the soul of a dead person, a disembodied spirit imagined, usually as a vague, shadowy or evanescent form, as wandering among or haunting living persons.
a mere shadow or semblance; a trace:He's a ghost of his former self.
a remote possibility:He hasn't a ghost of a chance.
(sometimes cap.) a spiritual being.
the principle of life; soul; spirit.
Informal TermsSee ghost writer.
Radio and Televisiona secondary image, esp. one appearing on a television screen as a white shadow, caused by poor or double reception or by a defect in the receiver.
PhotographyAlso called ghost image. a faint secondary or out-of-focus image in a photographic print or negative resulting from reflections within the camera lens.
an oral word game in which each player in rotation adds a letter to those supplied by preceding players, the object being to avoid ending a word.
Opticsa series of false spectral lines produced by a diffraction grating with unevenly spaced lines.
Metallurgya streak appearing on a freshly machined piece of steel containing impurities.
Biochemistrya red blood cell having no hemoglobin.
a fictitious employee, business, etc., fabricated esp. for the purpose of manipulating funds or avoiding taxes:Investigation showed a payroll full of ghosts.
Idiomsgive up the ghost:
to die.
to cease to function or exist.
v.t.
to ghostwrite (a book, speech, etc.).
to haunt.
Printing[Engraving.]to lighten the background of (a photograph) before engraving.
v.i.
to ghostwrite.
to go about or move like a ghost.
Naval Terms(of a sailing vessel) to move when there is no perceptible wind.
to pay people for work not performed, esp. as a way of manipulating funds.
adj.
fabricated for purposes of deception or fraud:We were making contributions to a ghost company.
bef. 900; Middle English goost (noun, nominal), Old English gāst; cognate with German Geist spirit
ghost′i•ly, adv. ghost′like′, adj.
1.See corresponding entry in Unabridged apparition, phantom, phantasm, wraith, revenant; shade, spook. Ghost,specter,spirit all refer to the disembodied soul of a person. A ghost is the soul or spirit of a deceased person, which appears or otherwise makes its presence known to the living:the ghost of a drowned child.A specter is a ghost or apparition of more or less weird, unearthly, or terrifying aspect:a frightening specter.Spirit is often interchangeable with ghost but may mean a supernatural being, usually with an indication of good or malign intent toward human beings:the spirit of a friend; an evil spirit.
(modifier)falsely recorded as doing a particular job or fulfilling a particular function in order that some benefit, esp money, may be obtained: a ghost worker