different between fair vs normal

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /f??/, /f??/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /f???/
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /fe?(?)/
• (General New Zealand) IPA^(key): /f??/
• Rhymes: -??(?)
• Homophone: fare

Etymology 1

From Middle English fayr, feir, fager, from Old English fæ?er (“beautiful”), from Proto-West Germanic *fagr, from Proto-Germanic *fagraz (“suitable, fitting, nice”), from Proto-Indo-European *peh??- (“to fasten, place”).

Cognate with Scots fayr, fare (“fair”), Danish feir, faver, fager (“fair, pretty”), Norwegian fager (“fair, pretty”), Swedish fager (“fair, pretty”), Icelandic fagur (“beautiful, fair”), Umbrian pacer (“gracious, merciful, kind”), Slovak pekný (“good-looking, handsome, nice”). See also peace.

Adjective

fair (comparative fairer, superlative fairest)

1. (archaic or literary) Beautiful, of a pleasing appearance, with a pure and fresh quality.
   • 1460-1500, The Towneley Plays?

     He is so fair, without lease, he seems full well to sit on this.
2. Unblemished (figuratively or literally); clean and pure; innocent.
   • 1605, The Booke of Common Prayer, and Administration of the Sacraments, London: Robert Barker, “The order for the administration of the Lords Supper, or holy Communion,”^[1]

     The Table hauing at the Communion time a faire white linnen cloth vpon it, shall stand in the body of the Church, or in the Chancell, where Morning prayer and Euening prayer be appointed to be said.

   • 1665, Robert Hooke, Micrographia, London, Observation 21, “Of Moss, and several other small vegetative Substances,” p. 135,^[2]

     […] I have observ’d, that putting fair Water (whether Rain-water or Pump-water, or May-dew, or Snow-water, it was almost all one) I have often observ’d, I say, that this Water would, with a little standing, tarnish and cover all about the sides of the Glass that lay under water, with a lovely green […]

3. Light in color, pale, particularly with regard to skin tone but also referring to blond hair.
   • 1677, Matthew Hale, The Primitive Origination of Mankind, Considered and Examined According to the Light of Nature, page 200

     the northern people large and fair-complexioned

   • This new-comer was a man who in any company would have seemed striking. In complexion fair, and with blue or gray eyes, he was tall as any Viking, as broad in the shoulder.

4. Just, equitable.

   • “[…] it is not fair of you to bring against mankind double weapons?! Dangerous enough you are as woman alone, without bringing to your aid those gifts of mind suited to problems which men have been accustomed to arrogate to themselves.”

6. Adequate, reasonable, or decent.

   Their performance has been only fair.
7. (nautical, of a wind) Favorable to a ship's course.
   • 1885, Richard F. Burton, The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Night 563:

     I shipped with them and becoming friends, we set forth on our venture, in health and safety; and sailed with a fair wind, till we came to a city called Madínat-al-Sín; […]

8. Not overcast; cloudless; clear; pleasant; propitious; said of the sky, weather, or wind, etc.
   • 1909, Frank R. Stockton, The adventures of Captain Horn Chapter 42

     They had good weather and tolerably fair winds, and before they entered the Straits of Magellan the captain had formulated a plan for the disposition of Garta.

9. Free from obstacles or hindrances; unobstructed; unencumbered; open; direct; said of a road, passage, etc.
   • c. 1610?, Walter Raleigh, A Discourse of War

     The caliphs obtained a mighty empire, which was in a fair way to have enlarged.

10. (shipbuilding) Without sudden change of direction or curvature; smooth; flowing; said of the figure of a vessel, and of surfaces, water lines, and other lines.
11. (baseball) Between the baselines.
12. (rugby, of a catch) Taken direct from an opponent's foot, without the ball touching the ground or another player.
13. (cricket, of a ball delivered by the bowler) Not a no-ball.
14. (statistics) Of a coin or die, having equal chance of landing on any side, unbiased.

Synonyms

• (beautiful): beautiful, pretty, lovely
• (unblemished): pure, clean, neat
• (light in color): pale
• (just): honest, just, equitable

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

fair (plural fair)

1. Something which is fair (in various senses of the adjective).

   When will we learn to distinguish between the fair and the foul?

2. (obsolete) A woman, a member of the ‘fair sex’; also as a collective singular, women.
   • 1744, Georg Friedrich Händel, Hercules, act 2, scene 8

     Love and Hymen, hand in hand, / Come, restore the nuptial band! / And sincere delights prepare / To crown the hero and the fair.

