Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Being positive or desirable in nature; not bad or poor.
  • adjective Having the qualities that are desirable or distinguishing in a particular thing.
  • adjective Serving the desired purpose or end; suitable.
  • adjective Not spoiled or ruined.
  • adjective In excellent condition; sound.
  • adjective Superior to the average; satisfactory.
  • adjective Used formerly to refer to the US Government grade of meat higher than standard and lower than choice.
  • adjective Of high quality.
  • adjective Discriminating.
  • adjective Of moral excellence; upright.
  • adjective Benevolent; kind.
  • adjective Loyal; staunch.
  • adjective Well-behaved; obedient.
  • adjective Socially correct; proper.
  • adjective Worthy of respect; honorable.
  • adjective Attractive; handsome.
  • adjective Beneficial to health; salutary.
  • adjective Competent; skilled.
  • adjective Complete; thorough.
  • adjective Reliable; sure.
  • adjective Valid or true.
  • adjective Genuine; real.
  • adjective In effect; operative.
  • adjective Ready or able for a specified or assumed activity.
  • adjective Able to pay or contribute.
  • adjective Able to elicit a specified reaction.
  • adjective Ample; substantial.
  • adjective Bountiful.
  • adjective Full.
  • adjective Pleasant; enjoyable.
  • adjective Propitious; favorable.
  • adjective Landing within bounds or within a particular area of a court and therefore in play.
  • adjective Passing between the uprights of the goal and therefore scoring, as a field goal in football.
  • adjective Used to form exclamatory phrases expressing surprise or dismay.
  • noun Something that is good.
  • noun A good, valuable, or useful part or aspect.
  • noun Welfare; benefit.
  • noun Goodness; virtue.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English gōd; see ghedh- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English goden, godien, from Old English gōdian ("to improve, get better; make better; endow, enrich"), from Proto-Germanic *gōdōnan (“to make better, improve”), from Proto-Germanic *gōdaz (“good, favourable”).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English good, from Old English gōd ("good, virtuous, desirable, favorable, salutary, pleasant, valid, efficient, suitable, considerable, sufficiently great"), from Proto-Germanic *gōdaz (“good”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰedʰ- (“to unite, be associated, suit”). Cognate with Scots guid ("good"), West Frisian goed ("good"), Dutch goed ("good"), Low German god ("good"), German gut ("good"), Danish and Swedish god ("good"), Icelandic góður ("good"), Lithuanian guõdas ("honor"), Albanian dial. hut ("good, fit, appropriate"), Old Church Slavonic годъ (godŭ, "pleasing time") and годенъ (godenŭ, "fitting, suitable"), Sanskrit गद्य (gádhya, "fitting, suitable"). Related to gather.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English good, god, from Old English gōd ("a good thing, advantage, benefit, gift; good, goodness, welfare; virtue, ability, doughtiness; goods, property, wealth"), from Proto-Germanic *gōdan (“goods, belongings”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʰedʰ-, *gʰodʰ- (“to unite, be associated, suit”).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From English dialectal, from Middle English *goden, of North Germanic origin, related to Swedish göda ("to fatten, fertilise, battle"), Danish gøde ("to fertilise, battle"), ultimately from the adjective. See above.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English goode ("good, well", adv), from the adjective. Compare Dutch goed ("good, well", adv), German gut ("good, well", adv), Danish godt ("good, well", adv), Swedish godt ("good, well", adv), all from the adjective.

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Examples

  • I could be assured just seeing his logo that the editors thought the book was good enough to shuck out the bucks for *good* cover art, at least.

    seanan_mcguire: A book by its cover. seanan_mcguire 2009

  • I think he may have taken it as me suggesting that our program wasn't good enough, and by extension that I thought I was *too good*, which wasn't the case at all- I simply wanted my undergrads to have the chance to work with different people, and perhaps to work with MA programs better known to the doctoral programs they'd next apply to.

    Ferule & Fescue Flavia 2009

  • I'm generally not good at remembering that I like things that are *good*.

    Bespoke Perfumes? Perfume in the Glossies March 2008. Marina Geigert 2008

  • October 12, 2008 at 11:20 pm i love their quilts! getting the back right while quilting is hard to do. i am sure that after some love, washings, shrinking, and dragging that the puckers will just fade away. good luck on the next one. even though i have a lot of mistakes in my first quilt, i still love to look at it. welcome to a whole new world my friend…..good luck

    Polka Dot Cottage: My first quilt! 2008

  • Kant's analysis of commonsense ideas begins with the thought that the only thing good without qualification is a ˜good will™.

    Kant's Moral Philosophy Johnson, Robert 2008

  • Anyway, I said, “Maddux is a good guy…..good luck”.

    IGD: Padres @ Diamondbacks (19 Aug 08) 2008

  • ˜God is good to us™ understanding of God's goodness is ruled out on this approach: for the notion of ˜good to us™ is a normative notion.

