In a recording of a conversation between officers working on the case, a detective with the Criminal Intelligence Unit acknowledged that the evidence against Brandenburg appeared insubstantial.
Its starchitect, Renzo Piano, has spoken of how, when completed, the 87-storey building – the European Union's highest – will appear altogether insubstantial, tapering away into expressive angles of glazing within which the cityscape will be reflected.
In his tome, a definitive work on depression, Andrew Solomon quoted Robert Post of the NIMH, whose words still ring true: "People worry about side effects from staying on medication for a lifetime, but the side effects of doing that appear to be insubstantial, very insubstantial compared to the lethality of undertreated depression".
Once there, he starts having a crisis of confidence: "As his surroundings had grown more primitive and elemental, so, it seemed, whatever strength, capability and powers he possessed appeared more insubstantial and weak.
In their big reflective jackets, the policemen appear crumpled and insubstantial.
The law grants the Justice Department little leeway in deciding whether to start an initial review in a case involving a Cabinet official because its provisions force the Justice Department to open an inquiry anytime there is potential criminal conduct, even if the grounds appear to be insubstantial.
The sums involved make Russian weightlifters look insubstantial.
The milky mid-December light streaming into the apartment made them seem insubstantial.
Though it won't plunge the people of the world into a solipsistic abyss, it is a development like that of the "internet of things" – something which may appear superficially modish and insubstantial, a froth of gadgets and jargon – but whose possibilities to transform the social world are at least as profound as the internet wave of the last quarter century.
The freer the self, the more insubstantial nature will appear to it, and the greater the possibility of rationalizing it through external means.
Ironically, for many Japanese the thin, insubstantial reality of animated film may well appear more alive more animated, literally than the flesh-and-blood reality of their own live-action films.
