artificiality

American  

[ahr-tuh-fish-ee-al-i-tee] / ˌɑr təˌfɪʃ iˈæl ɪ ti /

noun

artificialities plural

1. artificial quality.

2. an artificial thing or trait.

   artificialities of speech.

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Usage

What does artificiality mean? Artificiality is the quality of being artificial—made or manufactured as opposed to occurring naturally. Artificial is often used as the opposite of natural. A close synonym of artificial is synthetic. This sense of the word is often used in the context of food to describe things like ingredients, flavors, additives, and preservatives that are chemically processed. Food packaging often specifies whether a product has natural or artificial flavors (or both). An artificial sweetener is a kind of chemical used as a substitute for sugar, such as in diet sodas. Artificial is not only used in the context of food. Artificial turf is a grasslike surface used for sports playing fields. Artificial diamonds are those that are manufactured, as opposed to those that have developed through natural processes in the earth. Artificial flowers are often used as decorations. Artificial intelligence generally refers to the ability of a computer to function in a way that mimics or is likened to the human mind. Sometimes, artificial is used in a more negative way to describe something as fake or imitation, as in Something about this tastes artificial. This sense of the word is sometimes used figuratively to describe something as being faked, phony, or contrived—the opposite of real or genuine, as in an artificial smile. Artificiality can be used in all of these contexts. Example: When designing this material, I tried to avoid any sense of artificiality—I wanted it to feel completely real.

Other Word Forms

• overartificiality
  noun
• superartificiality
  noun

Etymology

Origin of artificiality

First recorded in 1755–65; artificial + -ity

Example Sentences

Yet Voisard believes people are increasingly tuning into animal livestreams to escape artificiality.

From Los Angeles Times • May 2, 2026

Engines with a 50-50 split between internal combustion and hybrid power - complete with 'overtaking' and 'boost' modes - have led to accusations of artificiality.

From BBC • Apr. 3, 2026

The mixture of digitally warped instrumentation that emphasizes its artificiality and cinematic string arrangements that evoke the melodrama of old Hollywood is pleasingly jarring and disorienting.

From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 17, 2026

Instead, the documentary is a star-studded, rose-colored recollection of better days, a look back at an era that didn’t seem so fraught with deception and morbid artificiality.

From Salon • Oct. 12, 2025

It is not surprising that the history of science is a problematic activity, because science itself constantly claims to escape from its own temporal specificity, its own artificiality.

From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton