provoke

How to use provoke in a sentence. Example sentences and definitions for provoke.

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Editorial note

I provoke them playfully and they understand that it's just the way I am.

Examples18

Definitions4

Parts of speech1

Quick take

call forth (emotions, feelings, and responses); "arouse pity"; "raise a smile"; "evoke sympathy"

Meaning at a glance

The clearest senses and uses of provoke gathered in one view.

verb

call forth (emotions, feelings, and responses); "arouse pity"; "raise a smile"; "evoke sympathy"

verb

evoke or provoke to appear or occur; "Her behavior provoked a quarrel between the couple"

verb

provide the needed stimulus for

Definitions

Core meanings and parts of speech for provoke.

verb

call forth (emotions, feelings, and responses); "arouse pity"; "raise a smile"; "evoke sympathy"

See also: arouse, elicit, enkindle, kindle, evoke, fire, raise

verb

evoke or provoke to appear or occur; "Her behavior provoked a quarrel between the couple"

verb

provide the needed stimulus for

verb

annoy continually or chronically; "He is known to harry his staff when he is overworked"; "This man harasses his female co-workers"

Example sentences

I provoke them playfully and they understand that it's just the way I am.

If you have no other way of fighting what you know is wrong, you have to provoke a response.

A wall of water could provoke some quite irrational reactions.

So you provoke them into caring?\nIt's like being a casino that steals from your customers.

They wanted trade, and it didn't take a religious schism to provoke that.

1. You need some amount of virus particles to provoke the immune reaction, call it 1 million.

There is room for debate when people are doing these things specifically to provoke debate, as one finds in art and drama.

"I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question.

"To which he replied:"I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question.

Dismissive sneers at the opposition aren't an attempt to provoke or engage debate.

Michael Hayden is being provocative -- attempting to provoke debate.

It's also something more tangible for non-geeks than other revelations so more likely to provoke a public reaction.

The troll can then take the moral highground and pretend to be perplexed at these harsh responses, which of courses only provokes even more enraged responses.

To see Ban Ki-moon say when some people use this freedom of expression to provoke or humiliate some others values and beliefs, then this cannot be protected.?

Only in retrospect and only after they provoke major changes in the society does the society recognize them as some kind of heroes.

I think it is entirely possible Bitcoin will provoke the mother-of-all battles for control over communication networks and how people use them.

There is absolutely no question about these tracking practices being perceived as ethically unacceptable in many countries, so why provoke both negative publicity and legislation that is likely to handicap less intrusive solutions as well?

I was telling all this to my cube neighbor Michael Riley, not knowing who he was, he says with a twinkle in his eye "Yeah, that was us".The most remarkable thing about these experiments that I learned from him was that the professor would provoke an illusion on the students on the first day of class.