# sphere

Pronunciation: say "SFEER" US /sfɪɚ/, UK /sfɪə(ɹ)/

## Noun

1. A round object that has the shape of a ball.
   - Simple: A round object shaped like a ball.
   - _The sculptor balanced a polished stone sphere on the pedestal._
   - _Tiny metal spheres rolled across the workbench when the jar tipped._
2. The area of activity or influence that belongs to a particular person or thing.
   - Simple: The area of life or work where someone is active or in charge.
   - _Foreign policy fell outside the minister's usual sphere of responsibility._
   - _Each department guards its own sphere within the company._
3. A surface in three dimensions made up of all the points that lie the same distance from a center point.
   - Simple: A round surface where every point is the same distance from the middle.
   - _Each point on the sphere lies exactly five centimeters from its center._
   - _To find the surface area of a sphere, the students used the radius._
4. The set of all points in three-dimensional space that lie a fixed distance from a fixed point.
   - Simple: The full set of points that are all the same distance from a single fixed point.
   - _In geometry, a sphere is every point that sits the same distance from one center point._
   - _Every sphere in this space shares the same center but differs in radius._
5. The area of activity assigned to a planet, or by extension the area of influence belonging to a god or hero.
   - Simple: The part of the sky or world ruled by a planet, god, or hero.
   - _Ancient astrologers assigned each planet a sphere of activity in the cosmos._
   - _Among the old gods, the sea fell within Poseidon's sphere of power._
6. The natural, normal, or proper place where something belongs.
   - Simple: The place where something or someone naturally and properly belongs.
   - _Returned to the quiet of the library, she felt back in her natural sphere._
   - _A wild animal kept in a cage is removed from its proper sphere._
7. Any of the concentric hollow transparent globes once believed to rotate around the Earth and carry the heavenly bodies.
   - Simple: One of the clear hollow balls that people once thought circled the Earth and carried the stars.
   - _Medieval thinkers held that each sphere turned at its own steady pace around the Earth._
   - _The outermost sphere was said to carry the fixed stars in its nightly rotation._

## Verb

8. To make something round or spherical; to bring it to perfection.
   - Simple: To make something round, or to make it complete and perfect.
   - _Skilled hands can sphere a lump of clay into a perfect ball._
   - _The jeweler spheres each pearl until it gleams._
9. To place something in a sphere, or among the celestial spheres; to enclose it within one.
   - Simple: To put something inside a sphere, or among the heavenly spheres.
   - _The myth tells how the gods sphered the hero among the stars._
   - _Poets would sphere the souls of the blessed within the turning heavens._

## Noun

10. The edge of the heavens, imagined as a hollow globe within which the stars and planets appear to be set. *(archaic)*
   - Simple: The outer edge of the sky, pictured long ago as a hollow ball holding the stars.
   - _Early astronomers charted the stars as points fixed upon the great sphere._
   - _They watched the sphere turn overhead, carrying the constellations from east to west._
11. The range of things to which a proposition, subject, or predicate applies; the whole set of cases it covers. *(dated)*
   - Simple: All the things that a statement or idea applies to.
   - _The sphere of the term 'metal' includes iron, copper, gold, and many others._
   - _Logicians once spoke of the sphere of a predicate as all the things it could be said of._

## Origin

This word passed from Middle English 'spere', through Old French 'sphere' and Late Latin 'sphēra' (earlier Latin 'sphaera', meaning 'ball, globe, celestial sphere'), from Ancient Greek 'sphaîra' ('ball, globe'), whose ultimate origin is unknown.

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