Noise

[noiz] /nɔɪz/

noun
1.
sound, especially of a loud, harsh, or confused kind:
deafening noises.
2.
a sound of any kind:
to hear a noise at the door.
3.
loud shouting, outcry, or clamor.
4.
a nonharmonious or discordant group of sounds.
5.
an electric disturbance in a communications system that interferes with or prevents reception of a signal or of information, as the buzz on a telephone or snow on a television screen.
6.
Informal. extraneous, irrelevant, or meaningless facts, information, statistics, etc.:
The noise in the report obscured its useful information.
7.
Obsolete. rumor or gossip, especially slander.
verb (used with object), noised, noising.
8.
to spread, as a report or rumor; disseminate (usually followed by about or abroad):
A new scandal is being noised about.
verb (used without object), noised, noising.
9.
to talk much or publicly.
10.
to make a noise, outcry, or clamor.
Idioms
11.
make noises, Informal. to speak vaguely; hint:
He is making noises to the press about running for public office.
/nɔɪz/
noun
1.
a sound, esp one that is loud or disturbing
2.
loud shouting; clamour; din
3.
any undesired electrical disturbance in a circuit, degrading the useful information in a signal See also signal-to-noise ratio
4.
undesired or irrelevant elements in a visual image: removing noise from pictures
5.
talk or interest: noise about strikes
6.
(pl) conventional comments or sounds conveying a reaction, attitude, feeling, etc: she made sympathetic noises
7.
make a noise, to talk a great deal or complain
8.
(informal) make noises about, to give indications of one’s intentions: the government is making noises about new social security arrangements
9.
(theatre) noises off, sounds made offstage intended for the ears of the audience: used as a stage direction
verb
10.
(transitive; usually foll by abroad or about) to spread (news, gossip, etc)
11.
(intransitive) (rare) to talk loudly or at length
12.
(intransitive) (rare) to make a din or outcry; be noisy
n.

early 13c., “loud outcry, clamor, shouting,” from Old French noise “din, disturbance, uproar, brawl” (11c., in modern French only in phrase chercher noise “to pick a quarrel”), also “rumor, report, news,” apparently from Latin nausea “disgust, annoyance, discomfort,” literally “seasickness” (see nausea).

Another theory traces the Old French word to Latin noxia “hurting, injury, damage.” OED considers that “the sense of the word is against both suggestions,” but nausea could have developed a sense in Vulgar Latin of “unpleasant situation, noise, quarrel” (cf. Old Provençal nauza “noise, quarrel”). Meaning “loud or unpleasant sound” is from c.1300. Replaced native gedyn (see din).
v.

late 14c., “to praise; to talk loudly about,” from noise (n.). Related: Noised; noising.

noun

Related Terms

big noise, make noises

communications
Any part of a signal that is not the true or original signal but is introduced by the communication mechanism.
A common example would be an electrical signal travelling down a wire to which noise is added by inductive and capacitive coupling with other nearby signals (this kind of noise is known as “crosstalk”).
A less obvious form of noise is quantisation noise, such as the error between the true colour of a point in a scene in the real world and its representation as a pixel in a digital image.
(2003-07-05)