Definify.com
Webster 1913 Edition
Potential
1.
Being potent; endowed with energy adequate to a result; efficacious; influential.
[Obs.]
“And hath in his effect a voice potential.” Shak.
2.
Existing in possibility, not in actuality.
“A potential hero.” Carlyle.
Potential
existence means merely that the thing may be at ome time; actual
existence, that it now is. Sir W. Hamilton.
Potential cautery
. See under
– Cautery
. Potential energy
. (Mech.)
See the Note under
– Energy
. Potential mood
, or
Potential mode
(Gram.)
, that form of the verb which is used to express possibility, liberty, power, will, obligation, or necessity, by the use of may, can, must, might, could, would, or should; as, I may go; he can write.
Po-ten′tial
,Noun.
1.
Anything that may be possible; a possibility; potentially.
Bacon.
2.
(Math.)
In the theory of gravitation, or of other forces acting in space, a function of the rectangular coordinates which determine the position of a point, such that its differential coefficients with respect to the coordinates are equal to the components of the force at the point considered; – also called
potential function
, or force function
. It is called also Newtonian potential
when the force is directed to a fixed center and is inversely as the square of the distance from the center. 3.
(Elec.)
The energy of an electrical charge measured by its power to do work; hence, the degree of electrification as referred to some standard, as that of the earth; electro-motive force.
Webster 1828 Edition
Potential
POTEN'TIAL
,Adj.
1.
Existing in possibility, not in act. This potential and imaginary materia prima, cannot exist without form.
2.
Efficacious; powerful. [Not in use.]Potential cautery, in medicine, is the consuming or reducing to an eschar, any part of the body by a caustic alkaline or metallic salt, &c. instead of a red hot iron, the use of which is called actual cautery.
Potential mode, in grammar, is that form of the verb which is used to express the power, possibility, liberty or necessity of an action or of being; as, I may go; he can write. This, in English, is not strictly a distinct mode, but the indicative or declarative mode, affirming the power to act, instead of the act itself. I may go or can go, are equivalent to, I have power to go.
POTEN'TIAL
,Noun.