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/sɪnθˈɛtɪk/ Listen

adjective

Synthetical, Synthetic adj.

Of or pertaining to synthesis; consisting in synthesis or composition; as, the synthetic method of reasoning, as opposed to analytical. "Philosophers hasten too much from the analytic to the synthetic method; that is, they draw general conclusions from too small a number of particular observations and experiments."

(Chem.) Artificial. Cf. Synthesis, 2.

(Zool.) Comprising within itself structural or other characters which are usually found only in two or more diverse groups; said of species, genera, and higher groups. See the Note under Comprehensive, 3.

Synthetic language, or Synthetical language, an inflectional language, or one characterized by grammatical endings; opposed to analytic language.

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Etymology of 'Synthetic'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Synthetic" Quotes from Famous Books

... troubles of Russia are entirely due to the cutting off of the supplies of caravan tea from China (the leading Bolshevists prefer vodka to tea in any form) and the consequent recourse to inferior synthetic substitutes. The rival merits of cream, milk and lemon are carefully discussed both from the gustatory and hygienic standpoint, Mr. WELLS pronouncing in favour of lemon, in which idiosyncrasy he resembles Mr. CONRAD and Mr. GALSWORTHY. The ...

— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, April 16, 1919 • Various

... the human body, but it can do little towards an explanation of the subtler meanings of life and mind. Its methods are analytical; it has reached no truly synthetic results in the regions where knowledge is most to be desired. Its effects on literature are destructive. Science destroys poetry, dries up the poetic sense, closes the doors of imagination. The attempt to make science co-operate with poetry is in itself the promise of failure. ...

— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke

... blood in that it conformed to all necessary specifications and yet it had a synthetic ...

— Ten From Infinity • Paul W. Fairman

... principle with which they identify it, 'the seeking for God,' as I call it more simply. The object of every national movement, in every people and at every period of its existence is only the seeking for its god, who must be its own god, and the faith in Him as the only true one. God is the synthetic personality of the whole people, taken from its beginning to its end. It has never happened that all, or even many, peoples have had one common, god, but each has always had its own. It's a sign of the decay of nations ...

— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... proper of the Yucatecan peninsula. While there are a number of verbal similarities between Maya and Nahuatl, the radicals of the two idioms and their grammatical structure are widely asunder. The Nahuatl is an excessively pliable, polysyllabic and highly synthetic tongue; the Maya is rigid, its words short, of one or two syllables generally, and is scarcely more synthetic than French. This contrast is carried out in the style of their writers. Those in Nahuatl were lovers ...

— Aboriginal American Authors • Daniel G. Brinton

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