The phrase "define away" is correct and can be used in written English.
It means to explain or justify something in a way that makes it less significant or troublesome. Example: The politician tried to define away the controversy surrounding her campaign contributions by claiming that they were simply gifts from friends.
Consider the above a good reason to define away NULLs from relational schema whenever possible.
"The law should not seek to define away the underlying, objective distinctiveness of men and women," the statement continued.
A new Justice Department memo appropriately rejects earlier government efforts to define away the prohibition of torture (front page, Jan . 1.
As Obama's presidency unfolds, there are almost surely moments ahead in which, whatever the yen to define away differences and dismiss divides, Obama and America will have to choose: The tyrant on the U.N. stage, or those little folks across the street.
Nothing is wrong with that; actually, it's human nature, and as long as it's not being used as a measuring stick for the community, define away.
In effect, Congress has defined away potential tax earmarks.
Does that come across as defining away torture?
In longitudinal section, the tissue zones become progressively better defined away from the tip.
Yet bear markets can always be defined away by excluding those sectors that have fallen farthest: that does not make them any less real.
It's the stain that runs through the raw material of history – oral and written recollections of the violence enacted against Indigenous people that cannot be defined away merely as colonial transgression.
The new strategy document finally defines away the Defense Department's historic requirement to have the ability to fight and win two wars at once — a measure that one official said "has been on life-support for years".
