[syn: car, auto, automobile, machine, motorcar]
VERB (2)
1. turn, shape, mold, or otherwise finish by machinery;
2. make by machinery;
- Example: "The Americans were machining while others still hand-made cars"
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Machine \Ma*chine"\ (m[.a]*sh[=e]n"), n. [F., fr. L. machina
machine, engine, device, trick, Gr. mhchanh`, from mh^chos
means, expedient. Cf. Mechanic.]
1. In general, any combination of bodies so connected that
their relative motions are constrained, and by means of
which force and motion may be transmitted and modified, as
a screw and its nut, or a lever arranged to turn about a
fulcrum or a pulley about its pivot, etc.; especially, a
construction, more or less complex, consisting of a
combination of moving parts, or simple mechanical
elements, as wheels, levers, cams, etc., with their
supports and connecting framework, calculated to
constitute a prime mover, or to receive force and motion
from a prime mover or from another machine, and transmit,
modify, and apply them to the production of some desired
mechanical effect or work, as weaving by a loom, or the
excitation of electricity by an electrical machine.
[1913 Webster]
Note: The term machine is most commonly applied to such
pieces of mechanism as are used in the industrial arts,
for mechanically shaping, dressing, and combining
materials for various purposes, as in the manufacture
of cloth, etc. Where the effect is chemical, or other
than mechanical, the contrivance is usually denominated
an apparatus or device, not a machine; as, a bleaching
apparatus. Many large, powerful, or specially important
pieces of mechanism are called engines; as, a steam
engine, fire engine, graduating engine, etc. Although
there is no well-settled distinction between the terms
engine and machine among practical men, there is a
tendency to restrict the application of the former to
contrivances in which the operating part is not
distinct from the motor.
[1913 Webster]
2. Any mechanical contrivance, as the wooden horse with which
the Greeks entered Troy; a coach; a bicycle. --Dryden.
--Southey. --Thackeray.
[1913 Webster]
3. A person who acts mechanically or at the will of another.
[1913 Webster]
4. A combination of persons acting together for a common
purpose, with the agencies which they use; as, the social
machine.
[1913 Webster]
The whole machine of government ought not to bear
upon the people with a weight so heavy and
oppressive. --Landor.
[1913 Webster]
5. A political organization arranged and controlled by one or
more leaders for selfish, private or partisan ends; the
Tammany machine. [Political Cant]
[1913 Webster]
6. Supernatural agency in a poem, or a superhuman being
introduced to perform some exploit. --Addison.
[1913 Webster]
Elementary machine, a name sometimes given to one of the
simple mechanical powers. See under Mechanical.
Infernal machine. See under Infernal.
Machine gun.See under Gun.
Machine screw, a screw or bolt adapted for screwing into
metal, in distinction from one which is designed
especially to be screwed into wood.
Machine shop, a workshop where machines are made, or where
metal is shaped by cutting, filing, turning, etc.
Machine tool, a machine for cutting or shaping wood, metal,
etc., by means of a tool; especially, a machine, as a
lathe, planer, drilling machine, etc., designed for a more
or less general use in a machine shop, in distinction from
a machine for producing a special article as in
manufacturing.
Machine twist, silken thread especially adapted for use in
a sewing machine.
Machine work, work done by a machine, in contradistinction
to that done by hand labor.
[1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:
Machine \Ma*chine"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Machined
(m[.a]*sh[=e]nd"); p. pr. & vb. n. Machining.]
To subject to the action of machinery; to make, cut, shape,
or modify with a machine; to effect by aid of machinery; to
print with a printing machine.
[1913 Webster]
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):
machine
n 1: any mechanical or electrical device that transmits or
modifies energy to perform or assist in the performance of
human tasks
2: an efficient person; "the boxer was a magnificent fighting
machine"
3: an intricate organization that accomplishes its goals
efficiently; "the war machine"
4: a device for overcoming resistance at one point by applying
force at some other point [syn: machine, simple machine]
5: a group that controls the activities of a political party;
"he was endorsed by the Democratic machine" [syn: machine,
political machine]
6: a motor vehicle with four wheels; usually propelled by an
internal combustion engine; "he needs a car to get to work"
[syn: car, auto, automobile, machine, motorcar]
v 1: turn, shape, mold, or otherwise finish by machinery
2: make by machinery; "The Americans were machining while others
still hand-made cars"
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:
186 Moby Thesaurus words for "machine":
American Party, Anti-Monopoly Party, Bull Moose Party, Bund,
Communist Party, Composaline, Conservative Party,
Constitutional Union Party, Democratic Party,
Democratic-Republican Party, Diatype, Ditto, Elrod,
Farmer-Labor Party, Federalist Party, Fotomatic, Fotosetter,
Fototronic, Free Soil Party, Greenback Party, Intertype,
Know-Nothing Party, Labour Party, Liberal Party,
Liberal Republican Party, Liberty Party, Linotype, Monotype,
Multigraph, National Republican Party, Photon, Populist Party,
Progressive Party, Prohibition Party, Republican Party,
Rochdale cooperative, Socialist Labor Party, Socialist Party,
Socialist Workers Party, Tammany Hall, Teletype, Tory Party,
Whig Party, Zip, addressing machine, alembic, alliance, anvil,
apparatus, appliance, assemblage, association, auto, autocar,
automaton, automobile, axis, band, bloc, boat, body, buggy, bus,
cabal, caldron, camp, car, carve, chisel, city hall, clique,
coalition, college, combination, combine, common market,
confederacy, confederation, consumer cooperative, contraption,
contrivance, convenience, convert, cooperative,
cooperative society, corps, council, crate, credit union, crucible,
cultivate, customs union, device, drive, duplicator,
economic community, engine, enginery, extract, facility, faction,
federation, fixture, free trade area, gadget, gang, gizmo, golem,
group, grouping, grow, harvest, heap, hectograph, implement,
instrument, jalopy, lathe, league, machinery, major party, make,
manufacture, mechanical aid, mechanical device, mechanism,
mechanize, melting pot, mill, mimeograph, mine, minor party, mob,
mortar, motive power, motor, motor vehicle, motorcar, motorize,
motorized vehicle, multiple party system, one-party system,
opposition party, organization, partnership, party, party in power,
phototypesetter, political machine, political party, power plant,
power source, prime mover, process, pump, raise, rear, refine,
retool, retort, ring, shape, sharpen, smelt, society,
splinter party, stock ticker, system, teleprinter, teletypewriter,
test tube, third party, ticker, tool, transducer, transformer, tub,
two-party system, typewriter, union, utensil, utility, vehicle,
voiture, wheels, wreck
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):
machine
Common term for "computer", usually when considered at the
hardware level. The Turing Machine, an early example of
this usage, was however neither hardware nor software, but
only an idea.
[Earlier use?]
(1995-02-15)
Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Revised 6th Ed (1856):
MACHINE. A contrivance which serves to apply or regulate moving power; or it
is a tool more or less complicated, which is used to render useful natural
instruments, Clef. des Lois Rom. h.t.
2. The act of congress gives to inventors the right to obtain a patent
right for any new and useful improvement on any art, machine, manufacture,
&c. Act of congress, July 4, 1836, s. 6. See Pet. C. C. 394; 3 Wash. C. C.
443; 1 Wash. C. C. 108; 1 Wash. C. C. 168; 1 Mason, 447; Paine, 300; 4 Wash.
C. C. 538; 1 How. U. S., 202; S. C. 17 Pet. 228; 2 McLean, 176.