Definition of "barren" []

• Not producing offspring. (adjective)
• Incapable of producing offspring. (adjective)
• Lacking vegetation, especially useful vegetation. (adjective)
• Unproductive of results or gains; unprofitable: barren efforts. See Synonyms at futile. (adjective)
• Devoid of something specified: writing barren of insight. See Synonyms at empty. (adjective)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "That is, _such barren plants_ are exhibited in the creation, to make us _thankful when we have more taste and feeling than he, of those parts_ or qualities _which_ produce fruit _in us_, and preserve as from being likewise _barren plants_."
• "But Strabo only speaks of the neighborhood of Jerusalem, which he calls barren and arid to the extent of sixty stadia round the city: in other parts he gives a favorable testimony to the fertility of many parts of Palestine: thus he says, "Near Jericho there is a grove of palms, and a country of a hundred stadia, full of springs, and well peopled.""
• "Given that recent US wars have been fought in barren deserts and urban cityspaces, it seems difficult to imagine that the robots will find plentiful plant matter to consume."