passing — OAT

passing

adjective

1 his death was of only passing interest:

fleeting, transient, transitory, ephemeral, evanescent, brief, short-lived, short, temporary, momentary, fading, impermanent;

rare fugacious.

▷antonyms permanent, lasting.

2 the sculpture is worth more than a passing glance:

hasty, rapid, hurried, brief, quick;

cursory, superficial, casual, perfunctory, desultory, incidental, summary, glancing.

▷antonyms careful.

noun

1 the passing of time has done little to improve the situation:

passage, course, progress, advance, process, flow.

2 it was with much regret that I learned of Jack's passing | the passing of “traditional” art:

death, demise, passing away, passing on, end, expiry, loss, expiration, decease;

disappearance, vanishing, dying out;

rare quietus.

3 the passing of the government's new Heritage Bill:

enactment, passage, ratification, acceptance, approval, adoption, authorization, sanction, validation, legalization, endorsement.

□ in passing

he mentioned in passing that you had a lot of female visitors:

incidentally, by the by, by the way, as it happens, in the course of conversation, en passant, parenthetically.