specific

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English[edit]

Alternative forms[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From Old French specifique, from Late Latin specificus (“specific, particular”), from Latin speciēs (“kind”) + faciō (“make”).

Pronunciation[edit]

  • (General American, UK) IPA(key): /spəˈsɪf.ɪk/, /spɪˈsɪf.ɪk/
  • Rhymes: -ɪfɪk
  • Hyphenation: spe‧cif‧ic
  • Audio (US)(file)

Adjective[edit]

specific (comparative more specific, superlative most specific)

  2. explicit or definite.
  4. (bioscience, taxonomy) pertaining to a species, as a taxon or taxa at the rank of species.
    • 2008, Richard Dawkins, The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing, Oxford 2009, p. 3:
      Science and literature, then, are the two achievements of Homo sapiens that most convincingly justify the specific name.
    Hyponyms: monospecific, multispecific, oligospecific, paucispecific
    Coordinate terms: subspecific, infraspecific, generic, familial
  6. special, distinctive or unique.
  8. intended for, or applying to, a particular thing.
  10. Serving to identify a particular thing (often a disease or condition), with little risk of mistaking something else for it.
    a highly specific test, specific and nonspecific symptoms
  11. being a remedy for a particular disease
    Quinine is a specific medicine in cases of malaria.
    • 1830 May 23, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Specific Medicines”, in Specimens of the Table Talk of the Late Samuel Taylor Coleridge, volume I, London: J. Murray, page 147:
      The study of specific medicines is too much disregarded now. No doubt, the hunting after specifics is a mark of ignorance and weakness in medicine, yet the neglect of them is proof also of immaturity ; for, in fact, all medicines will be found specific in the perfection of science.
  13. (immunology) limited to a particular antibody or antigen.
  15. (physics) of a value divided by mass (e.g. specific orbital energy)
  17. (physics) similarly referring to a value divided by any measure which acts to standardize it (e.g. thrust specific fuel consumption, referring to fuel consumption divided by thrust)
  19. (physics) a measure compared with a standard reference value by division, to produce a ratio without unit or dimension (e.g. specific refractive index is a pure number, and is relative to that of air)

Synonyms[edit]

Antonyms[edit]

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Hyponyms[edit]

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Derived terms[edit]

Translations[edit]

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Translations to be checked

See also[edit]

Noun[edit]

specific (plural specifics)

  1. A distinguishing attribute or quality.
  2. A remedy for a specific disease or condition.
    • 1831, Letitia Elizabeth Landon, Romance and Reality, volume 3, page 201:
      Change of scene, and a new lover, are infallible specifics, always supposing there is no character for constancy to be supported: if I witness the violent sorrow of to-day, I impose upon to-morrow the necessity of being sorry also.
    • 1968, Charles Portis, True Grit:
      I had no unreasonable fear of bats, […] yet I knew them too for carriers of the dread “Hydrophobia,” for which there was no specific.
  3. Specification
  4. (in the plural) The details; particulars.

Translations[edit]

Further reading[edit]

Romanian[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From French spécifique.

Pronunciation[edit]

Adjective[edit]

specific m or n (feminine singular specifică, masculine plural specifici, feminine and neuter plural specifice)

  1. specific
    Antonym: nespecific

Declension[edit]

Declension of specific
singular plural
masculine neuter feminine masculine neuter feminine
nominative/
accusative 		indefinite specific specifică specifici specifice
definite specificul specifica specificii specificele
genitive/
dative 		indefinite specific specifice specifici specifice
definite specificului specificei specificilor specificelor

Related terms[edit]

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