Fwd: automaton: Dictionary.com Word of the Day

[Dave Monroe]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: "Dictionary.com" <doctor at dictionary.com>
Date: Mon, 3 Jun 2013 00:00:03 -0700
Subject: automaton: Dictionary.com Word of the Day
To: Word of the Day Subscriber <against.the.dave at gmail.com>


Word of the Day for Monday, June 3, 2013

automaton \aw-TOM-uh-ton, -tn\, noun:
1. a mechanical figure or contrivance constructed to act as if by its
own motive power; robot.
2. a person or animal that acts in a monotonous, routine manner,
without active intelligence.
3. something capable of acting automatically or without an external
motive force.

 That this is so is evident from the fact that some apprentices as
 early as their thirteenth year are able to construct an automaton
 whose motions are anatomically flawless.
 -- Steven Millhauser, "The New Automaton Theater," The Knife
 Thrower: and Other Stories, 1998

 "You really are an automaton — a calculating machine," I cried.
 "There is something positively inhuman in you at times." He
 smiled gently.
 -- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Sign of Four, 1890

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Automaton comes from the Greek autos + matos, literally meaning
"self thinking." It entered English in the 1600s.

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