   • 1819, Lord Byron, Don Juan, III.24:

     If single, probably his plighted Fair / Has in his absence wedded some rich miser  […].

3. (obsolete) Fairness, beauty.
4. A fair woman; a sweetheart.
   • 1743, William Shenstone, A Pastoral Ballad

     I have found out a gift for my fair.

5. (obsolete) Good fortune; good luck.
   • c. 1590–1592, William Shakespeare, The Taming of the Shrew, Act V scene ii^[3]:

     Now, fair befall thee, good Petruchio!

Verb

fair (third-person singular simple present fairs, present participle fairing, simple past and past participle faired)

2. (transitive) To smoothen or even a surface (especially a connection or junction on a surface).
3. (transitive) To bring into perfect alignment (especially about rivet holes when connecting structural members).
4. (transitive, art) To make an animation smooth, removing any jerkiness.
   • 1996, Computer Animation '96: June 3-4, 1996, Geneva, Switzerland (page 136)

     Since the sequence of data contain sampling noises, the captured motion is not smooth and wiggles along the moving path. There are well-known fairing algorithms in Euclidean space based on difference geometry.

5. (transitive) To construct or design with the aim of producing a smooth outline or reducing air drag or water resistance.
   • 1920, Technical Report of the Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (page 206)

     Two forward cars were provided with the model. One of these (shown detached in Fig. 1) was faired at its after end, with a view to possible reduction of head resistance, and to induce a better flow of air to the propeller.

6. (transitive, obsolete) To make fair or beautiful.

Synonyms

• (to reduce air drag or water resistance): to streamline

Derived terms

• fair off
• fair up
• fairing

Translations

Adverb

fair (comparative more fair or fairer, superlative most fair or fairest)

1. clearly, openly, frankly, civilly, honestly, favorably, auspiciously, agreeably

Derived terms

• bid fair
• fair and square

Etymology 2

From Middle English feyre, from Old French foire, from Latin f?riae.

Noun

fair (plural fairs)

1. A community gathering to celebrate and exhibit local achievements.
2. An event for public entertainment and trade, a market.
3. An event for professionals in a trade to learn of new products and do business, a trade fair.
4. A travelling amusement park (called a funfair in British English and a (travelling) carnival in US English).

Derived terms

• fairgrounds
• funfair

Translations

References

• fair at OneLook Dictionary Search
• fair in Keywords for Today: A 21st Century Vocabulary, edited by The Keywords Project, Colin MacCabe, Holly Yanacek, 2018.
• fair in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Anagrams

• RIFA, fiar, rifa-

German

Etymology

From English fair, from Old English fæ?er, from Proto-West Germanic *fagr, from Proto-Germanic *fagraz, whence also Middle High German vager (“splendid, wonderful”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /f??r/, [f????], [fe???], [f???]
• Hyphenation: fair

Adjective

fair (comparative fairer, superlative am fairsten)

1. (especially sports) fair (just, honest, equitable, adequate)

Declension

Synonyms

• anständig
• ehrlich
• gerecht
• gleich
• ausgeglichen
• angemessen
• sauber

Antonyms

• unfair

Derived terms

• Fairness (rarely Fairheit)
• Fairplay
• Fair-Use-Doktrin

Further reading

• “fair” in Duden online
• “fair” in Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache

Hungarian

Etymology

From English fair.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [?f?r], [?f??r]
• Hyphenation: fair
• Rhymes: -?r

Adjective

fair (comparative fairebb, superlative legfairebb)

1. fair (just, equitable)

   Synonyms: méltányos, tisztességes, becsületes, igazságos, korrekt, sportszer?

Declension

Derived terms

• fair play
• fairül

Further reading

• fair in Bárczi, Géza and László Országh: A magyar nyelv értelmez? szótára (’The Explanatory Dictionary of the Hungarian Language’). Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1959–1962. Fifth ed., 1992: ?ISBN

Irish

Etymology

See aire (“watching, attention”)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [f?a??]

Verb

fair (present analytic faireann, future analytic fairfidh, verbal noun faire, past participle fairthe)

1. to watch

Conjugation

Mutation

References

• MacBain, Alexander; Mackay, Eneas (1911) , “fair”, in An Etymological Dictionary of the Gaelic Language, Stirling, ?ISBN, page 160

Polish

Etymology

From English fair.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /f?r/

Adjective

fair (not comparable)

1. fair (just, equitable)

   Synonym: uczciwy

Declension

Indeclinable.

