development

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. The act of developing.
2. n. The state of being developed.
3. n. A significant event, occurrence, or change.
4. n. A group of dwellings built by the same contractor.
5. n. Determination of the best techniques for applying a new device or process to production of goods or services.
6. n. The organized activity of soliciting donations or grants; fundraising.
7. n. Music Elaboration of a theme with rhythmic and harmonic variations.
8. n. Music The central section of a movement in sonata form, in which the theme is elaborated and explored.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. A gradual unfolding; a full disclosure or working out of the details of something, as the plot of a novel or a drama, an architectural or a military plan, a financial scheme, etc.; the act of evolving or unraveling.
2. n. The internal or subjective process of unfolding or expanding; the coming forth or into existence of additional elements, principles, or substances; gradual advancement through progressive changes; a growing out or up; growth in general: as, the development of the mind or body, or of a form of government; the development of the principles of art or of civilization.
3. n. Specifically.
4. n. In biology, the same as evolution: applied alike to an evolutionary process and its result.
5. n. In math.: The expression of any function in the form of series; also, the process by which any mathematical expression is changed into another of equivalent value or meaning and of more expanded form; also, the series resulting from such a process.
6. n. The bending of a surface into a plane, or of all its infinitesimal parts into parts of a plane.
7. n. The bending of a non-plane curve into a plane curve.
8. n. In photography, the process by which the latent image in a photographically exposed sensitive film is rendered visible through a chemical precipitation on that portion of the sensitized surface which has been acted on by light. The matter deposited varies with the nature of the process. In the daguerreotype process it is mercury; in negative processes with salts of silver it is silver combined with organic matter.
9. n. In music: The systematic unfolding, by a varied rhythmic, melodic, or harmonic treatment, of the qualities of a theme, especially in a formal composition like a sonata.
10. n. That part of a movement in which such an unfolding of a theme takes place.
11. n. In biology, the theory of evolution (which see, under evolution).
12. n. Synonyms Unraveling, disentanglement.
13. n. Growth, evolution, progress, ripening.
14. n. The generation of a new living being considered inductively as a fact, without reference to the question whether it is to be regarded as evolution or unfolding, or as epigenesis or new formation; the subject-matter of the science of descriptive embryology or embryogeny.
15. n. Specifically, in music, the second section of a movement in sonata form or the central portion of a fugue, in which the thematic material in the subject or subjects is unfolded and variously treated. Also called the working-out or the development section.
16. n. In chess, the movements by which a player in the early part of the game places his pieces in position for future action.

Wiktionary

1. n. uncountable The process of developing; growth, directed change
2. n. uncountable, biology The process by which a mature multicellular organism or part of an organism is produced by the addition of new cells.
3. n. countable Something which has developed
4. n. real estate, countable A project consisting of one or more commercial or residential buildings, real estate development
5. n. real estate, uncountable The building of a real estate development
6. n. uncountable The application of new ideas to practical problems (cf. research)
7. n. chess, uncountable The active placement of the pieces, or the process of achieving it
8. n. music The second section of a piece of music in sonata form.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The act of developing or disclosing that which is unknown; a gradual unfolding process by which anything is developed, as a plan or method, or an image upon a photographic plate; gradual advancement or growth through a series of progressive changes; also, the result of developing, or a developed state.
2. n. (Biol.) The series of changes which animal and vegetable organisms undergo in their passage from the embryonic state to maturity, from a lower to a higher state of organization.
3. n. The act or process of changing or expanding an expression into another of equivalent value or meaning.
4. n. The equivalent expression into which another has been developed.
5. n. (Mus.) The elaboration of a theme or subject; the unfolding of a musical idea; the evolution of a whole piece or movement from a leading theme or motive.
6. n. A tract of land on which a number of buildings have been constructed; -- especially used for tract on which from two to hundreds of houses have been constructed by a commercial developer{4} for sale to individuals.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a state in which things are improving; the result of developing (as in the early part of a game of chess)
2. n. a recent event that has some relevance for the present situation
3. n. a process in which something passes by degrees to a different stage (especially a more advanced or mature stage)
4. n. a district that has been developed to serve some purpose
5. n. the act of making some area of land or water more profitable or productive or useful
6. n. processing a photosensitive material in order to make an image visible
7. n. (music) the section of a composition or movement (especially in sonata form) where the major musical themes are developed and elaborated
8. n. act of improving by expanding or enlarging or refining
9. n. (biology) the process of an individual organism growing organically; a purely biological unfolding of events involved in an organism changing gradually from a simple to a more complex level