All 3 Uses of
bias
in
Sense and Sensibility
- If you could be supposed to be biased in any respect by your own feelings, your opinion would not be worth having.†
Chpt 24 *biased = created a personal preference; or creates a tendency to move in a particular direction
- Mrs. Dashwood would have interrupted her instantly with soothing tenderness, had not Elinor, who really wished to hear her sister's unbiased opinion, by an eager sign, engaged her silence.†
Chpt 47unbiased = without a personal preference; or without any tendency to move in a particular directionstandard prefix: The prefix "un-" in unbiased means not and reverses the meaning of biased. This is the same pattern you see in words like unhappy, unknown, and unlucky.
- His temper might perhaps be a little soured by finding, like many others of his sex, that through some unaccountable bias in favour of beauty, he was the husband of a very silly woman,—but she knew that this kind of blunder was too common for any sensible man to be lastingly hurt by it.†
Chpt 20
Definitions:
-
(1)
(bias) a personal preference -- especially a prejudice that prevents objective consideration
or:
any tendency to move in a particular direction -- such as a car that tends to want to swerve toward the right -
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Specialized meanings of bias include:- statistics: any of several errors that distort results
- textiles: a line or fold that is diagonal relative to the sides or grain of the fabric
- electronics: a steady-state current that is forced through an electronic device