organism

American  

[awr-guh-niz-uhm] / ˈɔr gəˌnɪz əm /

noun

1. a form of life composed of mutually interdependent parts that maintain various vital processes.

2. a form of life considered as an entity; an animal, plant, fungus, protistan, or moneran.

3. any organized body or system conceived of as analogous to a living being.

   the governmental organism.

4. any complex thing or system having properties and functions determined not only by the properties and relations of its individual parts, but by the character of the whole that they compose and by the relations of the parts to the whole.

   Synonyms:

   structure, entity, network, organization

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organism British  

/ ˈɔːɡəˌnɪzəm /

noun

1. any living biological entity, such as an animal, plant, fungus, or bacterium

2. anything resembling a living creature in structure, behaviour, etc

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organism Scientific  

/ ôr′gə-nĭz′əm /

1. An individual form of life that is capable of growing, metabolizing nutrients, and usually reproducing. Organisms can be unicellular or multicellular. They are scientifically divided into five different groups (called kingdoms) that include prokaryotes, protists, fungi, plants, and animals, and that are further subdivided based on common ancestry and homology of anatomic and molecular structures.

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Other Word Forms

• organismal
  adjective
• organismally
  adverb
• organismic
  adjective
• organismically
  adverb
• superorganism
  noun

Etymology

Origin of organism

First recorded in 1655–65; organ + -ism

Explanation

An organism is a living thing that can function on its own. That includes your pet guppy, the tree in your backyard, and — of course — you. While the word organism typically indicates an actual living thing, you can also use organism to refer to anything that acts or functions like a living thing. For example, the social scene at a high school might be described as "a social organism" because it seems to have a mind of its own — like a living thing or even a vicious animal, depending on where one falls on the popularity scale.

Example Sentences

PACterium: Organism that dies quickly in the absence of money.

From Washington Post • Jun. 8, 2017

Art Show as Unruly Organism KASSEL, Germany — The longtime curator Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev has a lot on her mind, and she has managed to wedge a remarkable amount of it into Documenta 13.

From New York Times • Jun. 14, 2012

Also found was a book entitled Evolution of the Organism that included 15 pages of notes in what is believed to be Mengele's handwriting.

From Time Magazine Archive

Makavejev's new film WR �Mysteries of the Organism is part biography, part documentary on Reichian therapy, part fable and part essay, an altogether improbable but successful collection of episodes.

From Time Magazine Archive

Organism and sleep, 95; ultimate explanation of rythmic events in, 96, 97; law of action of, 68 _et seq._; periodicity of; and law of progressive activity, 82 _et seq._

From The Birth-Time of the World and Other Scientific Essays by Joly, John

Related Words

• animal
• creature
• structure