| 释义 |
constructive, a.|kənˈstrʌktɪv|
[ad. med.L. constructīv-us, f. construct- ppl. stem: see -ive. Cf. F. constructif, -ive, 15th c. in Godef.]
1. a. Having the quality of constructing; given to construction. Also spec. of immaterial objects, ideas, etc.: having the quality of contributing helpfully (esp. opp. destructive).
1841–4Emerson Ess., Intellect Wks. (Bohn) I. 139 The constructive intellect produces thoughts, sentences, poems, plans, designs, systems. 1876J. H. Newman Hist. Sk. II. iii. vii. 345 Cyril was a clear-headed, constructive theologian. 1878Lecky Eng. in 18th C. II. viii. 514 We look in vain..for any signs of administrative or constructive talent. 1943H. Read Education through Art i. 9 Constructive education. 1955Bull. Atomic Sci. Apr. 145/1 The poor ones are those who like their job, not for its constructive, but for its destructive, qualities. 1955Times 9 May 10/3 It would not be a passive condition, but ‘eminently constructive’. 1962in Ann. Reg. 1962 (1963) 528 The United States government will be prepared to discuss these questions urgently, and in a constructive spirit, at Geneva or elsewhere. 1965New Statesman 19 Mar. 425/2 The New Statesman..has a duty to subject the government to a continuous process of constructive criticism.
b. constructive dilemma: in Logic, a dilemma that has alternative affirmations in its minor premiss (opp. destructive a. d); esp., the form of argument by which from two conditional propositions and the alternation of their antecedents one infers the alternation of their consequents (see quot. 1953).
1826Whately Logic ii. iii. Suppl. §5. 114 (side-note), Simple constructive Dilemma. 1906J. N. Keynes Formal Logic (ed. 4) iii. vi. 365 Taking the simple constructive dilemma given above, and contrapositing the major. 1953I. M. Copi Introd. Logic viii. 243 An argument form such as that of the Constructive Dilemma, (p⊃q).(r⊃s), p{logicor}r {ergo} q{logicor}s.
2. Of or pertaining to construction.
1817Let. in Coleridge Biog. Lit. I. xiii. 293, I look forward anxiously to your great book on the constructive philosophy. 1877S. J. Owen Wellesley's Desp. p. xxix, There was no hope of any constructive, wise, and political development from such a quarter. 1889Whitaker's Alm. 214 Naval Service..Constructive and Engineering Staff.
3. Belonging to the construction or structure of a building, etc.; structural, constructional.
1865J. Fergusson Hist. Arch. I. 25 Architectural ornament is of two kinds, constructive and decorative. By the former is meant all those contrivances, such as capitals, brackets, vaulting shafts, and the like, which serve to explain or give expression to the construction. 1874J. T. Micklethwaite Mod. Par. Churches 212 Design should be based upon constructive exigencies.
4. a. Deduced by construction or interpretation; resulting from a certain interpretation; not directly expressed, but inferred; inferential, virtual; often applied in legal language to what in the eye of the law amounts to the act or condition specified.
a1680Butler Rem. (1759) I. 282 Will an implicit constructive Acknowledgment bind those, whom solemn Oaths and Vows to Almighty God cannot hold? 1681Trial of S. Colledge 51 A seizing of the King..is a constructive intention of the death of the King; for Kings are never Prisoners, but in order to their death. a1852D. Webster Wks. (1877) IV. 107 The power of control and direction..is derived, by those who maintain it, from the right of removal: that is to say, it is a constructive power: it has an express warrant in the Constitution. 1865Lubbock Preh. Times iv. (1878) 165 Thus the customs of a tribe may..forbid marriage with one set of constructive sisters or brothers.
b. Hence constructive blasphemy, constructive contempt, constructive injury, constructive notice, constructive possession, constructive treason, constructive trust, etc.
constructive total loss (in Marine Insurance): the assumption of the loss of a ship or cargo as total under certain circumstances, as when arrival or recovery seems highly improbable, or the cost of the repairs promises to exceed the value, the owner abandoning to the insurers all claim to the ship and receiving the amount insured.
a1714Burnet Own Time an. 1682 (T.) It was not possible to make it look even like a constructive treason. 1769Blackstone Comm. IV. 75 The creatures of tyrannical princes had opportunity to create abundance of constructive treasons; that is, to raise, by forced and arbitrary constructions, offences into the crime and punishment of treason, which never were suspected to be such. 1789Durnford & East Reports III. 466 The necessity of an actual possession by the bankrupt, in contradistinction to a constructive possession by the intervention of an agent. a1797H. Walpole Mem. Geo. III, x. (1845) 319 It was at most constructive blasphemy. 1848Arnould Mar. Insur. (1866) I. i. iv. 170 Cases of constructive total loss. 1859Mill Liberty iv. 147 The merely contingent, or, as it may be called, constructive injury which a person causes to society, by conduct which neither violates any specific duty to the public, nor occasions perceptible hurt to any assignable individual except himself.
c. Math. Of a proof: showing how an entity may in principle be constructed or arrived at in a finite number of steps, without depending on the concept of an infinite set (though the entity may belong to such a set). Of, pertaining to, or being a philosophy of mathematics that accepts only proofs of this kind.
1938A. Church in Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. XLIV. 224 The existence of at least a vague distinction between what I shall call the constructive and the non-constructive ordinals of the second number class, that is, between the ordinals which can in some sense be built up step by step from below and those for which this cannot be done.., is, I believe, somewhat generally recognized. 1943Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. LIII. 41 It appears that there is a proposition provable classically for which no constructive proof is possible. 1965[see intuitionism 3]. 1972M. Kline Math. Thought li. 1203 The definition of a prime number is constructive, for it can be applied to determine in a finite number of steps whether a number is prime. The insistence on a constructive definition applies especially to infinite sets. 1977Sci. Amer. May 122/3 Stein's 1961 paper..extended the result to all values of k greater than 2; moreover, it did so in a constructive manner. 1979Sci. Amer. Oct. 134/1 The belief that mathematics is invented has given rise to a controversial theory known as constructive mathematics, which maintains that to prove that a mathematical object exists it is necessary to show how the object can be constructed.
5. Of or pertaining to constructivism.
1924H. Carter New Theatre Soviet Russia 71 By constructive scenery Meierhold understands essential scenery adapted to the realisation of man's free acting in space, and not photography or decoration. Ibid. 72 The scenery was simple, essential and constructive. 1929Encycl. Brit. XXII. plate 111 (facing 24) Expressionistic, constructive and abstract settings. 1937N. Gabo in J. L. Martin et al. Circle i. 3 The original source from which the Constructive idea derives is Cubism. |