Adverb

fair (not comparable)

1. fairly (in a fair manner)

   Synonym: uczciwie

Related terms

• (noun) fair play

Further reading

• fair in Wielki s?ownik j?zyka polskiego, Instytut J?zyka Polskiego PAN
• fair in Polish dictionaries at PWN

English

Etymology

From Latin norm?lis (“made according to a carpenter's square; later: according to a rule”), from n?rma (“carpenter's square”), of uncertain origin. The earliest use of the word in English was to mean "perpendicular; forming a right angle" like something norm?lis (“made according to a carpenter's square”), but by Late Latin norm?lis had also come to mean "according to a rule", from which modern English senses of the word derive: in the 1800s, as people began to quantitatively study things like height and weight and blood pressure, the usual or most common values came to be referred to as "normal", and by extension values regarded as healthy or desirable came to be called "normal" regardless of their usuality.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?n??m?l/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?n??m?l/
• Rhymes: -??(?)m?l

Adjective

normal (comparative normaler or more normal, superlative normalest or most normal)

1. According to norms or rules or to a regular pattern.
   • 2007, Steven Wilson, "Normal", Porcupine Tree, Nil Recurring.

   • 2014, Michael Rush, Politics & Society, Routledge (?ISBN), page 210:

     In other words, although the legal processes were observed, it was not a normal transfer of power within each of the ruling communist parties. […] Demonstrations of the sort that brought about the collapse of the communist regimes in Eastern Europe were not normal, and where attempts had previously been made to hold them, they were invariably suppressed by force.

   1. (mathematics) Adhering to or being what is considered natural or regular in a particular field or context:
      1. (number theory, of a real number) In whose representation in a given base b ? 2, for every positive integer n, the bⁿ possible strings of n digits follow a uniform distribution.

      2. (algebra, of a subgroup) With cosets which form a group.
      3. (algebra, of a field extension of a field K) Which is the splitting field of a family of polynomials in K.
      4. (probability theory, statistics, of a distribution) Which has a very specific bell curve shape; that is or has the qualities of a normal distribution.
      5. (probability theory, statistics, of a random variable, etc.) Which has a normal distribution; which is associated with random variable that has a normal distribution.
      6. (complex analysis, of a family of continuous functions) Which is pre-compact.
      7. (set theory, of a function from the ordinals to the ordinals) Which is strictly monotonically increasing and continuous with respect to the order topology.
      8. (linear algebra, of a matrix) Which commutes with its conjugate transpose.
      9. (functional analysis, of a Hilbert space operator) Which commutes with its adjoint.
      10. (category theory) Being (as a morphism) or containing (as a category) only normal epimorphism(s) or monomorphism(s), that is, those which are the kernel or cokernel of some morphism, respectively.
      11. (topology, of a topology) In which disjoint closed sets can be separated by disjoint neighborhoods.
2. Usual, healthy; not sick or ill or unlike oneself.

3. (education, of a school) teaching teachers how to teach (to certain norms)

4. (chemistry) Of, relating to, or being a solution containing one equivalent weight of solute per litre of solution.
5. (organic chemistry) Describing a straight chain isomer of an aliphatic hydrocarbon, or an aliphatic compound in which a substituent is in the 1- position of such a hydrocarbon.
6. (physics, of a mode in an oscillating system) In which all parts of an object vibrate at the same frequency (see normal mode).
7. (rail transport, of points) In the default position, set for the most frequently used route.
9. (geometry) Perpendicular to a tangent of a curve or derivative of a surface.

   The interior normal vector of an ideal perfect sphere will always point toward the center, and the exterior normal vector directly away, and both will always be co-linear with the ray whose' tip ends at the point of intersection, which is the intersection of all three sets of points.

Usage notes

• When used to describe a group of people, normal can be understood as meaning that those not part of the group are strange or freakish. Its usage can therefore be understood as offensive to those it excludes.

