Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Mechanically determined.
- adjective Philosophy Of or relating to the philosophy of mechanism, especially tending to explain phenomena only by reference to physical or biological causes.
- adjective Automatic and impersonal; mechanical.
from The Century Dictionary.
- Of or pertaining to mechanism or to mechanists: as, “mechanistic combination,”
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Having the
impersonal andautomatic characteristics of amachine - adjective
Predetermined by, or as if by, amechanism - adjective philosophy Having a
physical orbiological cause
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective explained in terms of physical forces
- adjective of or relating to the philosophical theory of mechanism
Etymologies
Sorry, no etymologies found.
Support
Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word mechanistic.
Examples
-
Pivar says he's been working for years in the Thompson tradition, which he characterizes as a mechanistic approach to evolution, using lab simulations, algorithms and topology.
ScreenTalk 2009
-
Pivar says he's been working for years in the Thompson tradition, which he characterizes as a mechanistic approach to evolution, using lab simulations, algorithms and topology.
ScreenTalk 2009
-
This sort of thing suggests that minds are grounded in mechanistic biology, rather than the other way around.
A Useless Critic 2007
-
Somehow you seem to think that the mere offering of what you term a mechanistic model with no evidence (nor even much of an explanation) trumps other concepts and makes you "scientific" and others not.
-
This sort of thing suggests that minds are grounded in mechanistic biology, rather than the other way around.
A Useless Critic 2007
-
Somehow you seem to think that the mere offering of what you term a mechanistic model with no evidence (nor even much of an explanation) trumps other concepts and makes you "scientific" and others not.
-
I suggest scientific patience is quickly running out since inventors are already using applied quantum mechanics and there are two main mechanistic explanations.
Cleaning Up The Mess 2007
-
All evolutionary theories must offer an explanation in mechanistic terms of how it should or could have happened in order to be tested.
A critique on the endosymbiotic theory for the origin of mitochondria 2007
-
This sort of thing suggests that minds are grounded in mechanistic biology, rather than the other way around.
A Useless Critic 2007
-
In typography, a slab serif (also called mechanistic, square serif or Egyptian) typeface is a type of serif typeface characterized by thick, block-like serifs.
teddy-risation™ 2009
-
Haven’t researchers made strides in areas like mechanistic interpretability — the field that studies the inner workings of A.I. models — that may give us better ways of controlling powerful A.I. systems?
Comments
Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.