Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The state of being probable; probability.
- noun Something probable.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The state of being likely or probable; probability; likeliness; promise.
- noun Promising state or appearance; standing; consideration.
- noun That which is probable; a probability; an indication.
- noun Likeness; resemblance; similarity.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun obsolete Appearance; show; sign; expression.
- noun obsolete Likeness; resemblance.
- noun Appearance of truth or reality; probability; verisimilitude.
- noun Statistical probability; probability of being true or of occurring in the future.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun The
probability of a specified outcome; thechance of something happening;probability ; the state of beingprobable . - noun mathematics Shorthand for likelihood function; the probability that a real world experiment would generate a specific datum, as a function of the parameters of a mathematical model.
- noun
Likeness ,resemblance . - noun archaic
Appearance ,show ,sign ,expression .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the probability of a specified outcome
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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If you are going to be in a dangerous situation, the likelihood is there is somebody standing around with a gun to shoot something ..
David Attenborough: 'I have been in a vehicle that was charged by a rhinoceros, and that was tiresome' Kate Kellaway 2010
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In the previous wheel the likelihood of exceeding 5°C was about 4%, but in the new wheels that likelihood is 57%.
Wonk Room » Global Boiling Roulette: The Margin For Error Is Gone 2009
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And I think the greatest likelihood is that he will resurface with some prominent job.
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With breakaway goals the likelihood is less, but still possible.
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But, I think, if the president doesn't reach across the aisle and actually try to do things on a bipartisan basis, the likelihood is that not a whole lot of legislating will be done.
Cornyn: 'We Need To Keep Expectations... Fairly Modest' About Health Care Repeal (VIDEO) The Huffington Post News Team 2010
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On the other hand, the greater likelihood is that the current regime will remain in power and, if we want to have NEW dialogue with them, one way of ending the OLD dialogue is opening the door to more amicable personal relationships with their leadership.
Officials: President Obama reconsidering July 4 invitations to Iran 2009
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But Marcy said that with so many Earth-size planets now expected to be orbiting distant suns - something on the order of 50,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 across the universe - the likelihood is high that many are in "habitable zones" where life can theoretically exist.
Scientists estimate tens of billions of Earth-size planets in Milky Way Marc Kaufman 2010
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In the previous wheel the likelihood of exceeding 5°C was about 4%, but in the new wheels that likelihood is 57%.
Wonk Room 2009
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Rather than challenge the Welsh MPs, the likelihood is that those very MPs will play an important role in the electoral college that will elect the new leader, meaning the candidates will be going out of their way to pet and pamper them.
Archive 2009-01-01 2009
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The weather today into tomorrow yields more of the same unsettled feel with frequently re-arranged sky conditions, warm breezes with occasional gusts, and sporadic showers that increase in likelihood tomorrow.
Forecast: Very warm through tomorrow Matt Rogers 2010
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