degenerate

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
degenerate

▶adjective /dɪˈdʒɛn(ə)rət/ 

• 1 having lost the physical or moral qualities considered normal and desirable; showing evidence of decline.

  ■ Biology having reverted to a simpler form as a result of losing a structure present in the ancestral form.

• 2 Physics relating to or denoting a quantized energy level corresponding to more than one state.

  ■ denoting matter at such high density (e.g. in neutron stars) that quantum effects are dominant.

▶noun /dɪˈdʒɛn(ə)rət/ a morally degenerate person. ▶verb /dɪˈdʒɛnəreɪt/ decline or deteriorate physically or morally.

– derivatives
degeneracy noun,
degenerately adverb.

– origin C15: from L. degeneratus ‘no longer of its kind’, from degenerare, from degener ‘debased’, from de- + genus, gener- ‘race, kind’.