necessary
Americanadjective
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essential, indispensable, or requisite.
The rotor is a necessary part of the motor.
- Synonyms:
- needed
- Antonyms:
- dispensable
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happening or existing by necessity.
The snow has forced a necessary change in our plans.
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acting or proceeding from compulsion or necessity; not free; involuntary.
a necessary agent.
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Logic.
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(of a proposition) such that a denial of it involves a self-contradiction.
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(of an inference or argument) such that its conclusion cannot be false if its supporting premises are true.
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(of a condition) such that it must exist if a given event is to occur or a given thing is to exist.
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noun
plural
necessaries-
something necessary or required for a particular purpose; necessity.
- Synonyms:
- essential, requisite, requirement
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Law. necessaries, food, clothing, etc., required by a dependent person and varying with their social or economic position or that of the person upon whom they are dependent.
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Chiefly New England. a privy or toilet.
adjective
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needed to achieve a certain desired effect or result; required
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resulting from necessity; inevitable
the necessary consequences of your action
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logic
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(of a statement, formula, etc) true under all interpretations or in all possible circumstances
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(of a proposition) determined to be true by its meaning, so that its denial would be self-contradictory
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(of a property) essential, so that without it its subject would not be the entity it is
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(of an inference) always yielding a true conclusion when its premises are true; valid
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(of a condition) entailed by the truth of some statement or the obtaining of some state of affairs Compare sufficient
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philosophy (in a nonlogical sense) expressing a law of nature, so that if it is in this sense necessary that all As are B, even although it is not contradictory to conceive of an A which is not B, we are licensed to infer that if something were an A it would have to be B
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rare compelled, as by necessity or law; not free
noun
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informal the money required for a particular purpose
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informal to do something that is necessary in a particular situation
Related Words
Necessary, essential, indispensable, requisite indicate something vital for the fulfillment of a need. Necessary applies to something without which a condition cannot be fulfilled or to an inevitable consequence of certain events, conditions, etc.: Food is necessary to life. Multiplicity is a necessary result of division. Indispensable applies to something that cannot be done without or removed from the rest of a unitary condition: Food is indispensable to living things. He made himself indispensable as a companion. Something that is essential forms a vitally necessary condition of something: Air is essential to red-blooded animals. It is essential to understand the matter clearly. Requisite applies to what is thought necessary to fill out, complete, or perfect something: She had all the requisite qualifications for a position.
Other Word Forms
- necessariness noun
- quasi-necessary adjective
Etymology
Origin of necessary
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English necessarie, from Latin necessārius “unavoidable, inevitable, needful,” equivalent to necess(e) (neuter indeclinable adjective) “unavoidable, necessary” + -ārius -ary
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The Welsh government cannot introduce the tax until the UK government agrees to devolve the necessary powers.
From BBC
Rebuilding a kitchen from scratch: strips everything away and forces you to think about what is necessary.
The Nexperia saga started last year when the Dutch government gave itself the power to block or reverse decisions at Nexperia to prevent the loss of “technological knowledge and capabilities” necessary for Europe’s economic security.
The first is whether companies that lay off workers clearly explain why the moves are necessary.
From MarketWatch
San Bernardino County district attorney investigators determined that the deputy’s use of deadly force was necessary that night, given the narrow driveway and lack of escape options.
From Los Angeles Times
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
