potential
Definition from Wiktionary, a free dictionary
Contents |
[edit] English
[edit] Etymology
From Late Latin potentialis < Latin potentia (“‘power’”) < potens (“‘powerful’”); see potent.
[edit] Noun
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Singular |
Plural |
potential (plural potentials)
- Currently unfulfilled capacity to improve, develop, and achieve impressive feats.
- Even from a young age it was clear that she had great musical potential.
- Anything that may be possible; a possibility; potentiality.
- (physics) In the theory of gravitation, or of other forces acting in space, a function of the rectangular coordinates which determine the position of a point, such that its differential coefficients with respect to the coordinates are equal to the components of the force at the point considered; -- also called potential function, or force function. It is called also Newtonian potential when the force is directed to a fixed center and is inversely as the square of the distance from the center.
- (physics) The energy of an electrical charge measured by its power to do work; hence, the degree of electrification as referred to some standard, as that of the earth; electro-motive force.
- (grammar) A verbal construction or form stating something is possible or probable.
[edit] Related terms
[edit] Translations
[edit] Adjective
potential (not comparable)
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Positive |
Superlative |
- Being potent; endowed with energy adequate to a result; efficacious; influential.
- Existing in possibility, not in actuality.
- (grammar) Referring to a verbal construction of form stating something is possible or probable.
[edit] Translations
[edit] External links
- potential in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913
- potential in The Century Dictionary, The Century Co., New York, 1911
