Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of or pertaining to the mind; specifically, belonging to or characteristic of the intellect; intellectual: as, the mental powers or faculties; a mental state or condition; mental perception.
  • Done or performed by the mind; due to the action of the mind.
  • Relating to the mind; concerned with the nature, attributes, or phenomena of the human intellect: as, mental philosophy; mental sciences.
  • In anat, of or pertaining to the mentum or chin; genial.
  • noun An Oriental water-tight basket, having four ropes attached, by which two men raise water from a stream or cistern and discharge it into a trench for irrigation.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective (Anat.) Of or pertaining to the chin; genian
  • adjective Of or pertaining to the mind; intellectual
  • adjective insanity.
  • adjective the art or practice of solving arithmetical problems by mental processes, unassisted by written figures.
  • noun (Zoöl.) A plate or scale covering the mentum or chin of a fish or reptile.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Of or relating to the mind or an intellectual process.
  • adjective colloquial, comparable Insane, mad, crazy.
  • adjective colloquial, UK, comparable Enjoyable; fun.
  • adjective anatomy Of or relating to the chin or median part of the lower jaw, genial.
  • adjective biology Of or relating to the chin-like or lip-like structure.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective of or relating to the mind
  • adjective of or relating to the chin- or liplike structure in insects and certain mollusks
  • adjective affected by a disorder of the mind
  • adjective of or relating to the chin or median part of the lower jaw
  • adjective involving the mind or an intellectual process

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle French mental, from Late Latin mentālis ("of the mind, mental"), from Latin mēns ("the mind"). Also from Latin mentum ("the chin"), depending on usage.

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Examples

  • Psychology, even so empirical a psychology as is possible of demonstration in western schools and colleges, evidences the fact that there is a far greater field of mental operation than is covered by the outer, or _mental_ consciousness.

    Cosmic Consciousness

  • Western Science, while performing a marvelous work in piling up fact after fact to support its newly-discovered theory of Evolution, in a way utterly unknown to the Oriental thinker who seeks after principles by mental concentration -- _within_ rather than without -- while actually proving by physical facts the _mental_ conceptions of the

    A Series of Lessons in Gnani Yoga William Walker Atkinson 1897

  • They need a positive mental (Int or Wis in this case) which follows the +physical/+mental/- anything format.

    EN World D&D / RPG News Transbot9 2009

  • Hearing the term mental block, she had always envisioned her barriers as just that, blocks—brightly colored and piled up in a wall between her and whatever she wanted to shut out.

    Dark Mirror Diane Duane 1993

  • Like many agency heads, SAMHSA Administrator Pamela Hyde has abandoned use of the term mental "illness" and avoids the term "mental health" feeling these are too limiting to their agencies newly formed expansive mission.

    DJ Jaffe: Improve Care For Mentally Ill: Eliminate Mental Health Agencies DJ Jaffe 2011

  • Like many agency heads, SAMHSA Administrator Pamela Hyde has abandoned use of the term mental "illness" and avoids the term "mental health" feeling these are too limiting to their agencies newly formed expansive mission.

    DJ Jaffe: Improve Care For Mentally Ill: Eliminate Mental Health Agencies DJ Jaffe 2011

  • Dr. ALLEN FRANCES (Psychiatrist): Over the course of time, we've become looser and looser in applying the term mental disorder to the expectable aches and pains and sufferings of everyday life.

    Is Emotional Pain Necessary? 2010

  • Clay Shirky used (coined?) the term mental transaction costs to describe the problem with using micropayments (small payments to download articles or music).

    EconLog: Behavioral Economics and Rationality Archives 2009

  • Excerpt: The term mental retardation was supposed to be an improvement.

    Archive 2007-01-01 Kay Olson 2007

  • Excerpt: The term mental retardation was supposed to be an improvement.

    Various NPR disability stories Kay Olson 2007

Comments

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  • They let Lisa go blind

    The world was at her feet and she was looking down

    They let Lisa go blind

    But everyone she knew thought she was beautiful

    Only slightly mental

    Beautiful, only temperamental.

    (Beautiful, by Belle and Sebastian)

    August 24, 2008

  • The Office, in contrast, and I might have chosen other examples such as I’m Alan Partridge or The League of Gentlemen, is, if only obliquely monumental though avowedly anti-sentimental, certainly ‘mental’ in at least three senses of the word. Firstly, it is cerebral. Secondly, it is anarchic. Thirdly, it is angry.”

    —Peter Stear, Mockumentalism: Re-Casting the Void in Contemporary British TV Comedy

    January 10, 2010