virtual

• POS: Adjective
• HYPHEN: vir=tu=al

CIDE DICTIONARY

virtual, a. [Cf. F. virtuel. See Virtue.].

•  Having the power of acting or of invisible efficacy without the agency of the material or sensible part; potential; energizing.  [1913 Webster]

  "Heat and cold have a virtual transition, without communication of substance."  [1913 Webster]

  "Every kind that lives,
  Fomented by his virtual power, and warmed."  [1913 Webster]
•  Being in essence or effect, not in fact; as, the virtual presence of a man in his agent or substitute.  [1913 Webster]

  "A thing has a virtual existence when it has all the conditions necessary to its actual existence."  [1913 Webster]

  "To mask by slight differences in the manners a virtual identity in the substance."  [1913 Webster]

Principle of virtual velocities (Mech.), the law that when several forces are in equilibrium, the algebraic sum of their virtual moments is equal to zero. -- Virtual focus (Opt.), the point from which rays, having been rendered divergent by reflection of refraction, appear to issue; the point at which converging rays would meet if not reflected or refracted before they reach it. -- Virtual image. (Optics) See under Image. -- Virtual moment (of a force) (Mech.), the product of the intensity of the force multiplied by the virtual velocity of its point of application; -- sometimes called virtual work. -- Virtual velocity (Mech.), a minute hypothetical displacement, assumed in analysis to facilitate the investigation of statical problems. With respect to any given force of a number of forces holding a material system in equilibrium, it is the projection, upon the direction of the force, of a line joining its point of application with a new position of that point indefinitely near to the first, to which the point is conceived to have been moved, without disturbing the equilibrium of the system, or the connections of its parts with each other. Strictly speaking, it is not a velocity but a length. -- Virtual work. (Mech.) See Virtual moment, above.

OXFORD DICTIONARY

virtual, adj.
1 that is such for practical purposes though not in name or according to strict definition (is the virtual manager of the business; take this as a virtual promise).
2 Optics relating to the points at which rays would meet if produced backwards (virtual focus; virtual image).
3 Mech. relating to an infinitesimal displacement of a point in a system.
4 Computing not physically existing as such but made by software to appear to do so (virtual memory).

Derivative

virtuality n. virtually adv.

Etymology

ME f. med.L virtualis f. L virtus after LL virtuosus

THESAURUS

virtual

accepted, basic, between the lines, constructive, covert, cryptic, delitescent, dormant, effective, esoteric, essential, fundamental, hibernating, hidden, latent, lurking, muffled, mystic, obfuscated, obscured, occult, possible, potential, practical, sleeping, submerged, under the surface, underlying, understood, unmanifested, veiled

ROGET THESAURUS

virtual

Inexistence

N inexistence, nonexistence, nonsubsistence, nonentity, nil, negativeness, nullity, nihility, nihilism, tabula rasa, blank, abeyance, absence, no such thing, nonbeing, nothingness, oblivion, annihilation, extinction, extinguishment, extirpation, Nirvana, obliteration, inexistent, nonexistent, negative, blank, missing, omitted, absent, insubstantial, shadowy, spectral, visionary, unreal, potential, virtual, baseless, in nubibus, unsubstantial, vain, unborn, uncreated, unbegotten, unconceived, unproduced, unmade, perished, annihilated extinct, exhausted, gone, lost, vanished, departed, gone with the wind, defunct, fabulous, ideal, supposititious &c, negatively, virtually, non ens.

Intrinsicality

N intrinsicality, inbeing, inherence, inhesion, subjectiveness, ego, egohood, essence, noumenon, essentialness, essential part, quintessence, incarnation, quiddity, gist, pith, marrow, core, sap, lifeblood, backbone, heart, soul, important part, principle, nature, constitution, character, type, quality, crasis, diathesis, habit, temper, temperament, spirit, humor, grain, disposition, endowment, capacity, capability, moods, declensions, features, aspects, peculiarities, idiosyncrasy, oddity, idiocrasy, diagnostics, derived from within, subjective, intrinsic, intrinsical, fundamental, normal, implanted, inherent, essential, natural, innate, inborn, inbred, ingrained, inwrought, coeval with birth, genetous, haematobious, syngenic, radical, incarnate, thoroughbred, hereditary, inherited, immanent, congenital, congenite, connate, running in the blood, ingenerate, ingenite, indigenous, in the grain, bred in the bone, instinctive, inward, internal, to the manner born, virtual, characteristic, invariable, incurable, incorrigible, ineradicable, fixed, intrinsically, at bottom, in the main, in effect, practically, virtually, substantially, au fond, fairly, character is higher than intellect, come give us a taste of your quality, magnos homines virtute metimur non fortuna, non numero haec judicantur sed pondere, vital spark of heavenly flame.