Word Finder - defining

definition

To determine with precision; to mark out with distinctness; to ascertain or exhibit clearly.

example

the defining power of an optical instrument

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To settle, decide (an argument etc.)

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To express the essential nature of something.

example

I define myself as a techno-anarchist.

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To state the meaning of a word, phrase, sign, or symbol.

example

The textbook defined speed as velocity divided by time.

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To describe, explain, or make definite and clear; used to request the listener or other person to elaborate or explain more clearly his or her intended meaning of a word or expression.

example

Person 1: Is she good at math?

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To demark sharply the outlines or limits of an area or concept.

example

to define the legal boundaries of a property

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To establish the referent of a term or notation.

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Serving to define or distinguish.

example

The ability to reproduce is a defining characteristic of living organisms.

July passed into August without any defining moments.

We should in fact have reached those two fundamentals of which man's whole outlook on the universe is constructed--the incomprehensible essence of life, and the laws defining that essence.

Antoneili profited by the situation to obtain Mneleks signature to a treaty fixing the frontiers of the Italian colony and defining Italo-Abyssinian relations.

Men are defining and protecting the positions they have inherited; they do not think of progress.

Experience forbids our excluding organic activity from natural causes, also our excluding intelligence from purposeful (zwecktdtigen) causes; hence experience forbids our defining the fundamental force or first cause out of which living creatures arose.'

The period from about 1880 has been an era of boundary-making in Asia, of defining the politicogeographical limits of empire, and of determining the responsibilities of government.

From that point southwards the river becomes the boundary between the Shan States and Tongking for some 200 m., the channel of the river defining the limits of occupation (though not entirely of interest) between French and British subjects.

The definition of the Council of Trent was intended both to enforce the accepted Catholic position and to exclude the teaching of Luther, who, whilst not professing to be certain whether the "substance" of the Bread and Wine could or could not be said to remain, exclaimed against the intolerance of the Roman Catholic Church in defining the question.6 For a full and recent exposition of the Catholic teaching on Transubstantiation the reader may consult De ecclesiae sacra mentis, auctore Ludovico Billot, S.J.

At the same time he clarified the conception of elements and compounds, rejecting the older notions, the four elements of the " vulgar Peripateticks " and the three principles of the " vulgar Stagyrists," and defining an element as a substance incapable of decomposition, and a compound as composed of two or more elements.

As a consequence of its having accepted Roman citizenship, it became a municipium; part of a copy of the Lex Iulia Municipalis of 46 B.C. (engraved on the back of two bronze tablets, on the front of which is a Greek inscription of the 3rd century B.C. defining the boundaries of lands belonging to various temples), which was found between Heraclea and Metapontum, is of the highest importance for our knowledge of that law.

After the treaty of Adis Adowa, recognizing the independence of Abyssinia, had been concluded in 1896, negotiations were opened for defining the Italian-Abyssinian frontier in the Somali regions.

The greatest difficulty in his way is not temperature, but the presence of parasitic diseases to resist which his body has not been prepared, and modern knowledge is rapidly defining these dangers and the modes of avoiding them.

But before it had penetrated far inland the political reasons for sending the expedition vanished with the signature, on the 1st of July 1890, of the Anglo-German agreement defining the spheres of influence of the two nations, an agreement which excluded the Albert Nyanza region from the German sphere.

Steps were taken to prevent the occurrence of any further conflicts, and an agreement defining the frontier was signed in January .1895.

In the Sovereignty difficulties arose in defining the reserves of the native chiefs, and with the Basutos there were armed conflicts.

At the same time he was more clearly defining and safeguarding his predecessors' position.

If the sinuosity is slight we have the Vibrio form; if pronounced, and the spiral winding well marked, the forms are known as Spirillum, Spirochaete, &c. These and similar terms have been applied partly to individual cells, but more often to filaments consisting of several cells; and much confusion has arisen form the difficulty of defining the terms themselves.

This gave rise to misunderstandings, and at last led to two widely separate ways of regarding and defining one important doctrine - the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father or from the Father and the Son.

The Eastern creeds may thus be roughly placed in two classes - the oecumenical creeds of the early undivided church, and later testimonies defining the position of the Orthodox Church of the East with regard to the belief of the Roman Catholic and of Protestant Churches.

The boundary dispute involved the interpretation of the words, quoted above, in the treaties of 1825 and 1867 defining the boundary of the Russian (later American) possessions, and also the determining of the location of Portland Canal, and the question whether the coastal girdle should cross or pass around the heads of the fjords of the coast.

It was followed in 1908 by an agreement defining the frontiers concerned.

The varieties of income charged being very great, and special claims for consideration having been set up at different times, the result has been the formation of an income tax code, defining the methods and rules for assessing the different classes of profits and income, and prescribing the way in which abatements and exemptions are to be obtained.

