What is "discern"

Usage examples of "discern".

How does the Ammophila, hovering over the turf and investigating it far and wide, in its search for a grey grub, contrive to discern the precise point in the depth of the subsoil where the larva is slumbering in immobility?

She had swooped into Pottery Barn one afternoon for simple, disposable furniture, but the walls were adorned with truly beautiful works of art from the collection of her mother, a woman of discerning taste and double fortune after remarrying an Argentinean named Helmut.

The thickness of their beards made it difficult for Ali Baba to discern their true emotions.

Baba fully agreed that it would be difficult to discern his true identity, for, surrounded by so many with virtually identical beards and clothing, he, too, found it nearly impossible to recognize those among the thieves whom he had so recently learned to know as individuals.

Tsecha looked Prime Minister Cao in the face as he tried to discern her meaning.

There were ceboids in the streets, and neuters, all hustling and bustling along, but he could discern no real intent.

The persona, who called herself the New Blue Rose of Chiba City for no reason Konstantin could discern, was an assassin, a popular occupation among lowdown children, but at least not a gang member, or a whore.

The turning led nowhere else but up to the Jcssop residence - a grandiose Gothic house whose dark spires we could already discern through the chokeberries and manzanita.

Kestrel squinted and stared, but could not discern a steady outline-the cultist seemed to waver before her eyes.

And yet the man who studied him more closely might discern a certain firmness of jaw and grim tightness about the lips which would warn him that there were depths beyond, and that this pleasant, brown-haired young Irishman might conceivably leave his mark for good or evil upon any society to which he was introduced.

He also strove, as we have just said, to discern the voice-ideas of the future, seeking to divine them, so to speak, in the place prepared for them in the dialog of the present, in the same way that it is possible to foresee a reply which has not yet been uttered in a dialog which is already in progress.

They could discern no more than can be seen by any one who looks at the great sphere through a bit of smoked glass, as we know this reveals a disklike body of very uniform appearance.

A Pagan magistrate, who possessed neither leisure nor abilities to discern the almost imperceptible line which divides the orthodox faith from heretical depravity, might easily have imagined that their mutual animosity had extorted the discovery of their common guilt.

Although he could discern flies in the Emersonian amber, he could not brook slight or indifference toward Emerson in the youth of to-day.

Two more miles were done, and scarce seven furlongs from them they saw the broad mouth of the bridge, while the towers of Emesa beyond seemed so close that in this clear air they could discern the watchmen outlined against the sky.