Verb

(resolv)

To find a solution to (a problem).

To reduce to simple or intelligible notions; to make clear or certain; to unravel; to explain.

to resolve a riddle

* Shakespeare

Resolve my doubt.

To solve again.

To make a firm decision to do something.

* '>citation

To determine or decide in purpose; to make ready in mind; to fix; to settle.

He was resolved by an unexpected event.

To come to an agreement or make peace; patch up relationship, settle differences, bury the hatchet.

(transitive, intransitive, reflexive) To break down into constituent parts; to decompose; to disintegrate; to return to a simpler constitution or a primeval state.

* Shakespeare

O, that this too too solid flesh would melt, / Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew!

* Dryden

Ye immortal souls, who once were men, / And now resolved to elements again.

* {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author= Fenella Saunders, magazine=(American Scientist)

, title= Tiny Lenses See the Big Picture , passage=The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail.}}

To cause to perceive or understand; to acquaint; to inform; to convince; to assure; to make certain.

* Alexander Pope

Resolve me, Reason, which of these is worse, / Want with a full, or with an empty purse?

* Sir Walter Raleigh

In health, good air, pleasure, riches, I am resolved it can not be equalled by any region.

* Milton

We must be resolved how the law can be pure and perspicuous, and yet throw a polluted skirt over these Eleusinian mysteries.

(music) To cause a chord to go from dissonance to consonance.

(computing) To find the IP address of a hostname, or the entity referred to by a symbol in source code; to look up.

(rare) To melt; to dissolve; to liquefy or soften (a solid).

(rare, intransitive, reflexive) To melt; to dissolve; to become liquid.

* Arbuthnot

When the blood stagnates in any part, it first coagulates, then resolves , and turns alkaline.

(obsolete) To liquefy (a gas or vapour).

(medicine, dated) To disperse or scatter; to discuss, as an inflammation or a tumour.

(obsolete) To relax; to lay at ease.

(Ben Jonson)

Verb

To see someone or something as different from others.

* {{quote-book, author=De Lacy O'Leary, title=, year=1922

, passage=It had begun to take a leading place even in the days of the Ptolemies, and in scientific, as distinguished from purely literary work, it had assumed a position of primary importance early in the Christian era.}}

* {{quote-magazine, year=2012, month=March-April

, author=(Jeremy Bernstein) , title=A Palette of Particles , volume=100, issue=2, page=146 , magazine=(American Scientist) citation , passage=The physics of elementary particles in the 20th century was distinguished by the observation of particles whose existence had been predicted by theorists sometimes decades earlier.}}

To see someone or something clearly or distinctly.

To make oneself noticeably different or better from others through accomplishments.

* 1784 : William Jones, The Description and Use of a New Portable Orrery, &c. , PREFACE

THE favourable reception the Orrery has met with from Per?ons of the fir?t di?tinction, and from Gentlemen and Ladies in general, has induced me to add to it ?everal new improvements in order to give it a degree of Perfection; and di?tingui?h it from others; which by Piracy, or Imitation, may be introduced to the Public.

(obsolete) To make to differ.

* Bible, 1 Cor. iv. 7 (Douay version)

Who distinguisheth thee?