safety.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 11, 2025

The giant trees resist burning thanks to the bark, up to about 30 centimeters thick at the base, which contains tannic acids that retard flames.

From Science Magazine ● Dec. 1, 2023

"Going forward, we'll be able to do tests on mice to see if new molecules that stabilise mitochondrial and autophagic function can retard the disease."

From Science Daily ● Nov. 1, 2023

“Although you may retard an ignition or a fire spread for this season, what you’ve done is grown a lot more biomass to burn in the next year,” he said.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 3, 2023

To the ANC, the act was a deeply sinister measure designed to retard the progress of African culture as a whole and, if enacted, permanently set back the freedom struggle of the African people.

From "Long Walk to Freedom" by Nelson Mandela

If the levels of solutes increase beyond a certain range, a hormone is released that retards water loss through the kidney and dilutes the blood to safer levels.

From Textbooks ● Jun. 9, 2022

Prior Vital Dufour, who was ordained Cardinal of the Catholic church by Pope Clement in 1313, once listed 40 of the virtues of Armagnac including: "It renders man joyous, preserves youth and retards senility."

From BBC ● May 28, 2022

Earlier, Holder posted a tweet that simply stated the law regarding the fines and imprisonment of up to six months that anyone who “willfully obstructs or retards the passage of the mail” can face.

From Slate ● Aug. 15, 2020

We found out it preserves the cells and retards the damage.

From New York Times ● Sep. 22, 2012

A substance which prevents or retards putrefaction, or destroys, or protects from, putrefactive organisms; as, salt, carbolic acid, alcohol, cinchona.

From Webster's Unabridged Dictionary by Webster, Noah

It retarded the progress after the Civil War by invalidating the civil rights acts and its invalidation of parts of the Voting Rights Act was fairly typical.

From Washington Post ● Aug. 16, 2022

Based on some of the results, the team thinks microbes retarded the growth of inbreds, rather than giving the hybrids a special boost.

From Science Magazine ● Jul. 29, 2021

Supreme Court ruled that states may not execute “mentally retarded offenders.”

From Slate ● May 22, 2020

Some users took note of Rosa’s Law, signed by President Barack Obama in 2010, which replaced the phrase “mentally retarded individual” in federal statues with “individual with an intellectual disability.”

From New York Times ● Sep. 8, 2019

But we already saw in Chapter 10 that the north—south axes and ecological barriers within Africa and the Americas retarded the diffusion of crops and domestic animals.

From "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" by Jared M. Diamond

Their opposition to transportation projects and other infrastructure, though supposedly grounded in Jeffersonian principle, was a roundabout way of retarding industrial development and ensuring that slavery did not become an economic anachronism.

From Salon ● Jul. 26, 2025

That drove prices in Europe and Asia to all-time highs earlier this year, fanning inflationary pressure and retarding efforts by countries to switch to gas from coal to reduce pollution and carbon emissions.

From Reuters ● May 27, 2022

“The effects of withholding, delaying or retarding Golden Rice development through overcautious regulation has imposed unconscionable costs in terms of years of sight and lives lost,” Regis concludes.

From The Guardian ● Oct. 26, 2019

Only the tides exert significant retarding torques on Earth, and so it will continue to spin, although ever more slowly, for many billions of years.

From Textbooks ● Aug. 12, 2015

Some insecticides affect sensitive plants such as beans, wheat, barley, or rye, retarding root development or depressing growth of seedlings.

From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson