sense

Definitions


[sɛns], (Noun)

Definitions:
- a faculty by which the body perceives an external stimulus; one of the faculties of sight, smell, hearing, taste, and touch
(e.g: the bear has a keen sense of smell which enables it to hunt at dusk)

- a feeling that something is the case
(e.g: she had the sense of being a political outsider)

- a sane and realistic attitude to situations and problems
(e.g: he earned respect by the good sense he showed at meetings)

- a way in which an expression or a situation can be interpreted; a meaning
(e.g: it is not clear which sense of the word ‘characters’ is intended in this passage)

- a property (e.g. direction of motion) distinguishing a pair of objects, quantities, effects, etc. which differ only in that each is the reverse of the other
(e.g: the cord does not become straight, but forms a length of helix in the opposite sense)


Phrases:
- bring someone to their senses
- come to one's senses
- in a sense
- in every sense of the word
- in one's senses
- make sense
- make sense of
- out of one's senses
- take leave of one's senses

Origin:
late Middle English (as a noun in the sense ‘meaning’): from Latin sensus ‘faculty of feeling, thought, meaning’, from sentire ‘feel’. The verb dates from the mid 16th century


[sɛns], (Verb)

Definitions:
- perceive by a sense or senses
(e.g: with the first frost, they could sense a change in the days)

- (of a machine or similar device) detect
(e.g: an optical fibre senses a current flowing in a conductor)


Phrases:
- bring someone to their senses
- come to one's senses
- in a sense
- in every sense of the word
- in one's senses
- make sense
- make sense of
- out of one's senses
- take leave of one's senses

Origin:
late Middle English (as a noun in the sense ‘meaning’): from Latin sensus ‘faculty of feeling, thought, meaning’, from sentire ‘feel’. The verb dates from the mid 16th century




definition by Oxford Dictionaries