Lexic.us

Definition of Positive

1. Noun. The primary form of an adjective or adverb; denotes a quality without qualification, comparison, or relation to increase or diminution.

2. Adjective. Characterized by or displaying affirmation or acceptance or certainty etc.. "A positive demand"

3. Noun. A film showing a photographic image whose tones correspond to those of the original subject.

4. Adjective. Persuaded of; very sure. "Was confident he would win"

5. Adjective. Involving advantage or good. "A plus (or positive) factor"

6. Adjective. Indicating existence or presence of a suspected condition or pathogen. "A positive pregnancy test"

7. Adjective. Formally laid down or imposed. "Positive laws"

8. Adjective. Impossible to deny or disprove. "An irrefutable argument"

9. Adjective. Of or relating to positivism. "Positive philosophy"

10. Adjective. Reckoned, situated or tending in the direction which naturally or arbitrarily is taken to indicate increase or progress or onward motion. "Positive increase in graduating students"

11. Adjective. Greater than zero. "Positive numbers"

12. Adjective. Having a positive charge. "Protons are positive"

13. Adjective. Marked by excessive confidence. "The less he knows the more positive he gets"

Definition of Positive

1. a. Having a real position, existence, or energy; existing in fact; real; actual; -- opposed to negative.

2. n. That which is capable of being affirmed; reality.

3. a. Designating, or pertaining to, a motion or device in which the movement derived from a driver, or the grip or hold of a restraining piece, is communicated through an unyielding intermediate piece or pieces; as, a claw clutch is a positive clutch, while a friction clutch is not.

Definition of Positive

1. Adjective. (legal) Formally laid down. (defdate from the 14th c.) ¹

2. Adjective. Stated definitively and without qualification. (defdate from the 16th c.) ¹

3. Adjective. Fully assured in opinion. (defdate from the 17th c.) ¹

4. Adjective. (mathematics) Of number, greater than zero. (defdate from the 18th c.) ¹

5. Adjective. Characterized by constructiveness or influence for the better. ¹

6. Adjective. Overconfident, dogmatic. ¹

7. Adjective. (chiefly philosophy) Actual, real, concrete, not theoretical or speculative. ¹

8. Adjective. (physics) Having more protons than electrons. ¹

9. Adjective. (grammar) Describing the primary sense of an adjective or adverb; not comparative or superlative. ¹

10. Adjective. Derived from an object by itself; not dependent on changing circumstances or relations; absolute. ¹

11. Adjective. Characterized by the existence or presence of distinguishing qualities or features, rather than by their absence. ¹

12. Adjective. Characterized by the presence of features which support a hypothesis. ¹

13. Adjective. (photography) Of a visual image, true to the original in light, shade and colour values. ¹

14. Adjective. Favorable, desirable by those interested or invested in that which is being judged. ¹

15. Adjective. Wholly what is expressed; ''colloquially'' downright, entire, outright. ¹

16. Adjective. Optimistic. (defdate from the 20th c.) ¹

17. Adjective. (slang) HIV positive. ¹

18. Adjective. (context: New Age jargon) Good, desirable, healthful; (often precedes 'energy', 'thought', 'feeling' or 'emotion'). ¹

19. Noun. A thing capable of being affirmed; something real or actual. ¹

20. Noun. A favourable point or characteristic. ¹

21. Noun. Something having a '''positive''' value in physics, such as an electric charge. ¹

22. Noun. (grammar) An adjective or adverb in the '''positive''' degree. ¹

23. Noun. (context: photography) A '''positive''' image; one that displays true colors and shades, as opposed to a negative. ¹

¹ Source: wiktionary.com

Definition of Positive

1. certain [adj -TIVER, -TIVEST] / a quantity greater than zero [n -S] - See also: certain

Lexicographical Neighbors of Positive

positionable positional positional isomer positional isomers positional notation positional representation system positionally positioned positioner positioners

positioning positioning time positionings positionless positions positive (current term) positive(p) positive-edge-triggered positive charge positive chemotaxis

positive correlation positive crystal positive degree positive drainage positive economics positive edge positive edge-triggered positive edges positive feedback

Literary usage of Positive

Below you will find example usage of this term as found in modern and/or classical literature:

1. Annual Report by Indiana State Board of Health (1917)
"The information on 5000 sputum specimens found positive for tubercle bacilli ... Seventy-five per cent of all positive sputum specimens are diagnosed in the ..."

2. The Encyclopaedia Britannica: A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, Literature and (1910)
"It is, however, to be observed, that as the product Ы the three quantities Va, Ví>, Vc must be equal to VR or to —\^. when q is positive, their product must ..."

3. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease by American Neurological Association, Philadelphia Neurological Society, Chicago Neurological Society, New York Neurological Association, Boston Society of Psychiatry and Neurology (1914)
"gave positive Wassermann on two trials. Fluid was positive five times. ... Fluid was positive three times, faintly positive four times and negative six ..."

4. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke (1849)
"We have no positive idea of an infinite duration.—I ask those who say they have a positive idea of eternity, whether their idea of duration includes in it ..."

5. Science by American Association for the Advancement of Science (1909)
"These and similar results lead to the conclusion that the atoms of the different chemical elements contain definite units of positive as well as of negative ..."

6. The Nation: The Foundations of Civil Order and Political Life in the United by Elisha Mulford (1870)
"The proposition, moreover, in the detachment of positive from natural rights, ... But this isolation of natural and positive rights is the sequence of a ..."

7. An essay concerning human understanding by John Locke (1838)
"does exist; and whether any one has, or can have, a positive idea of an actual infinite number, I leave him to consider, till his infinite number be so ..."

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