Other forms: negatives
In photography, a negative is the reversed image film makes, with light and dark swapped, from which prints are made. Keep the negatives, a strip of negatives.
The word covers a lot elsewhere. Negative means bad or unhelpful — a negative reaction, negative feedback — and it means saying no: a negative answer. In maths a negative number is below zero, and in medicine a negative result means the thing tested for was not found, which is usually good news and confuses people every time. Note negative in electricity, and the double negative, which in standard English cancels itself out.
1nounnegativeA photographic image with light and dark reversed.
“The negatives were in an envelope in the loft.”
2adjectivebadBad, harmful or unhelpful.
“The reaction was overwhelmingly negative.”
3adjectivetestOf a test, showing that something was not found.
“Both tests came back negative.”
4adjectivenumberOf a number, less than zero.
“The temperature was negative for six days running.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
negative is a reversal or denial.
Latin negativus comes from negare, to deny — the same verb behind deny and renege. Everything negative is a denying of something, whether the something is a charge, a number or an image.
Proto-Indo-European
*h₁eǵ-
Latin
negātīvus — that denies, negative
Old French
negatif
Middle English
negative
English, today
negative
Built from
From Middle English negative, negatif, from Old French negatif, from Latin negātīvus (“that denies, negative”), from negāre (“to deny”); see negate.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA