Wiktionary http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page MediaWiki 1.16alpha case-sensitive Media Special Talk User User talk Wiktionary Wiktionary talk File File talk MediaWiki MediaWiki talk Template Template talk Help Help talk Category Category talk Appendix Appendix talk Concordance Concordance talk Index Index talk Rhymes Rhymes talk Transwiki Transwiki talk Wikisaurus Wikisaurus talk WT WT talk Citations Citations talk 42311 6874720 2009-06-23T15:31:24Z AutoFormat 32732 sorted/rebalanced translations {{was wotd|2006|November|6}} ==English== {{wikipedia}} ===Etymology=== From {{etyl|grc}} '''{{polytonic|[[στοχαστικός]]}}''', from '''{{polytonic|[[στοχάζομαι]]}}''' ‘aim at a target, guess’, from '''{{polytonic|[[στόχος]]}}''' ‘an aim, a guess’. ===Pronunciation=== * {{IPA|/stəˈkæstɪk/}} * {{audio|en-us-stochastic.ogg|Audio (US)}} *: {{rhymes|æstɪk}} ===Adjective=== {{en-adj}} # [[random|Random]], randomly-determined. #* '''1970''', [[w:J. G. Ballard|J. G. Ballard]], ''The Atrocity Exhibition'': #*: In the evening, while she bathed, waiting for him to enter the bathroom as she powdered her body, he crouched over the blueprints spread between the sofas in the lounge, calculating a '''stochastic''' analysis of the Pentagon car park. #* '''2006''', Thomas Pynchon, ''Against the Day'', Vintage 2007, p. 854: #*: Self-slaughter, as Hamlet always says, was certainly in the cards, unless one had been out here long enough to have contemplated the will of God, observed the '''stochastic''' whimsy of the day, learned when and when not to whisper “''[[Insh'allah]]'',” and understood how, as one perhaps might never have in England, to await, to depend upon, the ineluctable departure of what was most dear. #* '''NB:''' This refers to the process of the determination, not necessarily the outcome. Flipping a fair coin that flipped a hundred heads in a row (unlikely to be a random result) could still be considered the product of a stochastic process. ====Derived terms==== * [[stochastically]] ====Translations==== {{trans-top|random}} * Danish: {{t+|da|stokastisk}} * Estonian: {{t|et|juhuslik}} * Finnish: {{t+|fi|stokastinen}} * French: {{t+|fr|stochastique}} * German: {{t+|de|stochastisch}} * Italian: {{t+|it|stocastico}} {{trans-mid}} * Polish: {{t|pl|stochastyczny|m}} * Portuguese: {{t+|pt|estocástico}} * Romanian: {{t-|ro|stocastic}} * Spanish: {{t+|es|estocástico}} * Swedish: {{t-|sv|stokastisk}} {{trans-bottom}} ====Derived terms==== * [[stochastic matrix]]<!--mathematics--> * [[stochastic process]]<!--mathematics--> [[et:stochastic]] [[id:stochastic]] [[it:stochastic]] [[hu:stochastic]] [[pl:stochastic]] [[ru:stochastic]] [[vi:stochastic]]