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visionary

[vizh-uh-ner-ee]

adjective

given to or characterized by fanciful, not presently workable, or unpractical ideas, views, or schemes: a visionary enthusiast.

given to or concerned with seeing visions.

belonging to or seen in a vision.

unreal; imaginary: visionary evils.

purely idealistic or speculative; impractical; unrealizable: a visionary scheme.

EXPAND

of, pertaining to, or proper to a vision.

COLLAPSE

noun

a person of unusually keen foresight.

a person who sees visions.

a person who is given to audacious, highly speculative, or impractical ideas or schemes; dreamer.

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Visionary is always a great word to know.

So is callithumpian. Does it mean:

a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.

a calculus or concretion found in the stomach or intestines of certain animals, esp. ruminants, formerly reputed to be an effective remedy for poison.

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Origin:
1640–50; vision + -ary

Related forms

vi·sion·ar·i·ness, noun

non·vi·sion·ar·y, adjective, noun

un·vi·sion·ar·y, adjective

Synonyms
1. impractical, impracticable. 4. fancied, illusory, chimerical. 5. unrealistic.

Antonyms
1. practical.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
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Link To visionary

Example Sentences

Visionary leader knows best practices for urban, commuter, community and technical college students.

Left in place, she would have been the beneficiary of her own visionary leadership.

Around the central character swirls a cast of cheats, anarchists, and visionary urban promoters.

EXPAND

Visionary leader knows best practices for urban, commuter, community and technical college students.

Left in place, she would have been the beneficiary of her own visionary leadership.

Around the central character swirls a cast of cheats, anarchists, and visionary urban promoters.

We asked the visionary scientists on our advisory board what new trends will shape the decades to come.

Brent is a visionary design artist with unique and one of a kind results.

He's built impeccable credentials as a media visionary.

Their purpose is to allow campus administrators to give the appearance of visionary.

Although his ecological thinking at first caused derision among other ranchers, he can now claim to be a visionary.

Kavli's strategy seems a natural extension of his entrepreneurial style, which was both visionary and practical.

He/she will be a visionary and a strategic thinker with the ability to think outside the box.

But what they have not demonstrated is that they have a visionary at or anywhere near the helm.

For a new campus facility to break new ground-both educationally and sustainably-the initial program must be visionary.

Some consider him to be a cool-headed and visionary moderniser, others a scheming centraliser who will not tolerate dissent.

There's real visionary thinking here, real possibilities to do something amazing.

Pearl was a visionary patron of the arts and an avid supporter of dance.

It's the flamboyant, visionary bosses who change the world.

It is not visionary to say internet will be used for distance education.

Put an excited visionary thinker with arbitrary wealth and access to great other minds and exciting interesting things happen.

Within companies, cherished perks will disappear and power will ebb from visionary bosses to the chief financial officer.

Wired caught up with the pop visionary via email to get his take on the importance of controlling your own product.

After that, the decoding model could be harnessed for more visionary purposes:.

COLLAPSE

Collins

World English Dictionary

visionary (ˈvɪʒənərɪ)

—*adj*
1.	marked by vision or foresight: a visionary leader
2.	incapable of being realized or effected; unrealistic
3.	(of people) characterized by idealistic or radical ideas, esp impractical ones
4.	given to having visions
5.	of, of the nature of, or seen in visions

—n , -aries
6.	a visionary person

'visionariness

—n

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

visionary

"able to see visions," 1651, from vision (q.v.). Meaning "impractical" is attested from 1727. The noun is attested from 1702, from the adj., originally "one who indulges in impractical fantasies."

FOLDOC

Computing Dictionary

visionary definition

1. One who hacks vision, in the sense of an Artificial Intelligence researcher working on the problem of getting computers to "see" things using TV cameras. (There isn't any problem in sending information from a TV camera to a computer. The problem is, how can the computer be programmed to make use of the camera information? See SMOP, AI-complete.)
2. [IBM] One who reads the outside literature. At IBM, apparently, such a penchant is viewed with awe and wonder.
[Jargon File]

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"There is no shadow of protection to be had by sheltering behind the slender stockades of visionary speculation, or by hiding behind the wagon-wheels of pacific theories."

-Madame Chiang Kai-Shek

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