Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act or process of deriving logical conclusions from premises known or assumed to be true.
  • noun The act of reasoning from factual knowledge or evidence.
  • noun Something inferred.
  • noun Usage Problem A hint or suggestion.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The formation of a belief or opinion, not as directly observed, but as constrained by observations made of other matters or by beliefs already adopted; the system of propositions or judgments connected together by such an act in a syllogism—namely, the premises, or the judgment or judgments which act as causes, and the conclusion, or the judgment which results as an effect; also, the belief so produced.
  • noun Reasoning from effect to cause; reasoning from signs; conjecture from premises or criteria; hypothesis.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act or process of inferring by deduction or induction.
  • noun That which inferred; a truth or proposition drawn from another which is admitted or supposed to be true; a conclusion; a deduction.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun uncountable The act or process of inferring by deduction or induction.
  • noun countable That which is inferred; a truth or proposition drawn from another which is admitted or supposed to be true; a conclusion; a deduction.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the reasoning involved in drawing a conclusion or making a logical judgment on the basis of circumstantial evidence and prior conclusions rather than on the basis of direct observation

Etymologies

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  • A conclusion that is based on and extends an observation. This can be of a generalizing or explanatory type.

    Eggen PD, Kauchak DP. Strategies for Teachers: Teaching Content and Thinking Skills

    April 22, 2007