BRAIN • DICCIONARIO INGLES.COM • Definition of Brain

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/breɪn/ Listen

noun

Brain n.

(Anat.) The whitish mass of soft matter (the center of the nervous system, and the seat of consciousness and volition) which is inclosed in the cartilaginous or bony cranium of vertebrate animals. It is simply the anterior termination of the spinal cord, and is developed from three embryonic vesicles, whose cavities are connected with the central canal of the cord; the cavities of the vesicles become the central cavities, or ventricles, and the walls thicken unequally and become the three segments, the fore-, mid-, and hind-brain. Note: In the brain of man the cerebral lobes, or largest part of the forebrain, are enormously developed so as to overhang the cerebellum, the great lobe of the hindbrain, and completely cover the lobes of the midbrain. The surface of the cerebrum is divided into irregular ridges, or convolutions, separated by grooves (the so-called fissures and sulci), and the two hemispheres are connected at the bottom of the longitudinal fissure by a great transverse band of nervous matter, the corpus callosum, while the two halves of the cerebellum are connected on the under side of the brain by the bridge, or pons Varolii.

(Zool.) The anterior or cephalic ganglion in insects and other invertebrates.

The organ or seat of intellect; hence, the understanding; as, use your brains. " My brain is too dull." Note: In this sense, often used in the plural.

The affections; fancy; imagination. (R.)

A very intelligent person. (informal)

The controlling electronic mechanism for a robot, guided missile, computer, or other device exhibiting some degree of self-regulation. (informal)

To have on the brain, to have constantly in one's thoughts, as a sort of monomania. (Low)

no-brainer a decision requiring little or no thought; an obvious choice. (slang)

Brain box or Brain case, the bony or cartilaginous case inclosing the brain.

Brain coral, Brain stone coral (Zool.), a massive reef-building coral having the surface covered by ridges separated by furrows so as to resemble somewhat the surface of the brain, esp. such corals of the genera Maeandrina and Diploria.

Brain fag (Med.), brain weariness. See Cerebropathy.

Brain fever (Med.), fever in which the brain is specially affected; any acute cerebral affection attended by fever.

Brain sand, calcareous matter found in the pineal gland.

verb

Brain v. t. (past & past part. brained; pres. part. braining)

To dash out the brains of; to kill by beating out the brains. Hence, Fig.: To destroy; to put an end to; to defeat. "There thou mayst brain him." "It was the swift celerity of the death... That brained my purpose."

To conceive; to understand. (Obs.) "'T is still a dream, or else such stuff as madmen Tongue, and brain not."

See images of 'Brain'

Etymology of 'Brain'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Brain" Quotes from Famous Books

... poison. Far from her, his imagination completes what reality had begun: seated on the foot of his bed, absorbed in thought, he once more sees Cressida, and sees her so beautiful, depicted in outlines so vivid, and colours so glowing, that this divine image fashioned in his own brain is henceforth the only one he will behold; forever will he have before his eyes that celestial form of superhuman beauty, never more the real earthly Cressida, the frail daughter of Calchas. Troilus is ill for life ...

— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand

... enslaved land, angel through love, witch through fancy, child by faith, aged by experience, man in brain, woman in heart, giant by hope, mother through sorrow, poet in thy dreams, to Thee belongs this book, in which thy love, thy fancy, thy experience, thy sorrow, thy hope, thy dreams, are the warp through ...

— As Seen By Me • Lilian Bell

... need—I grant him all you say and more, Vain, ambitious, large of purpose, Fantastic, fiery, swift and confident, A wayward child of vanity and spleen, A hair-brain'd mad-cap, dreamer of gold dreams, A daily feaster on high self-conceit, With many glorious faults beside, Weak minds ...

— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb IV - Poems and Plays • Charles and Mary Lamb

... went to her car, and she sought a person who professed to tell fortunes, and whom she made to say: "A gentleman is in love with you. And he loves you for your brain. He is not your husband. He is more to you than your husband. I hear his silver voice holding spellbound hundreds of people; I see his majestic forehead and his auburn locks and the ...

— My Neighbors - Stories of the Welsh People • Caradoc Evans

... individual is led to reproduce often the same series of actions it contracts a habit; the repetition may be so frequent that the animal comes to accomplish it without knowing it; the brain no longer intervenes; the spinal cord or the chain of ganglia alone govern this order of acts, to which has been given the name of reflex actions. A reflex may be so powerful as to be transmitted by heredity to the descendants; it then ...

— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay

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