English
phenomenon
Pronunciation
  • (British) IPA: /fɪˈnɒmənɒn/, /fɪˈnɒmənən/
  • (America) IPA: /fɪˈnɑmənɑn/, /fɪˈnɑmənən/
Noun

phenomenon

  1. A thing or being, event or process, perceptible through senses; or a fact or occurrence thereof.
    • 1900, Andrew Lang, The Making of Religion, ch. 1:
      The Indians, making a hasty inference from a trivial phenomenon, arrived unawares at a probably correct conclusion.
    • 2007, "Ask the Experts: Hurricanes ↗," USA Today, 7 Nov. (retrieved 16 Jan. 2009):
      Hurricanes are a meteorological phenomenon.
  2. (by extension) A knowable thing or event (eg by inference, especially in science)
    An electromagnetic phenomenon.
  3. A kind or type of phenomenon (sense 1 or 2)
    A volcanic eruption is an impressive phenomenon.
  4. Appearance; a perceptible aspect of something that is mutable.
    • 1662, Thomas Salusbury (translator), Galileo's Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief Systems of the World, First Day:
      I verily believe that in the Moon there are no rains, for if Clouds should gather in any part thereof, as they do about the Earth, they would thereupon hide from our sight some of those things, which we with the Telescope behold in the Moon, and in a word, would some way or other change its Phœnomenon.
  5. A fact or event considered very unusual, curious, or astonishing by those who witness it.
    • 1816, Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary—Volume I, ch. 18:
      The phenomenon of a huge blazing fire, upon the opposite bank of the glen, again presented itself to the eye of the watchman. . . . He resolved to examine more nearly the object of his wonder.
  6. A wonderful or very remarkable person or thing.
    • 1839, Charles Dickens, Nicholas Nickleby, ch. 23:
      "This, sir," said Mr Vincent Crummles, bringing the maiden forward, "this is the infant phenomenon—Miss Ninetta Crummles."
    • 1888, Rudyard Kipling, "The Phantom Rickshaw":
      But, all the same, you're a phenomenon, and as queer a phenomenon as you are a blackguard.
  7. (philosophy, chiefly, Kantian idealism) An experienced object whose constitution reflects the order and conceptual structure imposed upon it by the human mind (especially by the powers of perception and understanding).
    • 1900, S. Tolver Preston, "Comparison of Some Views of Spencer and Kant," Mind, vol. 9, no. 34, p. 234:
      Every "phenomenon" must be, at any rate, partly subjective or dependent on the subject.
    • 1912, Roy Wood Sellars, "Is There a Cognitive Relation?" The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods, vol. 9, no. 9, p. 232:
      The Kantian phenomenon is the real as we are compelled to think it.
Synonyms Antonyms Translations Translations Translations

This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.004
Offline English dictionary