# concept

Pronunciation: say "KON-sept" US /ˈkɑn.sɛpt/, UK /ˈkɒn.sɛpt/

## Noun

1. An abstract or general idea formed in the mind, especially one that captures what particular things or experiences have in common.
   - Simple: A general idea or understanding of what something is or how it works.
   - _The concept of justice underlies most modern legal systems._
   - _It took mathematicians centuries to fully accept the concept of zero as a number in its own right._

## Verb

2. To conceive an idea or plan in the mind, or to dream one up.
   - Simple: To think up or come up with a new idea or design.
   - _The writers concepted the entire season on a whiteboard over two long days._
   - _Engineers at the startup concept new features in short sprints, then build only the strongest._

## Other meanings

- (noun) In generic programming, a specification of the operations a type must support, together with their syntax and meaning.

## Origin

Latin concipiō ("to take in, conceive") gave conceptus ("a thought, purpose," and also "a conceiving"), which passed into Middle French as concept and then into English. Conceit and concetto are doublets.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/concept (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).