specific
Part of speech: adj
noun
Morphological type: derivation
Topics: biology
immunology
medicine
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
physics
sciences
taxonomy
Etymology: From Old French specifique, from Late Latin specificus (“specific, particular”), from Latin speciēs (“kind”) + -ific.
Affixes: -ific
Inflected forms:
form: more specific
pos: adj
tags: comparative
form: most specific
pos: adj
tags: superlative
form: specifick
pos: adj
tags: alternative
obsolete
form: specifics
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: specifick
pos: noun
tags: alternative
obsolete
Senses:
gloss: Explicit or definite.
pos: adj
examples: While some participants, like Gabi and Jasmine, had access to a gym but still felt uncertain about using specific types of equipment, others who trained at home faced even greater challenges due to the absence of both a coach and proper equipment.
gloss: Pertaining to a species, as a taxon or taxa at the rank of species.
pos: adj
examples: Holonyms: generic, familial
Meronyms: infrasubspecific, infraspecific, subspecific
Science and literature, then, are the two achievements of Homo sapiens that most convincingly justify the specific name.
gloss: Special, distinctive or unique.
pos: adj
tags: in-compounds
sometimes
examples: A psychologist told WJLA TV that, for the most part, this isn’t a Cocomelon-specific issue. The main issue is too much screen time and children's shows with fast-paced sequences.
gloss: intended for, or applying to, a particular thing.
pos: adj
gloss: Serving to identify a particular thing (often a disease or condition), with little risk of mistaking something else for it.
pos: adj
examples: a highly specific test    specific and nonspecific symptoms
gloss: Being a remedy for a particular disease on a deeper level, rather than just masking the symptoms
pos: adj
examples: Quinine is a specific medicine in cases of malaria.
Any improvement in secondary sciatica is probably due to the analgesic action of the sodium salicylate, but in primary sciatica, in all likelihood “rheumatic,” the effect of the sodium salicylate appears to be specific rather than symptomatic.
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.
gloss: Limited to a particular antibody or antigen.
pos: adj
gloss: Of a value divided by mass (e.g. specific orbital energy).
pos: adj
gloss: 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)
pos: adj
gloss: 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).
pos: adj
gloss: A distinguishing attribute or quality.
pos: noun
gloss: A remedy for a specific disease or condition.
pos: noun
examples: 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.
If Burd Ellen had gone “widishins" round the church, she would, I think, have used the best homoeopathic specific against the Elf-King's power; for "to go widishins" was the chief element in elfin practices, and if mortals wished to resist or unspell elf-craft, they, too, had "to go widershins," or they had to repeat the Paternoster backwards, which came to the same thing, or do something else contrariwise.
A compound of spurge, cardamom, cinnamon of Mecca, pellitory, ginger, nettle seed is an Arab specific for sexual weakness.
I had no unreasonable fear of bats, […] yet I knew them too for carriers of the dread “Hydrophobia,” for which there was no specific.
gloss: Specification
pos: noun
gloss: The details; particulars.
pos: noun
tags: in-plural
gloss: The distinguishing part of a toponym.
pos: noun
examples: With the exception of names of pan-Canadian significance and some alternate forms approved by provincial authorities, the specific is not translated.
Synonyms: monosemous
unambiguous
singular
concrete
discrete
individual
particular
proper
specific
peculiar
Antonyms: unspecific
nonspecific
broad
general
generic
universal
all-purpose
general-purpose
gross
group-specific antigen
non-specific
overall
pandemic
specific activity
specific gravity bottle
widespread
Related words: generic
Derived words: allospecific
antiphosphospecific
aspecific
biospecific
bispecific
cardiospecific
chemospecific
chirospecific
cospecific
domain-specific language
donor-specific antibody
ecospecific
enantiospecific
ethnospecific
extraspecific
gender-specific
geospecific
haplospecific
hepatospecific
heterospecific
homospecific
hyperspecific
idiospecific
immunospecific
inspecific
isospecific
JVM-specific
nanospecific
neurospecific
nothospecific
organospecific
osteospecific
overspecific
panspecific
paraspecific
phosphospecific
plurispecific
polyspecific
prespecific
prostate-specific antigen
quadrispecific
regiospecific
semispecific
serospecific
serotonin-specific reuptake inhibitor
specifical
specifically
specificate
specific charge
specific contract
specific density
specific energy
specific epithet
specific fuel consumption
specific gravity
specific heat
specific heat capacity
specific humidity
specific impulse
specificity
specificize
specificker
specific language impairment
specific leaf area
specific name
specificness
specific performance
specific phobia
specific power
specific resistance
specific risk
specific rotation
specific thrust
specific volume
specific weight
stereospecific
superspecific
supraspecific
thermospecific
transspecific
trispecific
ultraspecific
underspecific
unispecific
xenospecific
Translations: