Crossword clues for pragmatic
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Pragmatic \Prag*mat"ic\, n.
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One skilled in affairs.
My attorney and solicitor too; a fine pragmatic.
--B. Jonson. -
A solemn public ordinance or decree.
A royal pragmatic was accordingly passed.
--Prescott.
Pragmatic \Prag*mat"ic\, Pragmatical \Prag*mat"ic*al\, a. [L. pragmaticus busy, active, skilled in business, especially in law and state affairs, systematic, Gr. ?, fr. ? a thing done, business, fr. ? to do: cf. F. pragmatique. See Practical.]
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Of or pertaining to business or to affairs; of the nature of business; practical; material; businesslike in habit or manner.
The next day . . . I began to be very pragmatical.
--Evelyn.We can not always be contemplative, diligent, or pragmatical, abroad; but have need of some delightful intermissions.
--Milton.Low, pragmatical, earthly views of the gospel.
--Hare. -
Busy; specifically, busy in an objectionable way; officious; fussy and positive; meddlesome. ``Pragmatical officers of justice.''
--Sir W. Scott.The fellow grew so pragmatical that he took upon him the government of my whole family.
--Arbuthnot. -
Philosophical; dealing with causes, reasons, and effects, rather than with details and circumstances; -- said of literature. ``Pragmatic history.''
--Sir W. Hamilton. ``Pragmatic poetry.''
--M. Arnold.Pragmatic sanction, a solemn ordinance or decree issued by the head or legislature of a state upon weighty matters; -- a term derived from the Byzantine empire. In European history, two decrees under this name are particularly celebrated. One of these, issued by Charles VII. of France, A. D. 1438, was the foundation of the liberties of the Gallican church; the other, issued by Charles VI. of Germany, A. D. 1724, settled his hereditary dominions on his eldest daughter, the Archduchess Maria Theresa.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1610s, "meddlesome, impertinently busy," short for earlier pragmatical, or else from Middle French pragmatique (15c.), from Latin pragmaticus "skilled in business or law," from Greek pragmatikos "fit for business, active, business-like; systematic," from pragma (genitive pragmatos) "a deed, act; that which has been done; a thing, matter, affair," especially an important one; also a euphemism for something bad or disgraceful; in plural, "circumstances, affairs" (public or private), often in a bad sense, "trouble," literally "a thing done," from stem of prassein/prattein "to do, act, perform" (see practical). Meaning "matter-of-fact" is from 1853. In some later senses from German pragmatisch.
Wiktionary
a. 1 practical, concerned with making decisions and actions that are useful in practice, not just theory. 2 philosophical; dealing with causes, reasons, and effects, rather than with details and circumstances; said of literature.
WordNet
adj. concerned with practical matters; "a matter-of-fact (or pragmatic) approach to the problem"; "a matter-of-fact account of the trip" [syn: matter-of-fact, pragmatical]
of or concerning the theory of pragmatism [syn: pragmatical]
guided by practical experience and observation rather than theory; "a hardheaded appraisal of our position"; "a hard-nosed labor leader"; "completely practical in his approach to business"; "not ideology but pragmatic politics" [syn: hardheaded, hard-nosed, practical]
Wikipedia
Usage examples of "pragmatic".
One of the few intellectuals who could articulate, in abstract terms, the pragmatic motivations of the man from Prince Albert was Roy Faibish, who served through270 Exercise of Power out most of the Diefenbaker Years as special assistant to Alvin Hamilton.
From behind the Twists, escorted by two Pragmatics who kept it between them bound in thick crude-iron chains, stepped something that looked to Bowler like a giant tortoise, almost eight feet high, six wide.
From a plainer perspective, the men and women who worked the market exemplified, without varnish, a pragmatic materialism and even an exemplary work ethic.
Meanwhile, working under Lotta appealed to both her pragmatic and adventurous streaks.
But Pikel, for all his obvious enchantment, kept a pragmatic attitude about the situation.
Carmen took the more pragmatic approach and began ferreting in her bag for any loose change she might have to refeed the meter.
If Jake Spurling had not been a pragmatic man and a forensic scientist who believed only in what he could see under a microscope, he might have started to wonder if they had really just disappeared into thin air like people said.
South Bankers slid da gers from their sleeves as they drew pragmatic, razor-edged swon from scabbards that had appeared purely decorative.
If I had accepted the idea that the reality of special consensus was usable because it possessed inherently utilizable properties which were as pragmatic as those of the reality of everyday consensus, then it would have been logical for me to understand why don Juan exploited the notion of movement in the reality of special consensus at such great length.
In any case, as Hilary Putnam argues, on purely pragmatic grounds more understanding is gleaned by taking into account mental causation than by dogmatically attributing all events solely to physical causation.
Ori Lavin, normally a calm, pragmatic Pelorist, almost a caricature of that sect, had reacted to Bilong as if to a shot of rejuvenating hormones, and sleeked his moustache every time she undulated by.
The idea that an ally was manipulatable warranted its usefulness in the achievement of pragmatic goals, and the manipulatory techniques were the procedures that supposedly rendered the ally usable.
His inclinations were pragmatic and utilitarian, and in that scheme of things the Church had a distinctive social role, ministering to the needs of the credulous, giving them spiritual succor and keeping them in orderly relation with the state.
In the more than two years that elapsed between the time don Juan decided to teach me about the ally powers and the time he thought I was ready to learn about them in the pragmatic, participatory form he considered as learning, he gradually denned the general features of the two allies in question.
Banichi and Jago to know the situation as fully as possible, predigested for atevi comprehension: he did what he could to make it understood in shorthand, and he gave a second, reflexive bow of respect to a man of pragmatic combativeness and considerable virtue.