objective

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. adj. Of or having to do with a material object.
2. adj. Having actual existence or reality.
3. adj. Uninfluenced by emotions or personal prejudices: an objective critic. See Synonyms at fair¹.
4. adj. Based on observable phenomena; presented factually: an objective appraisal.
5. adj. Medicine Indicating a symptom or condition perceived as a sign of disease by someone other than the person affected.
6. adj. Grammar Of, relating to, or being the case of a noun or pronoun that serves as the object of a verb.
7. adj. Grammar Of or relating to a noun or pronoun used in this case.
8. n. Something that actually exists.
9. n. Something worked toward or striven for; a goal. See Synonyms at intention.
10. n. Grammar The objective case.
11. n. Grammar A noun or pronoun in the objective case.
12. n. The lens or lens system in a microscope or other optical instrument that first receives light rays from the object and forms the image. Also called object glass, objective lens, object lens.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. As perceived or thought; intentional; ideal; representative; phenomenal: opposed to subjective or formal—that is, as in its own nature.
2. Pertaining or due to the real object of cognition; real: opposed to subjective (pertaining or due to the subject of cognition, namely, the mind). [This meaning of the word nearly reverses the original usage; yet if such passages as that from Sir M. Hale, above, on the one hand, and that from Watts below, on the other, be compared, the transition will be seen to have been easy. Kant makes the objects of experience to be at once real and phenomenal; and what he generally means by the objective character of a proposition is the force which it derives from the thing itself compelling the mind, after examination, to accept it. But occasionally Kant uses objective to imply a reference to the unknowable thing-in-itself to which the compelling force of phenomena is due.]
3. Substantive; self-existent.
4. Intent, as a person, upon external objects of thought, whether things or persons, and not watching one's self and one's ways, nor attending to one's own sensations; setting forth, as a writing or work of art, external facts or imaginations of such matters as they exist or are supposed to exist, without drawing attention to the author's emotions, reflections, and personality.
5. In grammar, pertaining to or noting the object of a transitive verb, or of a preposition; forming or expressing a grammatical object: as, the objective case; an objective phrase or clause. Abbreviated obj.
6. n. In Eng. gram., the objective case; the case used to express the object of a verb or a preposition. This case answers in most of its uses to the accusative of Greek, Latin, German, and other languages, and is sometimes so called in English. In nouns it is never distinct in form from the subjective or nominative; the only objectives having such a distinct form are the pronominal case-forms me, thee, him, her, us, them, whom, corresponding to the nominatives I, thou, he, she, we, they, who respectively. Of these, her happens to be the same in form as the possessive. When words expressing extent in space or duration in time are put in the objective, they are called adverbial objectives: as, he ran a mile; she sang an hour. Compare connate object, under object, 5. Abbreviated obj.
7. n. An objective point; especially, the object, point, or place to or toward which a military force is directing its march or its operations.
8. n. The lens, or practically the combination of lenses, which forms the object-glass of an optical instrument, more particularly of the microscope (see object-glass). Objectives are generally named from the focal length of a single lens which would have the same magnifying power: as, a two-inch objective or power, a one-half-inch objective (or simply a half), etc. Objectives of high magnifying power and consequently short nominal focal length (e. g., less than half an inch) are often spoken of as high powers, in distinction from the low powers, which magnify less and have longer nominal focal lengths. Objectives are also characterized as immersion-objectives or dry objectives according as they are used with or without a drop of liquid between the lens and the object; if the liquid has sensibly the same refractive power as the glass of the lens, the system is called homogeneous immersion. (See immersion, 5.) The properties of an objective which determine its value for practical work are — definition or defining power, depending upon its freedom from spherical and chromatic aberration, which should be accompanied by flatness of field: penetration, the power of bringing parts of the object at different levels into focus at once; resolving power, the ability (depending upon the size of the aperture and the definition) to exhibit the minute details of structure, as the lines on a diatom frustule (see test-object); working distance, which is the space separating the lens and the object when the latter is in focus. These properties are in some degree antagonistic: thus, an increase in the aperture, and hence of the resolving power, is accompanied by a decrease in the working distance. The aperture of an objective is often measured by the angle of the cone of rays which it admits, and is then called angular aperture. Since, however, this angle varies according as it is used as a dry, water-immersion, or homogeneous-immersion objective, a common measure is obtained, as proposed by Abbe, by taking the product of the half-angle into the refractive index of the medium employed; this is called the numerical aperture (sometimes written N. A.). Thus, for the maximum air-angle of 180°, which is equivalent to a water-angle of 97°31′ and a balsam-angle of 82°17′ , the numerical aperture is unity, while for the respective angles of 60° (air), 44°10′ (water), 38° 24′ (balsam), it is 0.5. Again, a numerical aperture of 1.33 corresponds to the maximum water-angle of 180° and a balsam-angle of 122°6′ .
9. In grammar:
10. Noting the ease expressing the subject of the intransitive verb.
11. In Eskimo gram., noting the thing possessed. Also intransitive (which see).

Wiktionary

1. adj. Of or relating to a material object, actual existence or reality.
2. adj. Not influenced by the emotions or prejudices.
3. adj. Based on observed facts.
4. adj. grammar Of, or relating to a noun or pronoun used as the object of a verb.
5. n. A material object that physically exists.
6. n. A goal that is striven for.
7. n. grammar The objective case; a noun or pronoun in that case.
8. n. The lens or lenses of a camera, microscope, or other optical device closest to the object being examined.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. adj. Of or pertaining to an object.
2. adj. (Metaph.) Of or pertaining to an object; contained in, or having the nature or position of, an object; outward; external; extrinsic; -- an epithet applied to whatever is exterior to the mind, or which is simply an object of thought or feeling, as opposed to being related to thoughts of feelings, and opposed to subjective.
3. adj. Unbiased; unprejudiced; fair; uninfluenced by personal feelings or personal interests; considering only the facts of a situation unrelated to the observer; -- of judgments, opinions, evaluations, conclusions, reasoning processes.
4. adj. (Gram.) Pertaining to, or designating, the case which follows a transitive verb or a preposition, being that case in which the direct object of the verb is placed. See Accusative, n.
5. n. (Gram.) The objective case.
6. n. An object glass; called also objective lens. See under Object, n.
7. n. Same as Objective point, under Objective, a.

WordNet 3.0

1. adj. undistorted by emotion or personal bias; based on observable phenomena
2. adj. emphasizing or expressing things as perceived without distortion of personal feelings, insertion of fictional matter, or interpretation
3. n. the goal intended to be attained (and which is believed to be attainable)
4. adj. belonging to immediate experience of actual things or events
5. adj. serving as or indicating the object of a verb or of certain prepositions and used for certain other purposes
6. n. the lens or system of lenses in a telescope or microscope that is nearest the object being viewed