DIFFERENTIATION • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Differentiation

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/dɪfərˌɛnʃiˈeɪʃən/ /dˌɪfərˌɛntʃiˈeɪʃən/ Listen

noun

Differentiation n.

The act of differentiating. "Further investigation of the Sanskrit may lead to differentiation of the meaning of such of these roots as are real roots."

(Logic) The act of distinguishing or describing a thing, by giving its different, or specific difference; exact definition or determination.

(Biol.) The gradual formation or production of organs or parts by a process of evolution or development, as when the seed develops the root and the stem, the initial stem develops the leaf, branches, and flower buds; or in animal life, when the germ evolves the digestive and other organs and members, or when the animals as they advance in organization acquire special organs for specific purposes.

(Metaph.) The supposed act or tendency in being of every kind, whether organic or inorganic, to assume or produce a more complex structure or functions.

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Etymology of 'Differentiation'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Differentiation" Quotes from Famous Books

... all peoples have had philosophies consisting of their accepted explanation of things. Such a philosophy must necessarily result from the primary instincts developed in man in the early progress of his differentiation from the beast. This I postulate: if demonstration is necessary, demonstration is at hand. Not only has every people a philosophy, but every stage of culture is characterized by its stage of philosophy. Philosophy has been ...

— Sketch of the Mythology of the North American Indians • John Wesley Powell

... this people of a small country seemed to unconsciously uphold the marked differentiation between the laws of might and right, as exhibited by the two nationalities, ...

— With The Immortal Seventh Division • E. J. Kennedy and the Lord Bishop of Winchester

... instance, of the Bacchanal orgies. The votary of Dionysus, dancing, shrieking, tearing at his hair and at his garments, lost in the lightning change of his sensations all power of relating them. His mind was ringed in a whirling circle, every point of which merged into the next without possibility of differentiation. And since he could feel no transition periods, he could feel HIMSELF no longer; he was one with the content of his consciousness, which consciousness was no less a unit than our bright light aforesaid, just as a circle is as ...

— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer

... season, on the part of wheat raisers in sections tributary to Minneapolis, on account of the rigid standard of grading adopted by the millers of that city. It was asserted that the differentiation of prices between the grades was unjustly great and out of proportion to the actual difference of value. In order to ascertain whether this was the case or not, the Farmers' Association of Blue Earth County, ...

— Scientific American Supplement, No. 365, December 30, 1882 • Various

... discern in every question is the familiar obvious, and it came as a great and shattering discovery to the economic and sociological thought of the latter half of the nineteenth century that there was going on not simply a production but an immense concentration of wealth, a differentiation of a special wealthy class of landholder and capitalist, a diminution of small property owners and the development of a great and growing class of landless, nearly propertyless men, the proletariat. Marx showed—he showed so clearly that to-day it is recognized by every intelligent ...

— New Worlds For Old - A Plain Account of Modern Socialism • Herbert George Wells

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