Adjacent Words

Ideal definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

IDE'AL, a. Existing in idea; intellectual; mental; as ideal knowledge.
There will always be a wide interval between practical and ideal excellence.
1. Visionary; existing in fancy or imagination only; as ideal good.
2. That considers ideas as images, phantasms, or forms in the mind; as the ideal theory or philosophy.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: conforming to an ultimate standard of perfection or excellence; embodying an ideal
2: constituting or existing only in the form of an idea or mental image or conception; "a poem or essay may be typical of its period in idea or ideal content"
3: of or relating to the philosophical doctrine of the reality of ideas [syn: ideal, idealistic] n
1: the idea of something that is perfect; something that one hopes to attain
2: model of excellence or perfection of a kind; one having no equal [syn: ideal, paragon, nonpareil, saint, apotheosis, nonesuch, nonsuch]

Merriam Webster's

I. adjective Etymology: Middle English ydeall, from Late Latin idealis, from Latin idea Date: 15th century 1. existing as an archetypal idea 2. a. existing as a mental image or in fancy or imagination only; broadly lacking practicality b. relating to or constituting mental images, ideas, or conceptions 3. a. of, relating to, or embodying an ideal <ideal beauty> b. conforming exactly to an ideal, law, or standard ; perfect <an ideal gas> — compare real 2b(3) 4. of or relating to philosophical idealism II. noun Date: 15th century 1. a standard of perfection, beauty, or excellence 2. one regarded as exemplifying an ideal and often taken as a model for imitation 3. an ultimate object or aim of endeavor ; goal 4. a subset of a mathematical ring that is closed under addition and subtraction and contains the products of any given element of the subset with each element of the ring Synonyms: see model • idealless adjective

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. & n. --adj. 1 a answering to one's highest conception. b perfect or supremely excellent. 2 a existing only in idea. b visionary. 3 embodying an idea. 4 relating to or consisting of ideas; dependent on the mind. --n. 1 a perfect type, or a conception of this. 2 an actual thing as a standard for imitation. Phrases and idioms: ideal gas a hypothetical gas consisting of molecules occupying negligible space and without attraction for each other, thereby obeying simple laws. Derivatives: ideally adv. Etymology: ME f. F idéal f. LL idealis (as IDEA)

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Ideal I*de"al, a. [L. idealis: cf. F. id['e]al.] 1. Existing in idea or thought; conceptional; intellectual; mental; as, ideal knowledge. 2. Reaching an imaginary standard of excellence; fit for a model; faultless; as, ideal beauty. --Byron. There will always be a wide interval between practical and ideal excellence. --Rambler. 3. Existing in fancy or imagination only; visionary; unreal. ``Planning ideal common wealth.'' --Southey. 4. Teaching the doctrine of idealism; as, the ideal theory or philosophy. 5. (Math.) Imaginary. Syn: Intellectual; mental; visionary; fanciful; imaginary; unreal; impracticable; utopian.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Ideal I*de"al, n. A mental conception regarded as a standard of perfection; a model of excellence, beauty, etc. The ideal is to be attained by selecting and assembling in one whole the beauties and perfections which are usually seen in different individuals, excluding everything defective or unseemly, so as to form a type or model of the species. Thus, the Apollo Belvedere is the ideal of the beauty and proportion of the human frame. --Fleming. Beau ideal. See Beau ideal.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

(ideals) Frequency: The word is one of the 3000 most common words in English. 1. An ideal is a principle, idea, or standard that seems very good and worth trying to achieve. The party has drifted too far from its socialist ideals... N-COUNT: oft N of n 2. Your ideal of something is the person or thing that seems to you to be the best possible example of it. ...the Japanese ideal of beauty... N-SING: oft poss N 3. The ideal person or thing for a particular task or purpose is the best possible person or thing for it. She decided that I was the ideal person to take over the job... = perfect ADJ 4. An ideal society or world is the best possible one that you can imagine. We do not live in an ideal world... ADJ: ADJ n

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

I. a. 1. Intellectual, mental. 2. Imaginary, unreal, fanciful, fantastic, fancied, illusory, chimerical, visionary, shadowy. 3. Complete, perfect, consummate, filling our utmost conceptions. II. n. Imaginary standard, ideal model of perfection.

Moby Thesaurus

Arcadian, Edenic, Geistesgeschichte, Hegelian idea, Kantian idea, Platonic form, Platonic idea, Utopian, absolute, abstract, academic, acme, ambition, apotheosis, apprehension, archetypal, archetype, archetypical, armchair, aspiration, assumption, autism, autistic thinking, basis, beau ideal, belief, best type, beyond all praise, brainstorm, calling, caprice, cause, celestial, chaste, chimerical, classic, classical, complete, complex idea, conceit, concept, conception, conceptual, conclusion, conjectural, conjecture, consideration, consummate, conviction, criterion, cynosure, defectless, dereism, dereistic thinking, dream, dreamery, ego ideal, epitome, estimation, eternal object, eternal universal, example, excellent, exemplar, exemplary, fancied, fanciful, fancy, fantasy, faultless, feeling, fictitious, flawless, flight of fancy, formal cause, goal, good example, ground, guess, guiding light, guiding star, heavenly, hero, high goal, highest category, history of ideas, hypothesis, hypothetic, hypothetical, idealism, idealistic, ideality, idealization, idealized, ideals, ideate, ideational, ideatum, idee-force, ideological, idyllic, illusory, image, imaginary, imaginative exercise, imagined, immaculate, impeccable, impractical, impracticality, impression, inclination, indefectible, indefective, infallible, innate idea, inspiration, intellection, intention, irreproachable, jewel, judgment, just right, lodestar, mainspring, man of men, masterpiece, masterwork, matter, millennial, mirror, model, moot, morals, motive, mythic, mythical, nonesuch, nonpareil, noosphere, notion, notional, noumenon, opinion, paradigm, paradigmatic, paradisal, paragon, pattern, pattern of perfection, peerless, percept, perception, perfect, persuasion, phoenix, play of fancy, postulatory, precedential, presumption, principle, principles, prototypal, prototype, pure, quintessence, quintessential, quixotism, quixotry, reaching high, reaction, reason, reflection, regulative first principle, representative, romance, romantic, romanticism, sake, score, sentiment, shining example, simple idea, sinless, source, speculation, speculative, spotless, spring, stainless, standard, standards, subsistent form, supposition, supreme, surmise, suspicion, taintless, the Absolute, the Absolute Idea, the Self-determined, the realized ideal, theoretical, theory, thought, transcendent, transcendent idea, transcendent nonempirical concept, transcendent universal, transcendental, typical, ulterior motive, unadulterated, unblemished, uncontaminated, unfaultable, universal, universal concept, universal essence, unmixed, unpracticalness, unreal, unrealism, unreality, unspotted, untainted, upward looking, utopian, utopianism, vagary, very, very model, view, visionariness, visionary, vocation, whim, whimsy, wish fulfillment, wish-fulfillment fantasy, wishful thinking