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ideal
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As an adjective, ideal means optimal. As a noun, it means a perfect standard of beauty, intellect etc., or a standard of excellence to aim at.
Meanings of ideal
17 meaningsadjective
Optimal; being the best possibility.
Perfect, flawless, having no defects.
Pertaining to ideas, or to a given idea.
Existing only in the mind; conceptual, imaginary.
Teaching or relating to the doctrine of idealism.
“the ideal theory or philosophy”
mathematicsNot actually present, but considered as present when limits at infinity are included.
“An ideal triangle in the hyperbolic disk is one bounded by three geodesics that meet precisely on the circle.”
Conforming to an ultimate standard of perfection or excellence; embodying an ideal
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”
Of or relating to the philosophical doctrine of the reality of ideas
Similar: idealistic
noun
A perfect standard of beauty, intellect etc., or a standard of excellence to aim at.
“Ideals are like stars; you will not succeed in touching them with your hands. But like the seafaring man on the desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them you will reach your destiny - Carl Schurz”
algebraring theoryA subring closed under multiplication by its containing ring.
algebraorder theorylattice theoryA non-empty lower set (of a partially ordered set) which is closed under binary suprema (a.k.a. joins).
set theoryA collection of sets, considered small or negligible, such that every subset of each member and the union of any two members are also members of the collection.
algebralie theoryA Lie subalgebra (subspace that is closed under the Lie bracket) 𝖍 of a given Lie algebra 𝖌 such that the Lie bracket [𝖌,𝖍] is a subset of 𝖍.
algebraA subsemigroup with the property that if any semigroup element outside of it is added to any one of its members, the result must lie outside of it.
The idea of something that is perfect; something that one hopes to attain
Model of excellence or perfection of a kind; one having no equalperson
Similar: paragon, nonpareil, saint, apotheosis, nonesuch, nonsuch
Meanings from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0) and Open English WordNet (CC BY 4.0).