intensive, a. (n.)
(ɪnˈtɛnsɪv)
[a. F. intensif, -ive (14–15th c. in Hatz.-Darm.) = It. intensivo, med. or mod.L. intensīv-us, f. intens-, ppl. stem of intendĕre to stretch, strain: see intend, intense. Late L. had the parallel extensīvus extensive.]
A. adj.
† 1. Of very high degree or force, vehement: = intense a. 1. Obs.
| 1526 Pilgr. Perf. (W. de W. 1531) 283 It shall be to euery chrysten man or woman more intensyue and feruent than is the naturall loue. 1598 Yong Diana 225 It was strange to see what intensiue loue euery one did beare vs. 1621 Burton Anat. Mel. i. iii. iii, A very intensive pleasure follows the passion or displeasure. 1687 Death's Vis. viii. 74 Call yonder Planet, Mercury, Whom such intensive Heat Will not Evaporate. |
† 2. Strenuously directed upon something (quot. 1605); strained, earnest, eager, intent; = intense a. 3. Obs.
| 1605 Bacon Adv. Learn. ii. xi. §3 Fascination is the power and act of Imagination, intensive upon other bodies, than the bodie of the Imaginant. a 1628 Preston Mt. Ebal (1638) 5 It is nothing else but an intensive bending of the mind unto Christ. a 1639 Wotton Paralell in Reliq. (1651) 3 Being almost tyred..with that assiduous attendance, and intensive circumspection. 1669 Woodhead St. Teresa i. Pref. 12 Intensive thinking is tedious, and tires. |
3. a. Of, relating, or pertaining to intensity, or degree of intrinsic strength, depth, or fullness, as distinguished from external spatial extent or amount; of or pertaining to logical intension.
| 1604 T. Wright Passions v. 293 In every obiect of delight there is a certaine intensive goodnes and perfection, and there is an extensive. 1626 Jackson Creed viii. vi. §7 The intensive infinity of the satisfaction for the sinnes of the world. 1641 F. Greville Eng. Episc. i. i. 3 Concomitants, we may call, that almost illimited power, both Intensive, in sole Ordination; Jurisdiction..As also Extensive, over so vast a Diocesse. 1649 Jeanes Wks. Heaven on Earth in Spurgeon Treas. Dav. Ps. cxlv. 7 There must be an intensive greatness in our praises, in regard of the degree, fervour and heat of them. 1698 J. Keill Exam. Th. Earth (1734) 169 The part immerged of each Cylinder, bears the same proportion to the whole Cylinder, that the intensive gravity of the Cylinder bears to the intensive gravity of the Fluid. 1798 W. Taylor in Monthly Rev. XXV. 585 Were we endeavouring to characterize this work, in the dialect peculiar to Professor Kant, we should observe, that its intensive, like its extensive, magnitude is small. 1845–6 Trench Huls. Lect. Ser. i. iv. 58 The record of an intensive as well as extensive development. 1877 E. Caird Philos. Kant ii. xi. 442–3 In all phenomena the Real has intensive quantity or degree. |
b. Having the quality or character of intensity.
| 1836 J. Gilbert Chr. Atonem. vi. (1852) 167 Justice is an intensive exercise of holiness. 1836–7 Sir W. Hamilton Metaph. xxiv. (1859) II. 100 Hearing is, however, much less extensive in its sphere of knowledge or perception than sight; but in the same proportion is its capacity of feeling or sensation more intensive. 1899 Q. Rev. Oct. 492 Friends whose reciprocal intensive criticism fanned each other's interest into flame. |
4. Having the property of making intense; intensifying; esp. in Gram., expressing intensity; giving force or emphasis; = intensative.