Synonyms

• (usual): conventional, customary, ordinary, standard, usual, regular, routine, average, expected, natural, typical, everyday, common, commonplace, general
• (healthy): hale, healthy, well
• (perpendicular): at right angles to, perpendicular, orthogonal
• (statistics): Gaussian, standard normal

Antonyms

• (usual): unconventional, nonstandard, unusual, special
• (healthy): ill, poorly (British), sick, unwell
• (perpendicular): tangential
• (rail transport): reverse

Derived terms

Related terms

• norm

Translations

Noun

normal (countable and uncountable, plural normals)

2. (geometry) A line or vector that is perpendicular to another line, surface, or plane.
3. (slang, countable) A person who is normal, who fits into mainstream society, as opposed to those who live alternative lifestyles.
4. (uncountable) The usual state.

Synonyms

• (normal person): see Thesaurus:mainstreamer

Translations

References

Anagrams

• Marlon, Molnar, Morlan

Catalan

Etymology

From French normal.

Pronunciation

• (Balearic, Valencian) IPA^(key): /no??mal/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /nur?mal/

Adjective

normal (masculine and feminine plural normals)

1. normal

   Antonym: anormal

Derived terms

• normalitat
• normalment

Further reading

• “normal” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “normal” in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana.
• “normal” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “normal” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin norm?lis. Synchronically analysable as norme +? -al.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /n??.mal/

Adjective

normal (feminine singular normale, masculine plural normaux, feminine plural normales)

1. normal (according to norms, usual, pertaining to a school to teach teachers how to teach)
2. okay, alright.

   Antonym: anormal

Derived terms

Related terms

• norme

Further reading

• “normal” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

German

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /n?r?ma?l/, [n???ma?l], [n???-], [n?-], [no-]
• Rhymes: -a?l

Adjective

normal (comparative normaler, superlative am normalsten)

1. ordinary, normal

Declension

Derived terms

Adverb

normal

1. (standard) ordinarily, normally, in a normal fashion

2. (colloquial) Alternative form of normalerweise: usually, normally, in general

Interjection

normal

1. (colloquial) sure, of course, obviously; usually implies that something is trivial

Further reading

• “normal” in Duden online

Hunsrik

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /nor?ma?l/

Adjective

normal

1. normal

Declension

Further reading

• Online Hunsrik Dictionary

Interlingua

Adjective

normal (comparative plus normal, superlative le plus normal)

1. normal

   Antonym: anormal

Irish

Etymology

Borrowing from English normal.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?n?????(?)m??l?/

Noun

normal m (genitive singular normail, nominative plural normail)

1. (geometry, statistics, chemistry) normal

Declension

Derived terms

Further reading

• "normal" in Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla, An Gúm, 1977, by Niall Ó Dónaill.
• “normal” in New English-Irish Dictionary by Foras na Gaeilge.

Ladin

Adjective

normal m (feminine singular normala, masculine plural normai, feminine plural normales)

1. normal

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From Latin norm?lis.

Adjective

normal (neuter singular normalt, definite singular and plural normale)

1. normal, ordinary

   Antonym: unormal

Derived terms

References

• “normal” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From Latin norm?lis.

Adjective

normal (neuter singular normalt, definite singular and plural normale)

1. normal, ordinary

   Antonym: unormal

Derived terms

References

• “normal” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

Portuguese

Etymology

From Latin norm?lis.

Pronunciation

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /n??.?ma?/
• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /no?.?maw/, [n?ö?.?mä??]
• Hyphenation: nor?mal

Adjective

normal m or f (plural normais, comparable)

1. normal, standard, regular

Related terms

• norma

Romanian

Etymology

Borrowed from French normal, Latin norm?lis.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /nor?mal/

Adjective

normal m or n (feminine singular normal?, masculine plural normali, feminine and neuter plural normale)

1. normal

Related terms

• normalitate

Adverb

normal

1. normally

Spanish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /no??mal/, [no??mal]
• Hyphenation: nor?mal

Adjective

normal (plural normales)

1. normal, standard, regular, fine

   Synonyms: regular, común

   Antonyms: anormal, raro, poco común

2. (geometry) perpendicular

   Synonym: perpendicular

   Antonyms: oblicuo, paralelo

Derived terms

Noun

normal f (plural normales)

1. (education) a school for becoming a teacher

Swedish

Etymology

From Latin n?rm?lis, from n?rma + -?lis, equivalent to norm +? -al.

Pronunciation

Adjective

normal (comparative normalare, superlative normalast)

1. normal

   Antonyms: abnorm, onaturlig, onormal, sjuklig

Declension

Related terms

• normalisera

Noun

normal c

1. (geometry) a normal (a line which is perpendicular to another line or to a surface)

   Antonym: tangent

Declension

References

• normal in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)