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im·ag·ine 
Audio Help [i-maj-in] Pronunciation Key verb, -ined, -in·ing.
—Related forms
Audio Help [i-maj-in] Pronunciation Key verb, -ined, -in·ing. –verb (used with object)
–verb (used without object)
| 1. | to form a mental image of (something not actually present to the senses). |
| 2. | to think, believe, or fancy: He imagined the house was haunted. |
| 3. | to assume; suppose: I imagine they'll be here soon. |
| 4. | to conjecture; guess: I cannot imagine what you mean. |
| 5. | Archaic. to plan, scheme, or plot. |
| 6. | to form mental images of things not present to the senses; use the imagination. |
| 7. | to suppose; think; conjecture. |
[Origin: 1300–50; ME imaginen < MF imaginer < L imāginārī, equiv. to imāgin- (s. of imāgō) image + -ā- thematic vowel + -rī inf. ending]
] —Related forms
i·mag·in·er, noun
—Synonyms 1. image, picture. Imagine, conceive, conceive of, realize refer to bringing something before the mind. To imagine is, literally, to form a mental image of something: to imagine yourself in London. To conceive is to form something by using one's imagination: How has the author conceived the first act of his play? To conceive of is to comprehend through the intellect something not perceived through the senses: Wilson conceived of a world free from war. To realize is to make an imagined thing real or concrete to oneself, to grasp fully its implications: to realize the extent of one's folly.
| Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006. |
Imagine
To learn more about Imagine visit Britannica.com
| © 2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. |
| i·mag·ine
Audio Help (ĭ-māj'ĭn) Pronunciation Key
v. i·mag·ined, i·mag·in·ing, i·mag·ines v. tr.
v. intr.
[Middle English imaginen, from Old French imaginer, from Latin imāginārī, from imāgō, imāgin-, image; see aim- in Indo-European roots.] i·mag'in·er n. |
| The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. |
imagine
1340, "to form a mental image of," from O.Fr. imaginer, from L. imaginari "to form a mental picture to oneself, imagine" (also, in L.L. imaginare "to form an image of, represent"), from imago (see image). Sense of "suppose" is first recorded c.1380. Imaginary "not real" is from 1382 (ymaginaire). First record of imagination "faculty of the mind which forms and manipulates images" is from c.1340 (ymaginacion). Imaginative first attested c.1386 (ymaginatyf).
| Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper |
| imagine | |
verb | |
| 1. | form a mental image of something that is not present or that is not the case; "Can you conceive of him as the president?" |
| 2. | expect, believe, or suppose; "I imagine she earned a lot of money with her new novel"; "I thought to find her in a bad state"; "he didn't think to find her in the kitchen"; "I guess she is angry at me for standing her up" [syn: think] |
| WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University. |
imagine1 [iˈmӕdʒin] verb
to form a mental picture of (something)
Example: I can imagine how you felt.
imagine2 [iˈmӕdʒin] verbExample: I can imagine how you felt.
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to see or hear etc (something which is not true or does not exist)
Example: Children often imagine that there are frightening animals under their beds; You're just imagining things!
imagine3 [iˈmӕdʒin] verbExample: Children often imagine that there are frightening animals under their beds; You're just imagining things!
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to think; to suppose
Example: I imagine (that) he will be late.
See also: imaginary, imaginative, imaginationExample: I imagine (that) he will be late.
