| 释义 |
median, a.1 and n.1|ˈmiːdɪən|
Also 6 -ane.
[ad. L. mediān-us (cf. mean a.2), f. medius middle: see -an. Cf. F. médian, Sp., Pg., It. mediano.]
A. adj.
1. a. Occupying a middle or intermediate position; middle; † neutral.
1645Sacred Decretal 11 Not knowing which way the Dice would fall, we kept ourselves in a direct Median Posture, that wee might be sure notwithstanding, which way soever it went. 1656Blount Glossogr., Median, the middle, half, mean; not deserving praise or dispraise. 1771Antiq. Sarisb. 13 The Gates and the median rampart. 1877J. Sully Pessimism 244 In the lower and median latitudes of our emotional life.
b. median strip, a strip of ground, paved or landscaped, dividing a street or highway. N. Amer.
1954J. C. Ingraham Mod. Traffic Control ii. 31 Choice of the type of median strip—solid concrete, grass and curbing or grass alone. 1967Boston Sunday Herald 7 May 1/1 A fence erected on the median strip to discourage the road⁓crossings. Ibid., The need for the closing of dangerous, life-taking crossovers in the median strip. 1968Globe & Mail (Toronto) 3 Feb. 31/4 A street of exceptionally broad sidewalks and a median strip for trams. 1971Fremdsprachen XV. 67/1 The city of Lawndale, Calif., recently installed nearly two miles of man-made turf on its traffic median strips.
2. Special scientific uses.
a. Anat., as median artery, median nerve, median vein, now chiefly applied to certain structures in the arm; formerly in various other applications.
median line: any line in the median plane. median plane: the plane which divides any body into two equal and symmetrical parts; the mesial plane or meson.
1592Nashe Strange News K 2 b, This I will proudly boast..that the vaine which I haue (be it a median vaine, or a madde man) is of my owne begetting. 1597A. M. tr. Guillemeau's Fr. Chirurg. 30 The fourth is the mediane, or kidneyevayne, situated belowe the foote. 1629Bp. Hall Serm. to Lds. of Parlt. 18 Feb., God and his divine phisician doe still let bloud in the median vein of the heart. 1831R. Knox Cloquet's Anat. 85 The last-mentioned suture, designated by the name of the Median or Frontal,..is generally indistinct. 1835–6Todd's Cycl. Anat. I. 217/2 The median nerve. 1840G. V. Ellis Anat. 25 The anterior median fissure of the medulla spinalis.
b. Zool., as median crest, median fin, median line (see a), etc.
1835–6Todd's Cycl. Anat. I. 706/1 The median parts of the lobes of the mantle [in Conchifera] are extremely thin. 1840Cuvier's Anim. Kingd. 197 The Great Tit..with a black median list down the belly. 1861Hulme tr. Moquin-Tandon ii. iii. ii. 112 The median line of the abdomen. 1894R. B. Sharpe Handbk. Birds Gt. Brit. I. 35 The lesser and median wing-coverts white.
c. Bot.
[1852Henslow Dict. Bot. Terms 105 Medianus, when some part originates or is connected with the middle of some other.] 1884Bower & Scott De Bary's Phaner. 160 The median plane of the lens-shaped double cavity. 1900Jackson Gloss. Bot. Terms, Median Line, the central line of a bilateral organ, as the midrib of a symmetric leaf. Ibid., Median Wall, in Archegoniates, the wall in a plane at right angles to the basal wall dividing the proëmbryo into lateral halves.
d. Surg. Of an incision: Made through the middle of a tumour. median lithotomy: that method in which the incision is made through the median line of the perinæum (opposed to lateral).
