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Glite Dictionary
to conceive of

to conceive of

33 5.3
To imagine something as possible or real
  • phrasal verb
  • /kənˈsiːv əv/
translation icon : imaginar
  • According to White, the way people conceive of nature affects how they treat it.
  • difficult to conceive of
  • people conceive of
  • conceive of a park

Can you even conceive of the noise and the terror?

Autoplay Next

Examples

  • So how did he conceive of the scientific method?

  • It is something that we conceive of as being in space and time.

    Gregory B. Sadler - That Philosophy Guy

  • So the leaders of men conceived of their most desperate strategy yet.

    The Animatrix (2003)

  • Do you think you or I could have conceived of such a thing, much less have executed it?

    Fiction book (1995)

  • Can you even conceive of the noise and the terror?

    The Great War

  • Education is absolutely critical to the way that many of these W African families conceive of themselves.

  • Especially, how should we conceive of conflicts involving human rights?

  • It's the fact that we can do today what we couldn't conceive of a year ago.

    Harvard University

  • I just can't conceive of a president giving up that kind of power or forfeiting that kind of power.

    Alene B. Duerk: The First Woman Admiral (2020)

  • Many people struggle to conceive of what life might be like on another planet.

Synonyms

to see
vsto conceive of
∞ 1.0

To picture something in your mind

is more about forming an idea or considering it possible or true
to imagine
vsto conceive of
∞ 1.3

To form a picture in your mind of something not real

is used when ideas can be possible or regarded as true
to think of
vsto conceive of
834 1.0

See someone or something in a certain way

is more about actively forming an idea or seeing it as possible
to envision
vsto conceive of
164 4.1

To picture something in your mind, often a possible future

is used for ideas generally not only for future situations
to fantasize
vsto conceive of
  • US
126 4.5

To imagine things that are not real because you want them

is used when ideas are seen as possible or believable rather than impossible
to conceive
vsto conceive of
84 4.7

To imagine something or think about it in a certain way

is more about creating a mental picture or treating it as possible
to visualize
vsto conceive of
  • US
75 3.8

Form a clear picture of something in your mind

focuses more on forming an idea or seeing it as possible
to conceptualize
vsto conceive of
12 6.9

To form an idea in your mind about something

is broader covering any mental image or thought about possibility or truth
to envisage
vsto conceive of
11 6.8

To form a picture in your mind of something not present

is used to treat ideas as possible or sometimes actually true
to ideate
vsto conceive of
8.4

To think of new ideas

is used more for simple mental formation or considering something possible

How Vivid

to envision
164 4.1
to visualize
  • US
75 3.8
to picture
343 2.9
to conceive of
33 5.3
to imagine
∞ 1.3

Surface Forms

conceive of infinitive
conceiving of present participle
conceives of third person singular
conceived of past
conceived of past participle

Morphology

conceive + of

The core meaning 'to form an idea or imagine' is directly carried by 'conceive', while the preposition 'of' simply links the mental act to its object, so the phrase's meaning is compositionally predictable from its parts. This construction matches common patterns across languages (e.g. Spanish 'concebir en/imaginar', French 'concevoir'), making it readily inferable to a B1 learner who knows the constituent words.

Etymology

The verb conceive of may come from an older meaning of conceive: 'to become pregnant'. People used the image of taking something into the body and then used the same image for the mind, so to conceive of something came to mean 'to form an idea' or 'to imagine'.