Life

Pronunciation

• IPA: /laɪf/
• Rhymes: -aɪf

Origin

From Middle English lif, lyf, from Old English līf ("life, existence; life-time"), from Proto-Germanic *lībą ("life, body"), from Proto-Germanic *lībaną ("to remain, stay, be left"), from Proto-Indo-European *leyp-, *lip- ("to stick, glue"). Cognate with Scots life, leif ("life"), North Frisian liff ("life, limb, person, livelihood"), West Frisian liif ("belly, abdomen"), Dutch lijf ("body"), Low German lif ("body; life, life-force; waist"), German Leib ("body"), Swedish liv ("life; waist"), Icelandic líf ("life"). Related to belive.

Full definition of life

Noun

1. The state that follows birth, and precedes death; the state of being alive and living.
   He gave up on life.
   Having experienced both, the vampire decided that he preferred (un)death to life.
• 2013-06-01, Towards the end of poverty, But poverty’s scourge is fiercest below $1.25 (the average of the 15 poorest countries’ own poverty lines, measured in 2005 dollars and adjusted for differences in purchasing power): people below that level live lives that are poor, nasty, brutish and short.
1. A living being.
   Many lives were lost during the war.
• 2014-06-14, It's a gas, One of the hidden glories of Victorian engineering is proper drains. Isolating a city’s effluent and shipping it away in underground sewers has probably saved more lives than any medical procedure except vaccination.
2. (biology) A status given to any entity including animals, plants, fungi, bacteria, etc. — and sometimes viruses — having the properties of replication and metabolism.
3. A period of time.
1. The period during which one (a person, an animal, a plant, a star) is alive.
• 1916, Ezra Meeker, The Busy Life of Eighty-Five Years of Ezra Meeker
2. The span of time during which an object operates.
   This light bulb is designed to have a life of 2,000 hours.
3. The period of time during which an object is recognizable.
   The life of this milk carton may be thousands of years in this landfill.
4. (colloquial) A life sentence; a term of imprisonment of a convict until his or her death.
5. Personal existence.
1. (philosophy) The essence of the manifestation and the foundation of the being.
• 1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Land That Time Forgot Chapter VI"... I realize as never before how cheap and valueless a thing is life. Life seems a joke, a cruel, grim joke. You are a laughable incident or a terrifying one as you happen to be less powerful or more powerful than some other form of life which crosses your path; but as a rule you are of no moment whatsoever to anything but yourself. You are a comic little figure, hopping from the cradle to the grave. Yes, that is our trouble—we take ourselves too seriously; but Caprona should be a sure cure for that." She paused and laughed.
2. (phenomenology) The subjective and inner manifestation of the individual.
• 1898, Winston Churchill, The Celebrity Chapter 1, The stories did not seem to me to touch life. They were plainly intended to have a bracing moral effect, and perhaps had this result for the people at whom they were aimed. They left me with the impression of a well-delivered stereopticon lecture, with characters about as life-like as the shadows on the screen, and whisking on and off, at the mercy of the operator.
3. The world in general; existence.
   Man's life on this planet has been marked by continual conflict.
4. A worthwhile existence.
   He gets up early in the morning, works all day long — even on weekends — and hardly sees his family. That's no life!
   His life was ruined by drugs.
5. The most worthwhile component or participant.
• 1970, Mathuram Bhoothalingam, The finger on the lute: the story of Mahakavi Subramania Bharati, National Council of Educational Research and Training, page 87:"Don't I know that it is you who is the life of this house. Two delightful children!"
• 1998 Monica F. Cohen, Professional domesticity in the Victorian novel: Women, work and home, Cambridge University Press, page 32:And he is the life of the party at the Musgroves for precisely this reason: the navy has made him into a great storyteller.
6. Something which is inherently part of a person's existence, such as job, family, a loved one, etc.
   She's my love, my life.
7. (informal) Social life.
   Get a life.
• 1915, George A. Birmingham, Gossamer Chapter 1, It is never possible to settle down to the ordinary routine of life at sea until the screw begins to revolve. There is an hour or two, after the passengers have embarked, which is disquieting and fussy.
8. A biography.
   His life of the founder is finished, except for the title.
• C. MiddletonWriters of particular lives...are apt to be prejudiced in favour of their subject.
6. (video games) One of the player's chances to play, lost when a mistake is made.
   Scoring 1000 points is rewarded with an extra life.

Synonyms

• (philosophy, essence of manifestation and foundation of being) existence, experience
• (the world in general) time

Antonyms

• (the state that precedes death) death
• (biology) coma
• (philosophy) void

Derived terms

Related terms

Anagrams

• file
• lief