    Theological Voluntarism Murphy, Mark 2008

  • VERY IMPORTANT: In order for us to have a good Congress, it is terribly important to help to keep the * good* people in office.

    An Activist's Toolkit: Creative Strategies, Ideas, Links, Quotes and More for Beating the System! 2007

  • # Isabelon 12 May 2009 at 2:11 am good good… this post deserves a reply : :P …

    Mmmmm… Bacon « Whatever 2007

  • You tend to be more critical in your reviews than I am, and I mean that in a good way as you give really thorough reviews, so I was suprised to see that most of your books fell into the good+ categories.

    Neth Space Neth 2007

  • Whether you call it a bug-out bag, go bag, ready bag, to-go bag, scram bag, grab bag, or GOOD (“get out of Dodge”) bag, the important part is to have it “pre-prepared, in your home, ready to grab at any given moment,” according to survival instructor Creek Stewart (video).

    The Best Gear for Your Bug-Out Bag for 2018 2022

  • For many queries, the featured snippet will include exactly the answer sought by the user and the user will leave the search-results page without clicking on any link (a phenomenon known as good abandonment).

    Information Foraging with Generative AI: A Study of 3 Chatbots Bruce Tognazzini 2023

Comments

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  • Mr Stickle, who was alone, had dined with his customary excess of wisdom, and was feeling, in the transatlantic sense of the expression, good. -- ''Yashima, or, The Gorgeous West'' by R T Sherwood, 1931.

    December 24, 2008

  • Ie a euphemism for drunk.

    December 24, 2008

  • Often used incorrectly, such as when used as a response to the question "How are you?"

    December 14, 2009

  • So when you greet someone thus, and their reply is "Good.", you upbraid them for them grammar?

    December 14, 2009

  • "Well", while correct, is so unnatural--in North American speech, at least--that I feel awkward teaching my students to say it in reply to "How are you?", going so far as to try to avoid the question altogether.

    December 14, 2009

  • Well . . .

    December 14, 2009

  • I get more picky when responding to the questions "How's it going" or "How are you doing" -- doing good is very different from doing well, just like smelling good is very different from smelling well.

    December 14, 2009

  • My solution is to reply with "Fine, thanks. How are you?" Then I can gauge the other person's usage. Besides--how often does someone give a real reply to that question? Hasn't it become a slightly longer hello?

    December 14, 2009

  • Ru, it's more the case that hello became a short way of saying "How do you do?" some eighty years ago. And, I'm told, in good British society, the proper reply to "How do you do?" is "How do you do?": it's a polite formal greeting, not a question about the state of one's well-being. But today, the polite way to respond to the greeting, "How are you?" is, as you say, "Fine, thanks." But "Good, thanks," works too, meaning, "the present condition of my life is good, i.e. it's nothing for you to worry about, but thanks for showing even this formal interest."

    December 14, 2009

  • My reply to that question always, 'zuzu, is 'Exuberant'. I feel better just saying it, and it usually gets the questioner feeling better too. Try it sometime, even if it's not entirely true at the time. It's almost self-prophesising. Let me promote to you Exuberance Thinking

    December 14, 2009

  • It's a form of exuberudgeon.

    December 14, 2009

  • Why, hello bilby. How are you?

    December 15, 2009

  • How does one tell? I'm losing weight and gaining grey hair, puzzled by ants and unable to read fiction without succumbing to I'm-not-wasting-time-on-this pique by page 100. I feel my efforts to make tempeh have been disasters. I'm underemployed and overpaid. I'm fretting about whether the balcony plants will die while I'm away shortly. For some reason I woke up this morning with the taste of candied walnuts in my mouth and I've never eaten them. I'm terrified by phones. I left the windows slightly ajar during the weekend cyclone (supposed to release pressure and prevent windows being blown out) and now my bedroom carpet is sodden and smells like the athletic supporters of dead sheep. I don't think a round desk would make me any more productive, or happier, but it would be more rounded than my current desk. I haven't met any Sumatran tigers lately. Yesterday I bought a little bag that has 'You are freer than whether to use with what kind of use' written on it. I feel very fit and can run further than I have ever run in my life. If only I knew what I was running from.

    How do you do-zuzu, ruzuzu?

    December 15, 2009

  • HaHa! Brilliant, 'by. Glad you asked that, 'zuzu.

    December 15, 2009

  • Overpaid? I'll take that. :)

    December 17, 2009

  • *Gives an apple to jennarenn.*

    I'm fine, thank you. Bilby, I think I will start calling you "brillby." Because you're brilliant.

    December 18, 2009

  • ruzuzu: bilby's ears are big enough as it is. Telling him he's brilliant, will probably make his ears swell until they explode!

    December 18, 2009

  • Why, hello bilby's sodden carpet. How are you?

    December 20, 2009

  • I'm really not sure you want to know.

    December 21, 2009

  • Oops. I'm not supposed to be here.

    December 21, 2009

  • See comments on hi there!

    November 13, 2010