See Also: Mode(money)
Mode(health)
i-mode(dictionary)
mode(dictionary)
TM-mode(medicine)
Mode(medicine)
M-mode(medicine)
B-mode(medicine)
mode(encyclopedia)
A-mode(medicine)

mode (iou)



mode noun & adjective. LME.
[In branch I, from Latin modus measure etc., from Indo-European base repr. also by METE verb. In branch II, from French mode fem. from Latin modus, with change of gender due to final e. See also MOOD noun2.]
A. noun.
I.
Music.
a. Orig., a tune, an air. Later, a particular scheme or system of sounds, spec. (a) each of the ancient Greek scales (Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Ionian, etc.) in which music in the diatonic style was composed; any of the scales used in other (e.g. oriental) systems of music; (b) (in medieval church music) each of the scales in which plainsong was composed (derived from and named after, but not always corresponding to, the ancient Greek ones), beginning on different notes of the natural scale, and thus having the intervals differently arranged; (c) (in modern music) either of the two classes (major and minor) of keys, having the intervals differently arranged; formerly sometimes = KEY noun1 6. LME.
b. The proportion (3 or 2) of a long to a large or a breve to a long, determining rhythm. obsolete exc. Hist. M17.
Grammar. = MOOD noun2 2. Now N. Amer. LME.
Logic.
a. = MOOD noun2 1. M16.
b. The character of a proposition as either necessary, contingent, possible, or impossible; each of the four kinds into which propositions are divided as having one or another of these qualities. M19.
A way or manner in which something is done or takes place; a method of procedure; a means. M17.
M. Mitchell With the old horse dead, their one mode of conveyance was gone. D. Jacobson Such highflown display is now the only mode of self-expression open to her.
b. A mode of expression. rare. L18.
c. Physics. Any of the distinct kinds or patterns of vibration that an oscillatory system can sustain. M19.
d. Any of a number of distinct ways in which a machine, computer system, etc., operates. M20.
D. Adams The massive computer was now in total active mode.
A particular form, manner, or variety (of some quality, process, or condition). Now rare exc. in mode of life and similar uses. M17.
Pope Modes of Self-love the Passions we may call.
b. Petrography. The quantitative mineral (as distinct from chemical) composition of a rock sample. Cf. NORM noun 3. E20.
Philosophy. A manner or state of being of a thing; a thing considered as possessing certain non-essential attributes. Also (now rare), an attribute or quality of a substance. L17.
J. A. Froude God is an all-perfect Being..existence is a mode of perfection, and therefore God exists.
II.
A prevailing fashion, custom, or style, esp. of a particular place or period; (arch.) the fashion in dress, etiquette, etc., prevalent in society at the time. M17.
W. C. Smith A sort of dandies in religion, Affecting the last mode. A. Lurie Historians of costume have put forward various explanations for the modes of the 1920s.
b. Conventional usage in dress, manners, etc., esp. among people of fashion. L17.
T. Jefferson These sentiments became a matter of mode.
c. A fashionable person or thing. E18-E19.
A thin light glossy black silk, alamode. obsolete exc. Hist. M18.
Lace-making. sing. & in pl. Fancy stitching or stitches used to fill enclosed spaces in a design. M19.
[Short for French gris mode fashion grey.] Any of several shades of grey used in women's clothing. Now rare. L19.
Statistics. The value or range of values of the variable which occurs most frequently in a set of data etc. L19.
Phrases: all the mode enjoying general but usually temporary popularity, fashionable at the time in question. in mode, in the mode in fashion or customary use, esp. in polite society. man of mode = man of fashion s.v. FASHION noun 7.
Comb.: mode-locked adjective (Physics) subjected to or resulting from mode-locking; mode-locking Physics a technique of establishing a fixed phase relationship between the modes of oscillation in a laser, resulting in the emission at nanosecond intervals of short trains of picosecond light pulses.
b. adjective. Made of the silk mode (obsolete exc. Hist.). Also (rare), of the grey mode. L18.
modeless adjective (a) unmeasured; (b) having no mode: L16.