| 1608 Topsell Serpents (1658) 630 Aristophanes deriveth it from ‘Alpha’, an intensive particle, and ‘Spizo’, which signifieth ‘to extend’. 1751 Harris Hermes Wks. (1841) 175 These comparatives..seem sometimes to part with their relative nature, and only retain their intensive. 1820 Mair's Lat. Dict. 414 Vē..is sometimes intensive..and sometimes privative. 1882 Farrar Early Chr. I. 448 note, The τις is intensive. |
5. a. Econ. Applied to methods of cultivation, fishery, etc., which increase the productiveness of a given area: opposed to extensive in which the area of production is extended.
| 1832 Chalmers Pol. Econ. x. 324 The removal..of the tithes, gives scope both to a more extensive and a more intensive agriculture. 1865 Times 15 Apr., Ruin stares in the face the occupier whose farm premises are inadequate to the requirements of an ‘intensive cultivation’. 1889 Nature 3 Oct. 558/2 The necessity for increased food productions calls for intensive methods. 1899 19th Cent. No. 264. 300 There is little probability of their escaping from being caught..on account of the intensive fishery. |
b. Suffixed to ns. to form adjs. with the sense ‘intensively using the thing specified’, as capital-intensive, labour-intensive.
| 1957 K. A. Wittfogel Oriental Despotism vi. 218 The replacement of labor-intensive irrigation farming by labor-extensive cattle breeding. 1959 Listener 22 Oct. 666/1 We have the highly capital-intensive process of textile manufacture. 1970 Times 2 June (Container Suppl.) p. iii/4 The latest sophisticated container systems add up to a capital-intensive system of some magnitude. 1972 Guardian 29 June 15/5 The developing world..is beginning to see the case for labour-intensive farming. 1973 Nature 6 Apr. 378/2 Economies of scale have been operating in capital-intensive and graduate-intensive industries like chemicals, oil, electric power, steel, and computers. Ibid. 382/3 Intelligence-intensive biology would take its place alongside this intelligence-intensive cosmology. |
6. Med. Applied to a method of inoculation in which the intensity or strength of the matter introduced is increased in successive operations.
| 1888 Pall Mall G. 4 Sept. 4/2 He mistook the phials, and made the first inoculation with the intensive matter which should be used for the second. 1894 Lancet 3 Nov. 1049 A guinea-pig which had undergone ‘intensive treatment’ with Dr. Viquerat's serum had died ‘stuffed full of tubercle’. 1897 Allbutt's Syst. Med. II. 709. |
7. Subject to intensification; characterized by being intensified.
| 1888 J. T. Gulick in Linn. Soc. Jrnl. (Z.) XX. 197 A discussion of the principles of Intensive Segregation, under which name I class the different ways in which other principles combine with Segregation in producing Divergent Evolution. |
8. intensive care: a form of medical treatment in which a patient is kept under concentrated and special observation; so intensive-care unit, etc.
| 1963 Lancet 19 Jan. 169/2 Our medical staff found the medical intensive-care unit so valuable that they requested..a separate surgical intensive-care unit. 1965 Math. in Biol. & Med. (Med. Res. Council) i. 40 He felt that patient monitoring was essential in the operating theatre and the intensive-care unit. 1965 Listener 16 Sept. 401/1 We would like to see intensive-care units in all large modern hospitals. 1967 Spectator 11 Aug. 159/2 This method of dealing with a serious cardiac emergency..is known as intensive care. 1972 J. Gores Dead Skip (1973) ii. 14 Bart's at Trinity Hospital in intensive care, a single-bed room with a private nurse. 1973 J. Goodfield Courier to Peking x. 123 First, one of the general wards..and then to our new intensive care unit. |
B. n. Something that intensifies; spec. in Gram. an intensive word or prefix: see 4.
| 1813 W. Taylor Eng. Synon. 38 ætzen or ætschen is to eat into, to corrode; it is the intensive of the verb to eat. 1860 Marsh Eng. Lang. 570 The use of mere sound as an accompaniment and intensive of sense. 1888 Skeat Etym. Dict. s.v. To- prefix, Examples of the addition of al [= all] as an intensive, meaning ‘wholly’. |