Find the word definition

Crossword clues for at least

The Collaborative International Dictionary
At least

At \At\, prep. [AS. [ae]t; akin to OHG. az, Goth., OS., & Icel. at, Sw. [*a]t, Dan. & L. ad.] Primarily, this word expresses the relations of presence, nearness in place or time, or direction toward; as, at the ninth hour; at the house; to aim at a mark. It is less definite than in or on; at the house may be in or near the house. From this original import are derived all the various uses of at. It expresses:

  1. A relation of proximity to, or of presence in or on, something; as, at the door; at your shop; at home; at school; at hand; at sea and on land.

  2. The relation of some state or condition; as, at war; at peace; at ease; at your service; at fault; at liberty; at risk; at disadvantage.

  3. The relation of some employment or action; occupied with; as, at engraving; at husbandry; at play; at work; at meat (eating); except at puns.

  4. The relation of a point or position in a series, or of degree, rate, or value; as, with the thermometer at 80[deg]; goods sold at a cheap price; a country estimated at 10,000 square miles; life is short at the longest.

  5. The relations of time, age, or order; as, at ten o'clock; at twenty-one; at once; at first.

  6. The relations of source, occasion, reason, consequence, or effect; as, at the sight; at this news; merry at anything; at this declaration; at his command; to demand, require, receive, deserve, endure at your hands.

  7. Relation of direction toward an object or end; as, look at it; to point at one; to aim at a mark; to throw, strike, shoot, wink, mock, laugh at any one.

    At all, At home, At large, At last, At length, At once, etc. See under All, Home, Large, Last (phrase and syn.), Length, Once, etc.

    At it, busily or actively engaged.

    At least. See Least and However.

    At one. See At one, in the Vocabulary.

    Syn: In, At.

    Usage: When reference to the interior of any place is made prominent in is used. It is used before the names of countries and cities (esp. large cities); as, we live in America, in New York, in the South. At is commonly employed before names of houses, institutions, villages, and small places; as, Milton was educated at Christ's College; money taken in at the Customhouse; I saw him at the jeweler's; we live at Beachville. At may be used before the name of a city when it is regarded as a mere point of locality. ``An English king was crowned at Paris.''
    --Macaulay. ``Jean Jacques Rousseau was born at Geneva, June, 28, 1712.''
    --J. Morley. In regard to time, we say at the hour, on the day, in the year; as, at 9 o'clock, on the morning of July 5th, in the year 1775.

At least

Least \Least\ (l[=e]st), a. [OE. last, lest, AS. l[=ae]sast, l[=ae]sest, superl. of l[=ae]ssa less. See Less, a.] [Used as the superlative of little.] Smallest, either in size or degree; shortest; lowest; most unimportant; as, the least insect; the least mercy; the least space.

Note: Least is often used with the, as if a noun.

I am the least of the apostles.
--1 Cor. xv. 9.

At least, or At the least, at the least estimate, consideration, chance, etc.; being no less than; hence, at any rate; at all events; even. See However.

He who tempts, though in vain, at least asperses The tempted with dishonor.
--Milton.

Upon the mast they saw a young man, at least if he were a man, who sat as on horseback.
--Sir P. Sidney.

In least, or In the least, in the least degree, manner, etc. ``He that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.''
--Luke xvi. 10.

Least squares (Math.), a method of deducing from a number of carefully made yet slightly discordant observations of a phenomenon the most probable values of the unknown quantities.

Note: It takes as its fundamental principle that the most probable values are those which make the sum of the squares of the residual errors of the observation a minimum.

Wiktionary
at least

prep.phr. 1 (context focus English) At the least; at a minimum or lower limit. 2 In any event; anyway.

WordNet
at least
  1. adv. if nothing else (`leastwise' is informal and `leastways' is colloquial); "at least he survived"; "they felt--at any rate Jim felt--relieved though still wary"; "the influence of economists--or at any rate of economics--is far-reaching" [syn: leastways, leastwise, at any rate]

  2. not less than; "at least two hours studying the manual"; "a tumor at least as big as an orange" [syn: at the least] [ant: at most, at most]

Usage examples of "at least".

They only grinned back at her, at least as unrepentant as young Honor.

And initially, at least, it looked like something of a tossup as to whether or not Theisman and Pritchart could make their new Constitution stand up.

For at least a few years, they were going to be involved in what amounted to a civil war, even if they managed to win it in the end.

Descroix to actively seek to derail the negotiating process, we were able to feed her certain selected information which helped move her at least a bit in the direction we wanted.

And for reminding Detweiler that Anisimovna had not had primary, or at least solo, responsibility for the Verdant Vista operation.

Strategy Committee is already working on a plan to at least destabilize and hopefully permanently derail the Talbott annexation.

Not, at least, without security arrangements which would effectively hamstring their own operations.

Probably at least in part so that we can spend the time discussing all the ramifications.

The red ember of Phoenix, otherwise known as Manticore-A II, rested on the horizon, just above the tips of the Old Earth spruces fringing the lawn, and the gleaming gems of at least a dozen orbital platforms moved visibly against the stars.

Which means our total available pod-laying wall will consist of no more than a hundred and ten units for at least another two T-years.

Obviously, many of their systems had to be new-construction, but the truth is, that probably at least eighty-five percent of the design was based on existing hardware.

Having said all of that, however, Sonja and Toscarelli are looking at several developments which could have at least as significant an impact on our relative combat capabilities as the introduction of the Keyhole platforms.

LACs as a panacea has at least guaranteed that the LAC assembly line was in full swing when the penny dropped.

There ought to at least be a flock of Manty LACs coming out to meet us by now!

By the same token, you have had at least a little bit longer to think about this.