A charter of Offa, king of Mercia (785), deals with the conveyance of certain land to the monastery of St Peter; and King Edgar restored the church, clearly defining by a charter dated 951 (not certainly genuine) the boundary of Westminster, which may be indicated in modern terms as extending from the Marble Arch south to the Thames and east to the City boundary, the former river Fleet.

But the Cornwallis code, while defining the rights of the proprietors, failed to give adequate recognition to the rights of the undertenants and the cultivators.

The song was Biggie’s best selling single and not only became a landmark rap song but also a defining single of the 1990s.

In the war the advantage rested with the Basutos; thereupon the Free State appealed to Sir George Grey, who induced Moshesh to come to terms. On the 15th of October 1858 a treaty was signed defining anew the boundary.

The decree of 1896, which was of a provisional character, was replaced by another, dated the 23rd of August 1898, defining the powers of the governor-general under the new scheme.

To these letters he attaches numbers arranged on a principle showing the century to which the MS. belongs and defining its contents more precisely.

Andrews's conception of the critical temperature of gases by defining the absolute boiling-point of a substance as the temperature at which cohesion and heat of vaporization become equal to zero and the liquid changes to vapour, irrespective of the pressure and volume.

The explanation of the apparent conformity of the strata from the Cambrian to the Pennsylvanian in some parts of the west, with no fossils defining with certainty any horizon between the Ordovician and the Mississippian, is one of the open problems in the geology of the United States.

A bill of rights, defining the so-called primordial rights of the citizens to sectirity of life, liberty and property; A declaration and enactment of the frame of state government, i.e.

This bill was passed by both houses of Congress, just before their adjournment, but President Lincoln withheld his signature, and on the 8th of July issued a proclamation explaining his course and defining his position.

Quetelet's plan of defining such types will probably meet with general acceptance as the scientific method proper to this branch of anthropology.

In 1861-1863 he was the editor-in-chief of the Independent, then a Congregational journal; and in his editorials, copied far and wide, produced a profound impression on the public mind by clarifying and defining the issue.

The weight of the goods is recorded by means of an index pointer fixed to the casing on one side of the vertical slot, and the money values are opposite the figures defining the rates per lb, which are marked on the edge of the casing below the hori zontal slot.

In theory, this law has as its author the local ecclesiastical authorities, councils or bishops; but this is true only for laws and regulations which are in harmony with the common law, merely completing or defining it.

The first method consists in defining the first few numbers, and forming larger numbers by groups or aggregates, formed partly by multiplication and partly by addition.

Harrison made many treaties with the Indians, the most important being that signed at Fort Wayne on the 7th of June 1803, defining the Vincennes tract transferred to the United States by the Treaty of Greenville; those signed at Vincennes on the 18th and the 27th of August 1804, transferring to the United States a strip north of the Ohio river and south of the Vincennes tract; that concluded at Grouseland on the 21st of August 1805, procuring from the Delawares and others a tract along the Ohio river between the parcels of 1795 and 1804; and the treaties of Fort Wayne, signed on the 30th of September 1809, and securing one tract immediately west of that of 1795 and another north of the Vincennes tract defined in 1803.

They wished to reconstruct the system which had been violently interrupted by the events of the autumn of 1641, and to found government on the cooperation between king and parliament, without defining to themselves what was to be done if the kings conduct became insufferable.

Benn (History of English Rationalism in the zgth Cent.) goes beyond ordinary usage in defining rationalism as a militant theory opposed to all belief in God.

Passing on to Anselrn (1033-1109), we observe that the Augustinian doctrine of original sin and man's absolute need of unmerited grace is retained in his theory of salvation; he also follows Augustine in defining freedom as the " power not to sin "; though in saying that Adam fell " spontaneously " and " by his free choice," though not " through its freedom," he has implicitly made the distinction that Peter the Lombard afterwards expressly draws between the freedom that is opposed to necessity and freedom from the slavery to sin.

This Paley and Bentham (after Locke) interpreted as merely the effect on the will of the pleasures or pains attached to the observance or violation of moral rules, combining with this the doctrine of Hutcheson that " general good " or " happiness " is the final end and standard of these rules; while they eliminated all vagueness from the notion of general happiness by defining it to consist in " excess of pleasure over pain " - pleasures and pains being regarded as " differing in nothing but continuance or intensity."

It is our system of defining the position of a point on the earth's surface by its latitude and longitude.

The need is urgent of fixing a scale, and defining standards of actinic brightness; but it has not yet been successfully met.

The councils of Nicaea and Constantinople had asserted the full divinity and real humanity of Christ, without, however, defining the manner of their union.

A chartered company is a trading corporation enjoying certain rights and privileges, and bound by certain obligations under a special charter granted to it by the sovereign authority of the state, such charter defining and limiting those rights, privileges and obligations, and the localities in which they are to be exercised.

Setting guidelines can help in defining the context of your search.

Defining architecture, ascribing meanings, is a joint task between designer and user.

What is the reason for defining adjacency in Euclidean terms?

The behavior of radiobuttons can be changed by defining new bindings for individual widgets or by redefining the class bindings.