Definitions

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

  • noun The fifth letter of the Greek alphabet.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In mathematics, a quantity which approaches zero when the independent variable approaches a certain limit fixed for it by the conditions of the particular problem or discussion.
  • noun The fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, equivalent to short e.

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

  • noun The name for the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, ε or Ε, preceded by delta (Δ, δ) and followed by zeta (Ζ, ζ).
  • noun phonetics In IPA, the phonetic symbol that represents the open-mid front unrounded vowel; represented in SAMPA as E.
  • noun mathematics An arbitrarily small quantity.
  • noun computing, colloquial A negligible effect.

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

  • noun the 5th letter of the Greek alphabet

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Greek e psīlon, simple e, from neuter of psīlos, simple.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Ancient Greek ἒψιλόν (epsilon, "the letter Ε").

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Examples

  • Let's look at the second number, epsilon, which is roughly .007.

    Rabbi Shmuley Boteach: Does Questioning Evolution Make You Anti-Science? Rabbi Shmuley Boteach 2011

  • Let's look at the second number, epsilon, which is roughly .007.

    Rabbi Shmuley Boteach: Does Questioning Evolution Make You Anti-Science? Rabbi Shmuley Boteach 2011

  • Let's look at the second number, epsilon, which is roughly .007.

    Rabbi Shmuley Boteach: Does Questioning Evolution Make You Anti-Science? Rabbi Shmuley Boteach 2011

  • Hilbert developed a method for the study of consistency problems, called the epsilon substitution method, to deal with the quantifiers.

    Chores 2009

  • The EKG may show inverted t waves in right sided leads and the so-called epsilon waves.

    Is endurance exercise bad for the right ventricle? james gaulte 2007

  • The EKG may show inverted t waves in right sided leads and the so-called epsilon waves.

    Archive 2007-01-01 james gaulte 2007

  • I've been listening to a few odd bits and pieces of music these last few days (wanted to try and get the word epsilon into the last 3 words before the bracket, but couldn't ... conversation today re: possible other name for one of the rooms in MVB (Merchant Venturer's building, home of CS ppl ehre in Bristol) which is called 0.01, which spawned that idea floating around in my head).

    February 19th, 2003 2003

  • If you carry two copies of a variant called epsilon 4, then your risk of succumbing to Alzheimer's disease is greatly increased.

    New Scientist - Online News 2009

  • The pressure dependence of the melting point is indeed the key to the solution - it turns the arbitrarily small "epsilon" temperature difference into a finite delta T, the difference between the freezing point of water under the pressure of the weight and the melting point of ice after the weight is removed.

    Cockburning EliRabett 2010

  • For any finite "epsilon", the infrared problems are absent.

    The Reference Frame 2010

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