foresight

plural foresights

1. countableuncountableThe ability, or the due use of one's ability, to foresee or prepare wisely for the future.

   Near-synonym: forethought

   5 more examples

   Having the foresight to prepare an evacuation plan may have saved their lives.

   The rugged forhead that with graue foreſight / Welds kingdomes cauſes, & affaires of ſtate; […]

   1596, Edmund Spenser, “Book IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], part II (books IV–VI), London: […] [Richard Field] for William Ponsonby, →OCLC, stanza 1, page 1

   In the dead state all is apparently without motion. No agent within indicates design, intelligence, or foresight: […]

   1822, John Barclay, chapter I, in An Inquiry Into the Opinions, Ancient and Modern, Concerning Life and Organization, Edinburgh; London: Bell & Bradfute; Waugh & Innes; G. & W. B. Whittaker, section I, page 2

   The "D.N.B." wrote of one Railway Member that "he made himself personally acquainted with the working of the new systems of railroads, and with more foresight than his neighbours, he welcomed railways on his estate when other landowners were ordering their gamekeepers to warn off the surveyors or to put an end to their operations by force."

   1960 March 28, N. Caplan, “The Railway Member of Parliament”, in Railway Magazine, page 208

   The specifiers of the Freightliner network had the foresight to base the rail journey on carrying ISO containers which are 8ft wide and originally 8ft tall (although now increased to a height of 9ft 6ins), with a variety of lengths.

   2020 May 20, Industry Insider, “An online boost for freight”, in Rail, page 68

   Synonyms: prescience, forethought · Antonyms: hindsight

2. countableuncountableThe ability to foresee future events in a supernatural or paranormal way, such as psychically.

   Synonyms: foreknowledge, clairvoyance, precognition, prescience, divination, prophecy, psychicness

3. countableuncountableThe front sight on a firearm (e.g., rifle, handgun).

   Holonym: iron sights

   Antonyms: backsight, hindsight

4. countableuncountablegeographyA bearing taken forwards towards a new object.