conceivable


Also found in: Thesaurus, Medical, Idioms.
Related to conceivable: insurmountable, unremitting

con·ceive

 (kən-sēv′)
v. con·ceived, con·ceiv·ing, con·ceives
v.tr.
1. To become pregnant with (offspring): She conceived her first child in London, but her second child was conceived in Paris.
2. To form or develop in the mind: conceive a plan to increase profits; conceive a passion for a new acquaintance.
3. To apprehend mentally; understand: couldn't conceive the meaning of that sentence.
4. To be of the opinion that; think: didn't conceive that such a tragedy could occur.
5. To begin or originate in a specific way: a political movement that was conceived in the ferment of the 1960s.
v.intr.
1. To form or hold an idea: Ancient peoples conceived of the earth as flat.
2. To become pregnant.

[Middle English conceiven, from Old French concevoir, conceiv-, from Latin concipere : com-, intensive pref.; see com- + capere, to take; see kap- in Indo-European roots.]

con·ceiv′a·bil′i·ty, con·ceiv′a·ble·ness n.
con·ceiv′a·ble adj.
con·ceiv′a·bly adv.
con·ceiv′er n.
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

conceivable

(kənˈsiːvəbəl)
adj
capable of being understood, believed, or imagined; possible
conˌceivaˈbility, conˈceivableness n
conˈceivably adv
Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

con•ceiv•a•ble

(kənˈsi və bəl)

adj.
capable of being conceived; imaginable.
[1425–75]
con•ceiv′a•bly, adv.
Random House Kernerman Webster's College Dictionary, © 2010 K Dictionaries Ltd. Copyright 2005, 1997, 1991 by Random House, Inc. All rights reserved.
ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:
Adj.1.conceivable - capable of being imagined; "that is one possible answer"
thinkable - capable of being conceived or imagined or considered
Based on WordNet 3.0, Farlex clipart collection. © 2003-2012 Princeton University, Farlex Inc.

conceivable

adjective imaginable, possible, credible, believable, thinkable It is just conceivable that a single survivor may be found.
incredible, unbelievable, unthinkable, inconceivable, unimaginable
Collins Thesaurus of the English Language – Complete and Unabridged 2nd Edition. 2002 © HarperCollins Publishers 1995, 2002

conceivable

adjective
Capable of being anticipated, considered, or imagined:
Idioms: humanly possible, within the bounds of possibility.
The American Heritage® Roget's Thesaurus. Copyright © 2013, 2014 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.
Translations
مُمْكِن إدراكُه أو تَصَوُّرُه
představitelný
muligtænkelig
elképzelhetõ
hugsanlegur
predstaviteľný
akla uygundüşünülebilir

conceivable

[kənˈsiːvəbl] ADJimaginable, concebible
Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

conceivable

[kənˈsiːvəbəl] adj [kind, type] → concevable
in every conceivable way → de toutes les façons possibles et imaginables
there is no conceivable reason why ...
There is no conceivable reason why there should be any difficulty → Aucune raison ne laisse imaginer qu'il pourrait y avoir des difficultés.
it is conceivable that ... → il est concevable que ...
Collins English/French Electronic Resource. © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

conceivable

adjdenkbar, vorstellbar; it is hardly conceivable that …es ist kaum denkbar, dass …, man kann sich (dat)kaum vorstellen, dass …; it’s not conceivable that she would have gone without usich kann mir nicht vorstellen, dass sie ohne uns gegangen ist
Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

conceivable

[kənˈsiːvəbl] adjconcepibile
it is conceivable that ... → può anche darsi che...
Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

conceive

(kənˈsiːv) verb
1. to form (an idea etc) in the mind.
2. to imagine. I can't conceive why you did that.
3. (of a woman) to become pregnant.
conˈceivable adjective
able to be imagined or thought of.
conˈceivably adverb

conceive is spelt with -ei-.
Kernerman English Multilingual Dictionary © 2006-2013 K Dictionaries Ltd.
References in classic literature ?
God is a conjecture: but I should like your conjecturing restricted to the conceivable.
I envy you; upon my honor, I envy you!'--to receive this sort of welcome, emphasized by obtrusive hand-shakings, sometimes actually by downright kissings of my wife, and then to look round and see that not one in thirty of these very people had brought their unmarried daughters to the ball, was, I honestly believe, to see civilized human nature in its basest conceivable aspect.
In every gallery in Europe there are hideous pictures of blood, carnage, oozing brains, putrefaction--pictures portraying intolerable suffering--pictures alive with every conceivable horror, wrought out in dreadful detail--and similar pictures are being put on the canvas every day and publicly exhibited--without a growl from anybody--for they are innocent, they are inoffensive, being works of art.
There were masters, too, I have known, whose very art consisted in avoiding every conceivable situation.
The Brahmins maintain that in the almost endless sculptures of that immemorial pagoda, all the trades and pursuits, every conceivable avocation of man, were prefigured ages before any of them actually came into being.
I could have given my own sect the preference and made everybody a Presby- terian without any trouble, but that would have been to affront a law of human nature: spiritual wants and instincts are as various in the human family as are physical appetites, complexions, and features, and a man is only at his best, morally, when he is equipped with the religious garment whose color and shape and size most nicely accommodate themselves to the spirit- ual complexion, angularities, and stature of the indi- vidual who wears it; and, besides, I was afraid of a united Church; it makes a mighty power, the mightiest conceivable, and then when it by and by gets into selfish hands, as it is always bound to do, it means death to human liberty and paralysis to human thought.
If against the present one any objection be raised on the score of its truth, it can only be that its author was an Arab, as lying is a very common propensity with those of that nation; though, as they are such enemies of ours, it is conceivable that there were omissions rather than additions made in the course of it.
Situation, soil, climate, the nature of the productions, the nature of the government, the genius of the citizens, the degree of information they possess, the state of commerce, of arts, of industry, these circumstances and many more, too complex, minute, or adventitious to admit of a particular specification, occasion differences hardly conceivable in the relative opulence and riches of different countries.
She was looking on the ground, but Adam saw her face, saw the tears, and before he had finished saying, "Hetty, dear Hetty, what are you crying for?" his eager rapid thought had flown through all the causes conceivable to him, and had at last alighted on half the true one.
This passage, for no conceivable reason that I could devise, was always closed after the household had retired to rest, by drawing a heavy slide across it, composed of a dozen or more bits of wood, ingeniously fastened together by seizings of sinnate.
Met by this difficulty historians of that class devise some most obscure, impalpable, and general abstraction which can cover all conceivable occurrences, and declare this abstraction to be the aim of humanity's movement.
Form triumphed over substance, if triumph it could be called where the last conceivable atom of substance had found expression in so perfect construction as to make Martin's head swim with delight, to put passionate tears into his eyes, and to send chills creeping up and down his back.