pla|ce|bo

pla|ce|bo
pla|ce|bo «pluh SEE boh», noun, plural -bos or -boes.
1. a pill, preparation, or treatment given to a person as medicine, but actually containing no active ingredients. Placebos are sometimes given for psychological effect, especially to satisfy or please a patient who actually needs no additional medicine. They are also used as controls in testing the effectiveness of new medicines. »

The bottle, as the doctor had reason to know, contained a placebo—sugar pills (Time).

2. Figurative. a thing said merely to flatter, please, or mollify: »

So arbitrary a substance seems more a placebo to quiet the disturbed mind than a valid explanation of a physical phenomenon (John R. Pierce).

3. the vespers of the office for the dead in the Roman Catholic Church, from the beginning of the opening antiphon with the word placebo (In the Bible, Psalms 114:9 of the Vulgate; Psalms 116:9 of the Authorized Version).
╂[< Latin placēbō I shall please]

Useful english dictionary. 2012.

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