Grammar, Human sciences, Linguistics, SciencesOf a verb Not transitive: not having, or not taking, a direct object.
The word "drink" is a transitive verb in "they drink wine", but an intransitive one in "they drink often."
2
Rare Not transitive or passing further; kept; detained.
1664-1667, Jeremy Taylor, Dissuasive from Popery And then it is for the image's sake and so far is intransitive; but whatever is paid more to the image is transitive and passes further.
3
Mathematics, Probability, Sciences Of a set of dice: containing three dice A, B, and C, with the property that A rolls higher than B more than half the time, and B rolls higher than C more than half the time, but lacking the property that A rolls higher than C more than half the time. See intransitive dice and intransitive game.
This means that subcategorization properties do not allow us to distinguish between transitives and intransitives (both types of verbs are allowed, but not obliged, to take a direct object).2011, Carmen Dobrovie-Sorin, The Syntax of Romanian: Comparative Studies in Romance, page 136: