Meaning of GENERATION
| Pronunciation: | | `jenu'reyshun
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 WordNet Dictionary |
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- [n] the act of producing offspring or multiplying by such production
- [n] the production of heat or electricity; "dams were built for the generation of electricity"
- [n] a coming into being
- [n] group of genetically related organisms constituting a single step in the line of descent
- [n] all the people living at the same time or of approximately the same age
- [n] a stage of technological development or innovation; "the third generation of computers"
- [n] the normal time between successive generations; "they had to wait a generation for that prejudice to fade"
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| | Synonyms: | | coevals, contemporaries, genesis, multiplication, propagation |
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| | See Also: | | baby boom, beginning, biogenesis, biogeny, biological group, breeding, facts of life, peer group, people, period, period of time, phase, posterity, procreation, production, reproduction, stage, time period, youth culture | |
| Webster's 1913 Dictionary |
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| | Definition: | | \Gen`er*a"tion\, n. [OE. generacioun, F.
g['e]n['e]ration, fr.L. generatio.]
1. The act of generating or begetting; procreation, as of
animals.
2. Origination by some process, mathematical, chemical, or
vital; production; formation; as, the generation of
sounds, of gases, of curves, etc.
3. That which is generated or brought forth; progeny;
offspiring.
4. A single step or stage in the succession of natural
descent; a rank or remove in genealogy. Hence: The body of
those who are of the same genealogical rank or remove from
an ancestor; the mass of beings living at one period;
also, the average lifetime of man, or the ordinary period
of time at which one rank follows another, or father is
succeeded by child, usually assumed to be one third of a
century; an age.
This is the book of the generations of Adam. --Gen.
v. 1.
Ye shall remain there [in Babylon] many years, and
for a long season, namely, seven generations.
--Baruch vi.
3.
All generations and ages of the Christian church.
--Hooker.
5. Race; kind; family; breed; stock.
Thy mother's of my generation; what's she, if I be a
dog? --Shak.
6. (Geom.) The formation or production of any geometrical
magnitude, as a line, a surface, a solid, by the motion,
in accordance with a mathematical law, of a point or a
magnitude; as, the generation of a line or curve by the
motion of a point, of a surface by a line, a sphere by a
semicircle, etc.
7. (Biol.) The aggregate of the functions and phenomene which
attend reproduction.
Note: There are four modes of generation in the animal
kingdom: scissiparity or by fissiparous generation,
gemmiparity or by budding, germiparity or by germs, and
oviparity or by ova.
{Alternate generation} (Biol.), alternation of sexual with
asexual generation, in which the products of one process
differ from those of the other, -- a form of reproduction
common both to animal and vegetable organisms. In the
simplest form, the organism arising from sexual generation
produces offspiring unlike itself, agamogenetically.
These, however, in time acquire reproductive organs, and
from their impregnated germs the original parent form is
reproduced. In more complicated cases, the first series of
organisms produced agamogenetically may give rise to
others by a like process, and these in turn to still other
generations. Ultimately, however, a generation is formed
which develops sexual organs, and the original form is
reproduced.
{Spontaneous generation} (Biol.), the fancied production of
living organisms without previously existing parents from
inorganic matter, or from decomposing organic matter, a
notion which at one time had many supporters; abiogenesis.
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| Computing Dictionary |
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| | Definition: | | An attempt to classify the degree of sophistication of programming languages. See First generation language -- Fifth generation language. |
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| Easton Bible Dictionary |
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| | Definition: | | Gen. 2:4, "These are the generations," means the "history." 5:1, "The book of the generations," means a family register, or history of Adam. 37:2, "The generations of Jacob" = the history of Jacob and his descendants. 7:1, "In this generation" = in this age. Ps. 49:19, "The generation of his fathers" = the dwelling of his fathers, i.e., the grave. Ps. 73:15, "The generation of thy children" = the contemporary race. Isa. 53:8, "Who shall declare his generation?" = His manner of life who shall declare? or rather = His race, posterity, shall be so numerous that no one shall be able to declare it. In Matt. 1:17, the word means a succession or series of persons from the same stock. Matt. 3:7, "Generation of vipers" = brood of vipers. 24:34, "This generation" = the persons then living contemporary with Christ. 1 Pet. 2:9, "A chosen generation" = a chosen people. The Hebrews seem to have reckoned time by the generation. In the time of Abraham a generation was an hundred years, thus: Gen. 15:16, "In the fourth generation" = in four hundred years (comp. verse 13 and Ex. 12:40). In Deut. 1:35 and 2:14 a generation is a period of thirty-eight years. |
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| Thesaurus Terms |
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| | Related Terms: | | abiogenesis, aeon, age, age group, annus magnus, archigenesis, authorship, begetting, beginning, biogenesis, birth, blastogenesis, breeding, coinage, conception, concoction, contrivance, contriving, creation, creative effort, crop, crossbreeding, cycle, cycle of indiction, date, day, days, development, devising, digenesis, dissogeny, endogamy, engenderment, epigenesis, epoch, era, establishment, eumerogenesis, fabrication, fathering, formation, formulation, genesis, great year, hatching, heterogenesis, histogenesis, homogenesis, improvisation, inbreeding, inception, indiction, initiation, institution, invention, isogenesis, life, lifetime, linebreeding, making do, merogenesis, metagenesis, mintage, monogenesis, multiplication, origination, orthogenesis, outbreeding, pangenesis, parthenogenesis, period, period of existence, Platonic year, procreation, production, proliferation, propagation, reproduction, spontaneous generation, start, time, times, xenogamy |
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