释义 |
sixth sense|sɪksθ sɛns| [f. sixth a. + sense n.] A supposed intuitive faculty by which a person or animal perceives facts and regulates action without the direct use of any of the five senses. Hence sixth-sense v. trans., to discover by means of a sixth sense; sixth-sensed a., possessing a sixth sense.
[1687W. Domvile tr. B. de Fontenelle's Plurality of Worlds iii. 50 It has been thought that we want a sixth natural Sense, by which we might know many things more than we do.] 1761Sterne Tr. Shandy IV. i. 75 There seems in some passages to want a sixth sense to do it rightly. 1807R. Southey Lett. from England II. xl. 176 It was surprising to see them [sc. the blind] move about the room,..as if they had possessed that sixth sense, which experimental naturalists..are said to have discovered in bats, when they have put out their eyes. 1841Dickens Barn. Rudge xxxiii. 122 People..doing exactly the same things for a great many years, acquire a sixth sense, or some unknown power of influencing each other. 1903Science Siftings 31 Oct. 46/1 The ‘sixth sense’ by which blind persons perceive certain objects. 1958R. Godden Greengage Summer xvi. 199 Did she have some sixth-sense warning? 1967Punch 25 Oct. 609/2 This, I sixth-sensed, could well be it. 1976J. Crosby Nightfall xxx. 176 About Elf I am second-sighted, sixth-sensed, magicked. 1979R. Jaffe Class Reunion (1980) ii. iii. 199 There was something about living together and being very close that gave people a sort of sixth sense. |