temperatures

Noun

temperature (countable and uncountable, plural temperatures)

1. A measure of cold or heat, often measurable with a thermometer.
   • The boiling temperature of pure water is 100 degrees Celsius.
2. An elevated body temperature, as present in many illnesses; fever.
   • You have a temperature. I think you should stay home today. You’re sick.
3. A property of macroscopic amounts of matter that serves to gauge the average intensity of the random actual motions of the individually mobile particulate constituents.
   • In consequence, macroscopic amounts of matter in thermal contact with one another tend to be at the same temperature, a fact of sufficient fundamental importance to merit belated designation as the Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics.2000 September, Clinton D. Stoner, “Inquiries into the Nature of Free Energy and Entropy in Respect to Biochemical Thermodynamics”, in Entropy, volume 2, number 3, →DOI, →ISSN, pages 106–141
4. (machine learning) A parameter that controls the degree of randomness of the output.
5. (colloquial, figuratively) The general mood.
   • But it is both easier and more accurate to take the industry's true temperature at small private gatherings like a conference organized by the Ziff Davis publishing company in northern California last week.2005 August 20, Seth Schiesel, “Taking the Temperature of the Creative Body”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
6. (obsolete) The state or condition of being tempered or moderated.

See all 7 meanings of temperature