personal equation
Americannoun
noun
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the variation or error in observation or judgment caused by individual characteristics
-
the allowance made for such variation
Etymology
Origin of personal equation
First recorded in 1835–45
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Relations between the U.S. and Europe are complicated by the personal equation.
From Time Magazine Archive
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There are experimentalists, like Picasso, and those who, like Braque, discover their personal equation and go on repeating it.
From Time Magazine Archive
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Only through the lapse of time is the personal equation eliminated from the estimate of an author's relative proportion to the aggregate of his country's genius.
From Allan Ramsay Famous Scots Series by Smeaton, William Henry Oliphant
It must be the physician's business to find out in each individual case, according to his own personal equation, just how he may be able to use at least some of it.
From Psychotherapy by Walsh, James J. (James Joseph)
That was simply an acknowledgment of her complete effacement of the personal equation.
From Famous Prima Donnas by Strang, Lewis Clinton
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.