Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Possessed at birth; inborn.
- adj. Possessed as an essential characteristic; inherent.
- adj. Of or produced by the mind rather than learned through experience: an innate knowledge of right and wrong.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- Inborn; natural; pertaining to the inherited constitution of body or mind; not derived or acquired from any external source; especially, native to the mind; instinctive: as, an innate tendency to virtue or vice; innate ideas.
- In botany: Borne on the apex of the supporting part: as, an innate anther, which is one that directly continues and corresponds to the apex of the filament.
- Born within; originating within the matrix, or within the substance of the plant.
- To bring or call into existence; inform.
- In biology, characteristic of a species or common to the individuals of a species, or alike in parent and in offspring; hereditary; constitutional; congenital. So far as the development of an individual organism from the egg is considered as characteristic of its kind, it is termed innate or inherent; so far as it is considered as taking place in an individual external environment with which it is in continual reciprocal interaction, it is termed adventitious or induced: the contrast or distinction being in the mind of the observer rather than in the facts of embryology.
Wiktionary
- adj. Inborn; native; natural; as, innate vigor; innate eloquence.
- adj. Originating in, or derived from, the constitution of the intellect, as opposed to acquired from experience; as, innate ideas. See a priori, intuitive.
- adj. Joined by the base to the very tip of a filament; as, an innate anther.
- v. To cause to exist; to call into being.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Inborn; native; natural.
- adj. (Metaph.) Originating in, or derived from, the constitution of the intellect, as opposed to acquired from experience. See A priori, Intuitive.
- adj. (Bot.) Joined by the base to the very tip of a filament.
- v. obsolete To cause to exit; to call into being.
WordNet 3.0
- adj. being talented through inherited qualities
- adj. not established by conditioning or learning
- adj. present at birth but not necessarily hereditary; acquired during fetal development
Etymologies
- From Latin innātus ("inborn"), perfect active participle of innāscor ("be born in, grow up in"), from in ("in, at on") + nāscor ("be born"); see natal, native. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English innat, from Latin innātus, past participle of innāscī, to be born in : in-, in; see in-2 + nāscī, to be born; see genə- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“They wished to be "loyal," but they would not surrender what they termed innate rights; they would not be taxed without representation, nor be debarred from manufacturing; nor consent to make”
“From this he inferred the existence of two distinct natures in man, the mental and the physical, and the existence of certain ideas which he called innate in the mind, and serving to connect it with the spiritual and invisible.”
Handbook of Universal Literature From the Best and Latest Authorities
“No, innate is the natural and predilection of behavior for a species which includes primate species such as “man”.”
“That is to say, certain innate personality traits predispose one to teaching/acting, but there are also techniques that can be learned and which can make an average actor/teacher a better one, and a good actor/teacher quite brilliant!”
“There is a certain innate nobility deep down in the hearts of all men, which forces them to admire a brave act, even if it is performed by an enemy.”
“Under this view, the race and IQ question comes down to the question of whether African IQ deficits are like dark African skin, so pervasive across all imaginable environments that calling them innate is perfectly reasonable as a first approximation, or more like African-American success in popular music, for which we require no scientific evidence to attribute to the particular combination of history, culture and sociology of the present time.”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Approaching Arguments That Have A Racist Past
“In addition, I would question whether someone can speak “unofficially” about differences between the sexes that he is calling innate while presiding over a world-class research institution.”
“For such are the ideological roots of racism -- a belief in innate values that come invisibly in the blood.”
“But, truth-be-known, scientific evidence for homosexuality being innate is far more abundant than say, scientific evidence that man created sin, due to his separation from [your] god.”
“A former postdoctoral research fellow with Ostrander, Melissa Fleming, has developed an assay that attempts to quantify certain innate breed-specific behavioral differences.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘innate’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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sdamle1
echt
echt, apocalypse, resurgence, forthright, logorrhea, mercurial, torrid, exorcise, obscure, intrusive, morose, vindictive and 100 more...
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1100
abound, technology, branch of knowled..., prognosticate, automaton, matron, an older married ..., realm, special field of ..., kingdom, annals, historical records and 981 more...
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Cepstrums
to cepstrumize a word is to reverse its 1st 4 characters in the way that "cepstrum" was derived from "spectrum" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cepstrum...
acedy, adustion, sudation, aedility, ideality, agentive, negative, agral, argal, agrestic, ergastic, alerce and 202 more...
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GRE 2014
abase, abate, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abjure, abortive, abound, abrasive, abreast, abridge and 1577 more...
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AGRI - horse breeding
place bet, Przewalski's horse, piaffe, genus Claviceps, stadium jumping, draft animal, snaffle bit, noseband, equestrian sport, endurance riding, curb bit, dressage and 678 more...
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Aviator's supplement
anybody can add to this list which would help our goal to disperse more words...
raillery, scruples, conspicuous, concupiscent, ramshackled, exultant, innate, condescend, pariah, countenance, ply, vitiate and 6 more...
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Latin Spelling Bee List
need to know these words!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
inane, ambivalent, incriminate, interrupt, amicable, meticulous, animosity, curriculum, electoral, transect, condolences, bugle and 132 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, I
irenic, inimical, ignotism, infrangible, internecine, illumine, ingot, imposter, iconoclast, indefeasible, indefatigable, impingement and 184 more...
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Lively Words
quick, quicksilver, cwic, quitch grass, cwice, vivify, viviparous, viper, weever, wyvern, viand, victual and 148 more...
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Vocab
Words that I come across, and go blank, or want to clarify.
nefarious, edifice, malevolent, ostensible, folderol, bauble, livid, amnesty, calculus, saddlery, maisonette, cuisse and 423 more...
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SAT PSAT ALPHABETICAL I
iconoclast, idiosyncrasy, ignoble, ignominious, illicit, illusory, illustrious, imbibe, imbue, immaculate, immaterial, immolate and 155 more...
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List Erine
cool mint antiseptic
shalom, cattywampus, bourgeoisie, aerophile, traverse, grotto, epicurean, ex cathedra, nautilus, epitaph, lathe, continuum and 753 more...
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Misc. Words.
Words I like to use, words I like but may forget.
corrosion, astonish, solace, ferment, continuum, kinesthetic, permeate, repose, caprice, cardinal, discourse, surrender and 610 more...
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School Words
hagiography, antediluvian, rakish, impeccable, hackneyed, irascible, nascent, teetotaller, suffragette, amiable, expiate, turbulent and 110 more...
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The Collection
A somewhat discriminatory list of words and phrases collected for their euphonic or arcane appeal, interesting etymology, or concise definition of an otherwise unnamed phenomenon or concept.
ziggurat, neophilia, sucker punch, soporific, epoch, tundra, fiat, idiotproof, miscellany, metaphysics, cryptozoology, dysphoria and 856 more...
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