Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The ability to acquire, understand, and use knowledge.
  • noun Information, especially secret information gathered about an actual or potential enemy or adversary.
  • noun The gathering of such information.
  • noun An agency or organization whose purpose is to gather such information.
  • noun An intelligent, incorporeal being, especially an angel.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The quality of being intelligent; understanding; intellect; power of cognition.
  • noun Cultivated understanding; acquired knowledge; information stored up in the mind.
  • noun Exercise of superior understanding; address; skill: as, he performed his mission with much intelligence.
  • noun Mutual understanding; interchange of information or sentiment; intelligent intercourse; as, a glance of intelligence passed between them; to have intelligence with the enemy.
  • noun Information received or imparted; communicated knowledge; news: as, intelligence of a shipwreck.
  • noun An intelligent being; intellectual existence; concrete understanding: as, God is the Supreme Intelligence.
  • noun Advice, Tidings, etc. (see news), notification.
  • To convey intelligence; tell tales; tattle.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act or state of knowing; the exercise of the understanding.
  • noun The capacity to know or understand; readiness of comprehension; the intellect, as a gift or an endowment.
  • noun Information communicated; news; notice; advice.
  • noun obsolete Acquaintance; intercourse; familiarity.
  • noun (Mil.) Knowledge imparted or acquired, whether by study, research, or experience; general information.
  • noun An intelligent being or spirit; -- generally applied to pure spirits.
  • noun (Mil.) The division within a military organization that gathers and evaluates information about an enemy.
  • noun an office where information may be obtained, particularly respecting servants to be hired.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun uncountable Capacity of mind, especially to understand principles, truths, facts or meanings, acquire knowledge, and apply it to practice; the ability to learn and comprehend.
  • noun countable An entity that has such capacities.
  • noun uncountable Information, usually secret, about the enemy or about hostile activities.
  • noun countable A political or military department, agency or unit designed to gather information, usually secret, about the enemy or about hostile activities.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun secret information about an enemy (or potential enemy)
  • noun the ability to comprehend; to understand and profit from experience
  • noun a unit responsible for gathering and interpreting information about an enemy
  • noun information about recent and important events
  • noun the operation of gathering information about an enemy

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old French intelligence.

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Examples

  • My state of mind, which refers ... he proceeds to argue that the whole _either_ to unseen he himself is outside its intelligence, _or something sacred pale because he refers which man has never had any all these strange phenomena to conception of_, proves me to _unseen spiritual be out of the pale of the intelligence_.

    A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) Augustus De Morgan 1838

  • When implemented with our training programme for managers and team leaders to use this intelligence, we guarantee improvements in operational results in short timescales. eg's proprietary software package eg operational intelligence® including eg work manager® has been developed and refined over the last 18 years and form a comprehensive work, resource and performance reporting tool.

    Press Releases 2009

  • If so be, there is indeed no intelligence elsewhere; and we must be forced to confess, that this stupendous universe, with all the various bodies contained therein -- equally amazing, whether we consider their magnitude or number, whatever their use, whatever their order -- _all_ have been produced, not by _intelligence_, but _chance_! "

    Museum of Antiquity A Description of Ancient Life

  • We can invent tests for any sort of thing at all, and if we decide to call it "intelligence", then by definition, "intelligence" is what we are testing.

    Bunny and a Book 2008

  • We can invent tests for any sort of thing at all, and if we decide to call it "intelligence", then by definition, "intelligence" is what we are testing.

    Bunny and a Book 2008

  • By contrast, writing a private email concluding that one thinks that the science regarding racial differences in intelligence is uncertain istaboo.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » 2010 » April 2010

  • Quoth Volokh: “Whether there are genetic differences among racial and ethnic groups in intelligence is a question of scientific fact.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » 1. Science, Faith, and Not Ruling Out Possibilities 2010

  • Whether there are genetic differences among racial and ethnic groups in intelligence is a question of scientific fact.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » 1. Science, Faith, and Not Ruling Out Possibilities 2010

  • Obviously, the question of differences in intelligence is extremely relevant in the law because of the current theory of disparate impact, first enunciated by the Supreme Court in Griggs in 1972 and encoded in legislation by Congress in1991.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Judging a Person Based on a Single Forwarded Personal E-Mail 2010

  • By contrast, writing a private email concluding that one thinks that the science regarding racial differences in intelligence is uncertain istaboo.

    The Volokh Conspiracy » Taboo and Not Taboo at Elite Universities 2010

  • A potential answer lies in the work of the British psychologist Raymond Cattell, who in the early 1940s introduced the concepts of fluid and crystallized intelligence. Cattell defined fluid intelligence as the ability to reason, analyze, and solve novel problems—what we commonly think of as raw intellectual horsepower. Innovators typically have an abundance of fluid intelligence. It is highest relatively early in adulthood and diminishes starting in one’s 30s and 40s. This is why tech entrepreneurs, for instance, do so well so early, and why older people have a much harder time innovating.Crystallized intelligence, in contrast, is the ability to use knowledge gained in the past. Think of it as possessing a vast library and understanding how to use it. It is the essence of wisdom. Because crystallized intelligence relies on an accumulating stock of knowledge, it tends to increase through one’s 40s, and does not diminish until very late in life.Careers that rely primarily on fluid intelligence tend to peak early, while those that use more crystallized intelligence peak later. For example, Dean Keith Simonton has found that poets—highly fluid in their creativity—tend to have produced half their lifetime creative output by age 40 or so. Historians—who rely on a crystallized stock of knowledge—don’t reach this milestone until about 60.

    Your Professional Decline Is Coming (Much) Sooner Than You Think Arthur C. Brooks 2022

  • A potential answer lies in the work of the British psychologist Raymond Cattell, who in the early 1940s introduced the concepts of fluid and crystallized intelligence. Cattell defined fluid intelligence as the ability to reason, analyze, and solve novel problems—what we commonly think of as raw intellectual horsepower. Innovators typically have an abundance of fluid intelligence. It is highest relatively early in adulthood and diminishes starting in one’s 30s and 40s. This is why tech entrepreneurs, for instance, do so well so early, and why older people have a much harder time innovating.Crystallized intelligence, in contrast, is the ability to use knowledge gained in the past. Think of it as possessing a vast library and understanding how to use it. It is the essence of wisdom. Because crystallized intelligence relies on an accumulating stock of knowledge, it tends to increase through one’s 40s, and does not diminish until very late in life.Careers that rely primarily on fluid intelligence tend to peak early, while those that use more crystallized intelligence peak later. For example, Dean Keith Simonton has found that poets—highly fluid in their creativity—tend to have produced half their lifetime creative output by age 40 or so. Historians—who rely on a crystallized stock of knowledge—don’t reach this milestone until about 60.

    Your Professional Decline Is Coming (Much) Sooner Than You Think Arthur C. Brooks 2022

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