probabilistic
Americanadjective
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Statistics. of or relating to probability.
probabilistic forecasting.
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of or relating to probabilism.
Etymology
Origin of probabilistic
1650–60; probabil(ism) or probabil(ity) + -istic; compare French probabiliste believer in probabilism
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.
The other thing that worries me is that machines aren’t really thinking — they’re probabilistic.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2026
In researching how police departments use AI and how digital technologies operate in a democratic society, we have seen how quickly the shift from probabilistic prediction to operational certainty happens in practice.
From Salon ● May 12, 2026
But ultimately, their output is probabilistic, and if something is right 99.999% of the time, that also means it’s wrong 0.001% of the time.
From Barron's ● Apr. 29, 2026
Cognitive scientists have investigated whether the brain itself is Bayesian—a probabilistic inference engine, perpetually recalibrating, merging incoming sensory data with past experience.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 29, 2026
Many mathematical problems are so intractable, and experiments involving them so expensive, that this kind of probabilistic simulation is the only alternative to giving up on them.
From "Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences" by John Allen Paulos
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.
