- explicitly stated, stipulated, or expressed: a positive acceptance of the agreement.
- admitting of no question: positive proof.
- stated; express; emphatic: a positive denial.
- confident in opinion or assertion; fully assured: He is positive that he will win the contest.
- overconfident or dogmatic: The less he knows, the more positive he gets.
- without relation to or comparison with other things; not relative or comparative; absolute.
- downright; out-and-out: She's a positive genius.
- determined by enactment or convention; arbitrarily laid down: positive law.
- emphasizing what is laudable, hopeful, or to the good; constructive: a positive attitude toward the future; positive things to say about a painting.
- encouraging or noting a healthy or balanced outlook toward something, especially toward sex and sexuality (used in combination):sex-positive attitudes;the body-positive movement;a gay-positive movie.
- not speculative or theoretical; practical: a positive approach to the problem.
- possessing an actual force, being, existence, etc.
- Philosophy.
- constructive and sure, rather than skeptical.
- concerned with or based on matters of experience: positive philosophy.
- showing or expressing approval or agreement; favorable: a positive reaction to the speech.
- consisting in or characterized by the presence or possession of distinguishing or marked qualities or features (opposed to negative): Light is positive, darkness negative.
- noting the presence of such qualities, as a term.
- measured or proceeding in a direction assumed as beneficial, progressive, or auspicious: a positive upturn in the stock market.
- Electricity.
- of, relating to, or characterized by positive electricity.
- indicating a point in a circuit that has a higher potential than that of another point, the current flowing from the point of higher potential to the point of lower potential.
- of, relating to, or noting the north pole of a magnet.
- (of an element or group) tending to lose electrons and become positively charged; basic.
- being, noting, or pertaining to the initial degree of the comparison of adjectives and adverbs, as the positive form good.
- Medicine/Medical.
- (of blood, affected tissue, etc.) indicating the presence of a specified medical condition or substance:Her urine was positive for opiates.
- (of a diagnostic test) indicating the presence of the medical condition or substance tested for:a positive test for tuberculosis.
- (of a person) diagnosed as having a specified medical condition, or having a specified substance in the body (often used in combination):He's HIV positive.She tested positive for lupus.
- Rh factor.
- noting a quantity greater than zero.
- (of government) assuming control or regulation of activities beyond those involved merely with the maintenance of law and order.
- oriented or moving toward the focus of excitation: a positive tropism.
- denoting a print or transparency showing the brightness values as they are in the subject.
- noting or pertaining to a process or machine part having a fixed or certain operation, especially as the result of elimination of play, free motion, etc.: positive lubrication.
- something positive.
- a positive quality or characteristic.
- a positive quantity or symbol.
- a positive test result:The athlete was disqualified from competing because his drug test came back a positive.
- Grammar.
- the positive degree.
- a form in the positive, as good or smooth.
- a positive image, as on a print or transparency.
- characterized by or expressing certainty or affirmation
- composed of or possessing actual or specific qualities; real
- tending to emphasize what is good or laudable; constructive
- tending towards progress or improvement; moving in a beneficial direction
- philosophy
- constructive rather than sceptical
- (of a concept) denoting the presence rather than the absence of some property
- independent of circumstances; absolute or unqualified
- (intensifier)
- maths
- having a value greater than zero
- designating, consisting of, or graduated in one or more quantities greater than zero
- maths
- measured in a direction opposite to that regarded as negative
- having the same magnitude as but opposite sense to an equivalent negative quantity
- denoting the usual form of an adjective as opposed to its comparative or superlative form
- indicating movement or growth towards a particular stimulus
- physics
- (of an electric charge) having an opposite polarity to the charge of an electron and the same polarity as the charge of a proton
- (of a body, system, ion, etc) having a positive electric charge; having a deficiency of electrons
- (of a point in an electric circuit) having a higher electric potential than some other point with an assigned zero potential
- short for electropositive
- (of a lens) capable of causing convergence of a parallel beam of light
- (of the results of an examination or test) indicating the existence or presence of a suspected disorder or pathogenic organism
- (of the effect of a drug or therapeutic regimen) beneficial or satisfactory
- short for Rh positive
- (of a machine part) having precise motion with no hysteresis or backlash
- (of a government) directly involved in activities beyond the minimum maintenance of law and order, such as social welfare or the organization of scientific research
- of or denoting an analysis that is free of ethical, political, or value judgments
- of, relating to, or governed by the group of signs of the zodiac that belong to the air and fire classifications, which are associated with a self-expressive spontaneous nature
- something that is positive
- a quantity greater than zero
- a print or slide showing a photographic image whose colours or tones correspond to those of the original subject
- the positive degree of an adjective or adverb
- a positive object, such as a terminal or plate in a voltaic cell
- music
- a medieval nonportable organ with one manual and no pedals
- a variant spelling of positif
