lazy suggests a disinclination to work or to take trouble.
take-out foods for lazy cooks
indolent suggests a love of ease and a dislike of movement or activity.
the heat made us indolent
slothful implies a temperamental inability to act promptly or speedily when action or speed is called for.
fired for being slothful about filling orders
Example Sentences
Perhaps Henry James's idea of the taste for art in England as a "tribute to propriety" holds perversely true, with the indolent taste for scandal and celebrity having taken hold as a bizarre new form of etiquette. Sebastian Smee, Prospect, July 2003At home, however, there's something indolent about listening to a record that offers no hope for the unexpected. John Milward, Rolling Stone, 11–25 July 1991Air-conditioning is for the weak and indolent. This isn't the Ritz, you know. Be thankful for a little breeze. It was luxuries like A/C that brought down the Roman Empire. Garrison Keillor, Lake Wobegon Days, (1985) 1986 She is indolent and irresponsible. an indolent boy who had to be forced to help out with the chores
Recent Examples on the WebBankers and financiers always had a somewhat dark reputation as swindlers, but technologists reframed them as indolent parasites who made nothing and preyed upon the inventions of others. Ian Bogost, The Atlantic, 4 Feb. 2022 Ruth, the eldest, is moody, beautiful, indolent, and mysterious; Carolyn, nicknamed Corky, is a square striver and a good golfer; Douglas, Connell’s alter ego, is indelible as one of the most authentic specimens of boyhood in American fiction. Gemma Sieff, Harper’s Magazine , 4 Jan. 2022 Granted, not all who have been reluctant to return to work--at least while the checks keep coming--are necessarily indolent, but many seem to be and that is a bad condition to encourage in an individual and a nation.Arkansas Online, 2 July 2021 Indeed, this was one of Alexis de Tocqueville’s many criticisms of the indolent slavers of the Old South. Cameron Hilditch, National Review, 29 May 2021 The countess also casts her indolent spell on the resolute state prosecutor Norbert von Wenk (Bernhard Goetzke), who doggedly pursues Mabuse until he is hypnotized by the master to drive a speeding death car. J. Hoberman, New York Times, 6 May 2020 Among men with an elevated PSA who are found on biopsy to have cancer, about 80 percent have an indolent form of the disease that is highly unlikely to become life-threatening.New York Times, 24 Feb. 2020 This approach results in the diagnosis of many fewer indolent cancers that would likely never threaten a man’s life, said Dr. Klotz, a professor of surgery at the University of Toronto and a mentor in the field of prostate cancer diagnosis.New York Times, 2 Mar. 2020 The disease can be indolent, which spreads slowly with few signs and symptoms, or aggressive, which spreads quickly with severe symptoms, the institute said. Madeline Holcombe, CNN, 16 Jan. 2020 See More
Word History
Etymology
Late Latin indolent-, indolens insensitive to pain, from Latin in- + dolent-, dolens, present participle of dolēre to feel pain