different between instinct vs characteristic

English

Etymology

From Latin ?nstinctus, past participle of ?nstingu? (“to incite, to instigate”), from in (“in, on”) + stingu? (“to prick”). This etymology is incomplete. You can help Wiktionary by elaborating on the origins of this term.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??n.st??kt/

Noun

instinct (countable and uncountable, plural instincts)

1. A natural or inherent impulse or behaviour.

   Many animals fear fire by instinct.
2. An intuitive reaction not based on rational conscious thought.

   an instinct for order; to be modest by instinct

   Debbie's instinct was to distrust John.

Derived terms

• instinctively
• instinctive

Translations

Adjective

instinct (comparative more instinct, superlative most instinct)

1. (archaic) Imbued, charged (with something).
   • 1838, Henry Brougham, Historical Sketches of Statesmen Who Flourished in the Time of George III

     a noble performance, instinct with sound principle

   • 1857, Charlotte Brontë, The Professor

     Her eyes, whose colour I had not at first known, so dim were they with repressed tears, so shadowed with ceaseless dejection, now, lit by a ray of the sunshine that cheered her heart, revealed irids of bright hazel – irids large and full, screened with long lashes; and pupils instinct with fire.

   • 1928, HP Lovecraft, ‘The Call of Cthulhu’:

     This thing, which seemed instinct with a fearsome and unnatural malignancy, was of a somewhat bloated corpulence, and squatted evilly on a rectangular block or pedestal covered with undecipherable characters.

Further reading

• instinct in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• instinct in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from French instinct, from Latin ?nstinctus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?n?st??(k)t/
• Hyphenation: in?stinct
• Rhymes: -??kt

Noun

instinct n (plural instincten)

1. instinct (innate response, impulse or behaviour)

Derived terms

• instinctief
• instinctmatig
• moederinstinct
• vaderinstinct

French

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin ?nstinctus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??s.t??/

Noun

instinct m (plural instincts)

1. instinct
2. gut feeling

Related terms

• instinctif

Further reading

• “instinct” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Romanian

Etymology

From French instinct

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /in?stinkt/

Noun

instinct n (plural instincte)

1. instinct

Declension

Related terms

• instinctiv

English

Etymology

From Ancient Greek ??????????????? (kharakt?ristikós), from ??????????? (kharakt?ríz?, “to designate by a characteristic mark”), from ???????? (kharakt?r, “a mark, character”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?kæ??kt????st?k/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?k???kt????st?k/
• Rhymes: -?st?k
• Hyphenation: char?ac?te?ris?tic

Adjective

characteristic (comparative more characteristic, superlative most characteristic)

1. Being a distinguishing feature of a person or thing.

Synonyms

• distinctive
• exclusive
• idiosyncratic
• indicative
• representative
• signature
• specific
• typical

Antonyms

• uncharacteristic
• untypical

Derived terms

• characteristic function
• characteristicness

Translations

Noun

characteristic (plural characteristics)

1. A distinguishing feature of a person or thing.
2. (mathematics) The integer part of a logarithm.
   • 1830, Solomon Pearson Miles, Thomas Sherwin, Mathematical Tables: Comprising Logarithms of Numbers, […] , page 69,

     It is evident, moreover, that as the logarithms of numbers, which are tenfold, the one of the other, do not differ except in their characteristics, it is sufficient that the tables contain the fractional parts only of the logarithms.

   • 1911, F. T. Swanwick, Elementary Trigonometry, Cambridge University Press, page 60,

     As the sine and cosine are always proper fractions their logarithms are negative, i.e. have negative characteristics. When we are given an angle, it is impossible to say, from inspection of the angle, what the characteristic of the logarithm of its sine, cosine or tangent may be; so the characteristics have to be printed with the mantissae.

   • 1961, Principles and Applications of Mathematics for Communications-Electronics, [U.S.] Department of the Army, page 69,

     Similarly, the characteristic for .003 is ?3, and the characteristic for .0003 is ?4.

3. (nautical) The distinguishing features of a navigational light on a lighthouse etc by which it can be identified (colour, pattern of flashes etc.).
4. (algebra, field theory, ring theory) For a given field or ring, a natural number that is either the smallest positive number n such that n instances of the multiplicative identity (1) summed together yield the additive identity (0) or, if no such number exists, the number 0.
   • 1962 [John Wiley & Sons], Nathan Jacobson, Lie Algebras, 1979, Dover, page 289,

     In this chapter we study the problem of classifying the finite-dimensional simple Lie algebras over an arbitrary field of characteristic 0.

   • 1992, Simeon Ivanov (translator), P. M. Gudivok, E. Ya. Pogorilyak, On Modular Representations of Finite Groups over Integral Domains, Simeon Ivanov (editor), Galois Theory, Rings, Algebraic Groups and Their Applications, American Mathematical Society, page 87,

     Let R be a Noetherian factorial ring of characteristic p which is not a field.

   • 1993, S. Warner, Topological Rings, Elsevier (North-Holland), page 424,

     Traditionally, a complete, discretely valued field of characteristic zero, the maximal ideal of whose valuation ring is generated by the prime number p, has been called a p-adic field. In our terminology, the valuation ring of a p-adic field is a Cohen ring of characteristic zero whose residue field has characteristic p, and consequently a p-adic field is simply the quotient field of such a Cohen ring.

Synonyms

• (distinguishing feature of a person or thing): attribute, hallmark, idiosyncrasy, mannerism, quality, tendency, trademark, trait
• See also Thesaurus:characteristic

Coordinate terms

• (part of a logarithm): mantissa

Derived terms

• defining characteristic

Related terms

• characteristically

Translations

See also

• mantissa

Further reading

• characteristic in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• characteristic in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Interlingua

Adjective

characteristic (not comparable)

1. characteristic

Related terms

• characteristica