Definition of "thought"

thought

/θɔːt/

noun
countable and uncountable, plural thoughts
1. (countable) Representation created in the mind without the use of one's faculties of vision, sound, smell, touch, or taste; an instance of thinking.
  Quotations
  I corralled the judge, and we started off across the fields, in no very mild state of fear of that gentleman's wife, whose vigilance was seldom relaxed. And thus we came by a circuitous route to Mohair, the judge occupied by his own guilty thoughts, and I by others not less disturbing.
  1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter VIII, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd.
  He was thinking; but the glory of the song, the swell from the great organ, the clustered lights, […] , the height and vastness of this noble fane, its antiquity and its strength—all these things seemed to have their part as causes of the thrilling emotion that accompanied his thoughts.
  1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter V, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company
2. (uncountable) The operation by which mental activity arise or are manipulated; the process of thinking; the agency by which thinking is accomplished.
  Quotations
  The only reason some people get lost in thought is because it’s unfamiliar territory.
  a. 1983, Paul Fix (attributed quote)
3. (uncountable) A way of thinking (associated with a group, nation or region).
4. (uncountable, now dialectal) Anxiety, distress.
  Quotations
  Which of you by taking thought, can adde one cubite vnto his ſtature?
  1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Matthew 6:27
5. (uncountable) The careful consideration of multiple factors; deliberation.
6. A very small amount, distance, etc.; a whit or jot.
  Quotations
  'Bide the night at Heriotside,' says he. 'It's a thought out of your way, but it's a comfortable bit.'
  1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide
verb
1. simple past and past participle of think