What (who) is Thumb - definition
FIRST FINGER OF THE HAND
Opposable thumb; Thumbs; Opposable thumbs; Pollical; Opposable; Opposability; Digitus I manus; Digitus primus manus; Bones of the thumb; Pollicis; Opposition of the thumb; Thumb apposition; Opposing thumb
![[[Hitchhiker's thumb]]](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:FilePath/Hitchhikers thumb.jpg?width=200 "[[Hitchhiker's thumb]]")
thumb
(thumbs, thumbing, thumbed)
1.
Your thumb is the short thick part on the side of your hand next to your four fingers.
She bit the tip of her left thumb, not looking at me.
N-COUNT
2.
If you thumb a lift or thumb a ride, you stand by the side of the road holding out your thumb until a driver stops and gives you a lift.
It may interest you to know that a boy answering Rory's description thumbed a ride to Howth...
Thumbing a lift had once a carefree, easy-going image.
= hitch
VERB: V n to n, V n
3.
see also well-thumbed
4.
If you say that someone or something sticks out like a sore thumb or stands out like a sore thumb, you are emphasizing that they are very noticeable, usually because they are unusual or inappropriate.
Does the new housing stick out like a sore thumb or blend into its surroundings?...
PHRASE: V and N inflect [emphasis]
5.
If you say that someone is twiddling their thumbs, you mean that they do not have anything to do and are waiting for something to happen.
The prospect of waiting around just twiddling his thumbs was appalling...
PHRASE: V inflects
6.
If you are under someone's thumb, you are under their control, or very heavily influenced by them.
I cannot tell you what pain I feel when I see how much my mother is under my father's thumb...
PHRASE: v-link PHR, PHR after v
7.
Thumb
<processor> An extension to the Advanced RISC Machine
architecture, announced on 06 March 1995 by {Advanced RISC
Machines} Ltd. By identifying the critical subset of the ARM
instruction set and encoding it into 16 bits, ARM has
succeeded in reducing typical program size by 30-40% from
ARM's already excellent code density. Since this Thumb
instruction set uses less memory for program storage, cost is
further reduced.
All Thumb-aware processor cores combine the capability to
execute both the 32-bit ARM and the 16-bit Thumb instruction
sets. Careful design of the Thumb instructions allow them to
be decompressed into full ARM instructions transparently
during normal instruction decoding without any performance
penalty. This differs from other 32-bit processors, like the
Intel 486SX, with a 16-bit data bus, which require two
16-bit memory accesses to execute every 32-bit instruction and
so halve performance.
The patented Thumb decompressor has been carefully designed
with only a small amount of circuitry additional to the
existing instruction decoder, so chip size and thus cost do
not significantly increase. Designers can easily interleave
fast ARM instructions (for performance critical parts of a
program) with compact Thumb code to save memory.
(1995-03-14)
thumb
¦ noun the short, thick first digit of the hand, set lower and apart from the other four and opposable to them.
¦ verb
1. press, touch, or indicate with one's thumb.
2. turn over (pages) with or as if with one's thumb.
[usu. as adjective thumbed] wear or soil (a book's pages) by repeated handling.
3. request or obtain (a free ride in a passing vehicle) by signalling with one's thumb.
Phrases
thumb one's nose at informal show disdain or contempt for. [with ref. to the gesture of putting one's thumb on one's nose and spreading the fingers.]
thumbs up (or down) informal an indication of satisfaction or approval (or of rejection or failure). [with ref. to the signal of approval or disapproval used by spectators at a Roman amphitheatre (although the Romans used the symbols in reverse).]
under someone's thumb completely under someone's influence or control.
Derivatives
thumbed adjective
thumbless adjective
Origin
OE thu?ma, of W. Gmc origin.
Wikipedia
Thumb
The thumb is the first digit of the hand, next to the index finger. When a person is standing in the medical anatomical position (where the palm is facing to the front), the thumb is the outermost digit. The Medical Latin English noun for thumb is pollex (compare hallux for big toe), and the corresponding adjective for thumb is pollical.
Pronunciation examples for Thumb
1. Thumb.
The Fast and the Furious 4 (2009)
2. Same thumb, or different thumb?
Living a Purpose Driven Life _ Robert Macphee _ Talks at Google
3. thumb--
The Customer Playbook _ Peter Fader & Sarah Toms _ Talks at Google
4. Big thumb up or big thumb down.
How to Fix the Future _ Andrew Keen _ Talks at Google
5. your thumb.
The Ocean at the End of the Lane _ Neil Gaiman _ Talks at Google
Examples of use of Thumb
1. Meanest moment Thumb sucker Francesco Totti‘s thumb–sucking after that dodgy penalty against Australia.
2. Only once has this rule of thumb proved misleading.
3. Blackberry thumb is now the must–have medical ailment.
4. With his strenuous thumb, he obliterates his subject.
5. White House officials yesterday said it was his thumb.