degree Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. noun a position on a scale of intensity or amount or quality
    grade; level.
    • a moderate grade of intelligence
    • a high level of care is required
    • it is all a matter of degree
  2. noun a specific identifiable position in a continuum or series or especially in a process
    point; stage; level.
    • a remarkable degree of frankness
    • at what stage are the social sciences?
  3. noun an award conferred by a college or university signifying that the recipient has satisfactorily completed a course of study
    academic degree.
    • he earned his degree at Princeton summa cum laude
  4. noun a measure for arcs and angles
    arcdegree.
    • there are 360 degrees in a circle
  5. noun the highest power of a term or variable
  6. noun a unit of temperature on a specified scale
    • the game was played in spite of the 40-degree temperature
  7. noun the seriousness of something (e.g., a burn or crime)
    • murder in the second degree
    • a second degree burn

WordNet

De*gree" noun
Etymology
F. degré, OF. degret, fr. LL. degradare. See Degrade.
Definitions
  1. A step, stair, or staircase. Obs.
    By ladders, or else by degree. Rom. of R.
  2. One of a series of progressive steps upward or downward, in quality, rank, acquirement, and the like; a stage in progression; grade; gradation; as, degrees of vice and virtue; to advance by slow degrees; degree of comparison.
  3. The point or step of progression to which a person has arrived; rank or station in life; position. "A dame of high degree." Dryden. "A knight is your degree." Shak. "Lord or lady of high degree." Lowell.
  4. Measure of advancement; quality; extent; as, tastes differ in kind as well as in degree.
    The degree of excellence which proclaims genius, is different in different times and different places. Sir. J. Reynolds.
  5. Grade or rank to which scholars are admitted by a college or university, in recognition of their attainments; as, the degree of bachelor of arts, master, doctor, etc. ✍ In the United States diplomas are usually given as the evidence of a degree conferred. In the humanities the first degree is that of bachelor of arts (B. A. or A. B.); the second that of master of arts (M. A. or A. M.). The degree of bachelor (of arts, science, divinity, law, etc.) is conferred upon those who complete a prescribed course of undergraduate study. The first degree in medicine is that of doctor of medicine (M. D.). The degrees of master and doctor are sometimes conferred, in course, upon those who have completed certain prescribed postgraduate studies, as doctor of philosophy (Ph. D.); but more frequently the degree of doctor is conferred as a complimentary recognition of eminent services in science or letters, or for public services or distinction (as doctor of laws (LL. D.) or doctor of divinity (D. D.), when they are called honorary degrees. by 1960 the Ph. D. was more common than the honorary degree.
    The youth attained his bachelor's degree, and left the university. Macaulay.
  6. (Genealogy) A certain distance or remove in the line of descent, determining the proximity of blood; one remove in the chain of relationship; as, a relation in the third or fourth degree.
    In the 11th century an opinion began to gain ground in Italy, that third cousins might marry, being in the seventh degree according to the civil law. Hallam.
  7. (Arith.) Three figures taken together in numeration; thus, 140 is one degree, 222,140 two degrees.
  8. (Algebra) State as indicated by sum of exponents; more particularly, the degree of a term is indicated by the sum of the exponents of its literal factors; thus, a2b2c is a term of the sixth degree. The degree of a power, or radical, is denoted by its index, that of an equation by the greatest sum of the exponents of the unknown quantities in any term; thus, ax4 + bx2 = c, and mx2y2 + nyx = p, are both equations of the fourth degree.
  9. (Trig.) A 360th part of the circumference of a circle, which part is taken as the principal unit of measure for arcs and angles. The degree is divided into 60 minutes and the minute into 60 seconds.
  10. A division, space, or interval, marked on a mathematical or other instrument, as on a thermometer.
  11. (Mus.) A line or space of the staff. ✍ The short lines and their spaces are added degrees.
    It has been said that Scotsmen . . . are . . . grave to a degree on occasions when races more favored by nature are gladsome to excess. Prof. Wilson.

Webster 1913