speculate
English
Etymology
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Borrowed from Latin speculātus, past participle of speculor (“look out”), from specula (“watchtower”), from speciō (“look at”)
Verb
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- (obsolete, intransitive) To think, meditate or reflect on a subject; to consider, to deliberate or cogitate.
- Hawthorne
- It is remarkable that persons who speculate the most boldly often conform with the most perfect quietude to the external regulations of society.
- Hawthorne
- (intransitive) To make an inference based on inconclusive evidence; to surmise or conjecture.
- 1983, Richard Ellis, The Book of Sharks, Knopf, →ISBN, page 171:
- We can speculate that in many instances the sharks are not feeding on their victims, but only in a few cases can we guess what they are doing.
- 2013 June 7, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 36:
- It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: perhaps out of a desire to escape the gravity of this world or to get a preview of the next; […].
- (intransitive, business, finance) To make a risky trade in the hope of making a profit; to venture or gamble.
- (intransitive, programming) To anticipate which branch of code will be chosen and execute it in advance.
Related terms
Translations
to meditate
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to make an inference based on inconclusive evidence
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to make a risky trade
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Further reading
- “speculate”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
- “speculate”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
Anagrams
Italian
Verb
speculate
- second-person plural present indicative of speculare
- second-person plural imperative of speculare
- feminine plural of speculato
Latin
Pronunciation
- (Classical Latin) IPA(key): /spe.kuˈlaː.te/, [s̠pɛkʊˈɫ̪äːt̪ɛ]
- (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA(key): /spe.kuˈla.te/, [spekuˈläːt̪e]
Participle
(deprecated template usage) speculāte
Categories:
- English terms borrowed from Latin
- English terms derived from Latin
- English terms with obsolete senses
- English intransitive verbs
- English terms with quotations
- en:Business
- en:Finance
- en:Programming
- Italian non-lemma forms
- Italian verb forms
- Italian entries with language name categories using raw markup
- Italian past participle forms
- Latin 4-syllable words
- Latin terms with IPA pronunciation
- Latin non-lemma forms
- Latin participle forms