illation

English

WOTD – 23 July 2011

Etymology

From Latin illātiō (“logical inference, deduction, conclusion”), from illātus, perfect passive participle of inferō (“carry or bring into somewhere; conclude”), from in + ferō (“bear, carry; suffer”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ɪˈleɪʃ(ə)n/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /əˈleɪʃ(ə)n/
• Homophone: elation

Noun

illation (countable and uncountable, plural illations)

1. The act of inferring or concluding, especially from a set of premises; a conclusion, a deduction.
   • 1650, Thomas Browne, chapter I, in Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC, 1st book, page 2:

     Now herein there seems to be a very erroneous Illation: from the Indulgence of God unto Cain, concluding an immunity unto himself […]

   • 1689 (indicated as 1690), [John Locke], An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding. […], London: […] Eliz[abeth] Holt, for Thomas Basset, […], →OCLC:

     it so orders the intermediate Ideas, as to discover what Connection there is in each Link of the Chain, whereby the Extreams are held together; and thereby, as it were, to draw into View the Truth sought for, which is what we call Illation or Inference […]

   • 1974, Guy Davenport, Tatlin!:

     Adriaan moved to Pierce’s American illation whereby an if begets a therefore, event by event, the javelin’s flight issuing from the web of contingencies in which we may locate the javelin and the javelineer […]

Related terms

• illative

Translations

action of concluding or inferring

• Arabic: please add this translation if you can
• Armenian: եզրահանգում (hy) (ezrahangum), մտահանգում (hy) (mtahangum)
• Bulgarian: заключение (bg) n (zaključenie), извод (bg) m (izvod)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 演繹／演绎 (zh) (yǎnyì), 推論／推论 (zh) (tuīlùn), 推定 (zh) (tuīdìng)

• Czech: please add this translation if you can
• French: illation (fr) f
• German: Schlussfolgerung (de) f, Herleitung (de) f
• Hindi: please add this translation if you can
• Hungarian: következtetés (hu)
• Italian: please add this translation if you can
• Japanese: 推定 (ja) (すいてい, suitei)
• Korean: please add this translation if you can
• Portuguese: ilação (pt) f
• Russian: вы́вод (ru) m (vývod), заключе́ние (ru) n (zaključénije), умозаключе́ние (ru) n (umozaključénije)
• Spanish: deducción (es) f
• Vietnamese: please add this translation if you can