1854Allarton Lithotomy Simplif. 42 The spot selected for the incision in the median operation. 1863― (title) A Treatise on Modern Median Lithotomy. 1891Lancet 18 Apr. 907/1 He makes a median incision over the tumour.
e. Geography, etc.
median line, the line along the middle of the calm belt between the north and south trade winds. median zone, a zone along the sea-bottom between 50 and 100 fathoms in depth.
a1854E. Forbes Nat. Hist. Europ. Seas (1859) 100 The inhabitants of the median or coralline zone around the British shores. 1875J. Croll Climate & Time xiv. 229 During a glacial period in the northern hemisphere the median line between the trades would be shifted..south of the equator.
3. Statistics.
a. Used to designate that quantity which is so related to the quantities occurring in a given set of instances that exactly as many of them exceed it as fall short of it. median dose, a dose which is effective in half of those receiving it.
Thus, 6 is the median number of the set 1, 1, 2, 6, 20, 20, 27.
1882F. Galton in Rep. Brit. Assoc. Adv. Sci. 1881 245 The Median, in height, weight, or any other attribute, is the value which is exceeded by one-half of an infinitely large group, and which the other half falls short of. 1894Times 19 Dec. 12/2 If graphically arranged, they would present a ‘curve of error’, the ‘median ordinate’ of which (to use a phrase familiar to the new school of statisticians) would yield a sentence far more satisfactory and just than many that are every week awarded. 1900Boston (Mass.) Transcript Mar., The average age of the population of the United States..is twenty-five years; the median age is twenty-one years. The latter means the point at which there are as many people above as below. 1929Kelley & Shen in C. Murchison Found. Exper. Psychol. 838 Some investigators have often preferred the median to the mean as a measure of central tendency. 1947Radiology XLIX. 302/2 Most of the following data were obtained after median lethal and lower doses of radiation. 1973Daily Tel. 30 Jan. 7/1 The Statistical Office report shows the median wage for Northamptonshire as {pstlg}1,260.
b. (See quot.)
1901U.S. 12th Census Rep. I. p. xxxvi, The median point is the point of intersection of the line dividing the population equally north and south with the line dividing it equally east and west.
B. n.
1. Anat. The median vein, nerve, etc.
1541R. Copland Guydon's Quest. Chirurg. M iij, Howe many and what veynes are to be let blode in the body?..there be .xij amyd the armes that is to wyte two medyans, two cephalykes [etc.]. 1564–78W. Bullein Dial. agst. Pest. (1888) 41 Fower vnces [of blood must be letten]..sometyme in the Median, sometyme in the Basilica. 1660Culpepper Two Treat. (1672) 10 In Summer open still the Liver-vein, In Spring that of the Heart called Median. 1899Allbutt's Syst. Med. VIII. 9 The simultaneous examination of the medians can only be made by crossing the hands.
†2. Something which is in an intermediate condition. Obs.
1635D. Person Varieties i. v. 16 Fumes are medians betwixt fire and earth, in respect that they are easily transmuted or changed in the one or the other.
3. Math. A line drawn from a vertex of a triangle to the midpoint of the opposite side.
1883Encycl. Brit. XVI. 15/1 If a, b, c be the three sides of a triangle, and α, β, γ the three medians, i.e., the lines drawn from the angles to the middle points of the opposite sides. 1888[see cosymmedian]. 1888Hall & Stevens Text-bk. Euclid (1894) 105 The medians of a triangle are concurrent.
4. Statistics. A median quantity (see A. 3).
1902F. Y. Edgeworth in Encycl. Brit. XXVIII. 287/1 The median (that point which has as many of the given observations above as below it).
Add:[B.] 5. = median strip., sense A. 1 b above. U.S.
1944Policy on Grade Separations for Intersecting Highways (Amer. Assoc. State Highway Officials) 36 It is practicable to span four lanes and a narrow median without a central pier. 1976N.Y. Times 25 Sept. 18 There is much..benefit to be gained by refashioning the old highway into a promenade with a grass median bracketed by bicycle lanes. 1985New Yorker 18 Nov. 49/1, I take a corner too fast, bump into a curb, then bounce up on the median. 1992Albuquerque (New Mexico) Jrnl. 27 Dec. a5/5 A state Highway Department fence in the median prevented him from crossing over. |