imply

From Middle English implien, emplien, borrowed from Old French emplier, from Latin implicare (“to infold, involve”), from in (“in”) + plicare (“to fold”). Doublet of employ and implicate.

• (General American, Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ɪmˈplaɪ/

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• Rhymes: -aɪ
• Hyphenation: im‧ply

imply (third-person singular simple present implies, present participle implying, simple past and past participle implied)

1. (transitive, of a proposition) to have as a necessary consequence

   The proposition that "all dogs are mammals" implies that my dog is a mammal

2. (transitive, of a person) to suggest by logical inference

   When I state that your dog is brown, I am not implying that all dogs are brown

3. (transitive, of a person or proposition) to hint; to insinuate; to suggest tacitly and avoid a direct statement

   What do you mean "we need to be more careful with hygiene"? Are you implying that I don't wash my hands?

4. (archaic) to enfold, entangle.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, I.iv:

     And in his bosome secretly there lay / An hatefull Snake, the which his taile vptyes / In many folds, and mortall sting implyes.

• This is a catenative verb that takes the gerund (-ing). See Appendix:English catenative verbs

• (to have as a necessary consequence): entail
• (to suggest tacitly): allude, hint, insinuate, suggest

• implicate
• implication
• implicative
• implicit
• implicitness
• implision

• connotation
• entail

• imply in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• imply in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.