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| Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary, © 2000-2006 K Dictionaries Ltd. |
Main Entry: imag·ine
Pronunciation: im-'aj-&n
Function: verb
Inflected Forms: imag·ined; imag·in·ing /-'aj-(&-)ni[ng]/
transitive senses
: to form a mental image of (something not present) imagine intransitive senses
: to use theimagination
| Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary, © 2002 Merriam-Webster, Inc. |
Imagine
Im"age\, n. [F., fr. L. imago, imaginis, from the root of imitari to imitate. See Imitate, and cf. Imagine.]1. An imitation, representation, or similitude of any person, thing, or act, sculptured, drawn, painted, or otherwise made perceptible to the sight; a visible presentation; a copy; a likeness; an effigy; a picture; a semblance. Even like a stony image, cold and numb. --Shak. Whose is this image and superscription? --Matt. xxii. 20. This play is the image of a murder done in Vienna. --Shak. And God created man in his own image. --Gen. i. 27. 2. Hence: The likeness of anything to which worship is paid; an idol. --Chaucer. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, . . . thou shalt not bow down thyself to them. --Ex. xx. 4, 5. 3. Show; appearance; cast. The face of things a frightful image bears. --Dryden. 4. A representation of anything to the mind; a picture drawn by the fancy; a conception; an idea. Can we conceive Image of aught delightful, soft, or great? --Prior. 5. (Rhet.) A picture, example, or illustration, often taken from sensible objects, and used to illustrate a subject; usually, an extended metaphor. --Brande & C. 6. (Opt.) The figure or picture of any object formed at the focus of a lens or mirror, by rays of light from the several points of the object symmetrically refracted or reflected to corresponding points in such focus; this may be received on a screen, a photographic plate, or the retina of the eye, and viewed directly by the eye, or with an eyeglass, as in the telescope and microscope; the likeness of an object formed by reflection; as, to see one's image in a mirror. Electrical image. See under Electrical. Image breaker, one who destroys images; an iconoclast. Image graver, Image maker, a sculptor. Image worship, the worship of images as symbols; iconolatry distinguished from idolatry; the worship of images themselves. Image Purkinje (Physics), the image of the retinal blood vessels projected in, not merely on, that membrane. Virtual image (Optics), a point or system of points, on one side of a mirror or lens, which, if it existed, would emit the system of rays which actually exists on the other side of the mirror or lens. --Clerk Maxwell.| Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc. |
Imagine
Im*ag`i*na"tion\, n. [OE. imaginacionum, F. imagination, fr. L. imaginatio. See Imagine.]1. The imagine-making power of the mind; the power to create or reproduce ideally an object of sense previously perceived; the power to call up mental imagines. Our simple apprehension of corporeal objects, if present, is sense; if absent, is imagination. --Glanvill. Imagination is of three kinds: joined with belief of that which is to come; joined with memory of that which is past; and of things present, or as if they were present. --Bacon. 2. The representative power; the power to reconstruct or recombine the materials furnished by direct apprehension; the complex faculty usually termed the plastic or creative power; the fancy. The imagination of common language -- the productive imagination of philosophers -- is nothing but the representative process plus the process to which I would give the name of the "comparative." --Sir W. Hamilton. The power of the mind to decompose its conceptions, and to recombine the elements of them at its pleasure, is called its faculty of imagination. --I. Taylor. The business of conception is to present us with an exact transcript of what we have felt or perceived. But we have moreover a power of modifying our conceptions, by combining the parts of different ones together, so as to form new wholes of our creation. I shall employ the word imagination to express this power. --Stewart. 3. The power to recombine the materials furnished by experience or memory, for the accomplishment of an elevated purpose; the power of conceiving and expressing the ideal. The lunatic, the lover, and the poet Are of imagination all compact . . . The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven, And as imagination bodies forth The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing A local habitation and a name. --Shak. 4. A mental image formed by the action of the imagination as a faculty; a conception; a notion. --Shak. Syn: Conception; idea; conceit; fancy; device; origination; invention; scheme; design; purpose; contrivance. Usage: Imagination, Fancy. These words have, to a great extent, been interchanged by our best writers, and considered as strictly synonymous. A distinction, however, is now made between them which more fully exhibits their nature. Properly speaking, they are different exercises of the same general power -- the plastic or creative faculty. Imagination consists in taking parts of our conceptions and combining them into new forms and images more select, more striking, more delightful, more terrible, etc., than those of ordinary nature. It is the higher exercise of the two. It creates by laws more closely connected with the reason; it has strong emotion as its actuating and formative cause; it aims at results of a definite and weighty character. Milton's fiery lake, the debates of his Pandemonium, the exquisite scenes of his Paradise, are all products of the imagination. Fancy moves on a lighter wing; it is governed by laws of association which are more remote, and sometimes arbitrary or capricious. Hence the term fanciful, which exhibits fancy in its wilder flights. It has for its actuating spirit feelings of a lively, gay, and versatile character; it seeks to please by unexpected combinations of thought, startling contrasts, flashes of brilliant imagery, etc. Pope's Rape of the Lock is an exhibition of fancy which has scarcely its equal in the literature of any country. -- "This, for instance, Wordsworth did in respect of the words `imagination' and `fancy.' Before he wrote, it was, I suppose, obscurely felt by most that in `imagination' there was more of the earnest, in `fancy' of the play of the spirit; that the first was a loftier faculty and gift than the second; yet for all this words were continually, and not without loss, confounded. He first, in the preface to his Lyrical Ballads, rendered it henceforth impossible that any one, who had read and mastered what he has written on the two words, should remain unconscious any longer of the important difference between them." --Trench. The same power, which we should call fancy if employed on a production of a light nature, would be dignified with the title of imagination if shown on a grander scale. --C. J. Smith.| Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc. |
IMAGINE
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