Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
generalize \gen"er*al*ize\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Generalized; p. pr. & vb. n. Generalizing.] [Cf. F. g['e]n['e]raliser.]
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To bring under a genus or under genera; to view in relation to a genus or to genera.
Copernicus generalized the celestial motions by merely referring them to the moon's motion. Newton generalized them still more by referring this last to the motion of a stone through the air.
--W. Nicholson. -
To apply to other genera or classes; to use with a more extensive application; to extend so as to include all special cases; to make universal in application, as a formula or rule.
When a fact is generalized, our discontent is quited, and we consider the generality itself as tantamount to an explanation.
--Sir W. Hamilton. -
To derive or deduce (a general conception, or a general principle) from particulars. [WordNet sense 2]
Syn: generalize, extrapolate, infer.
A mere conclusion generalized from a great multitude of facts.
--Coleridge. -
To speak in generalities; to talk in abstract terms.
Syn: generalise, speak generally.
Generalized \Gen"er*al*ized\, a. (Zo["o]l.) Comprising structural characters which are separated in more specialized forms; synthetic; as, a generalized type.
Wiktionary
Made more general, less specialized. v
(en-past of: generalize)
WordNet
adj. not biologically differentiated or adapted to a specific function or environment; "the hedgehog is a primitive and generalized mammal" [syn: generalised]
made general; widely prevalent; "a problem of generalized human needs"; "a state of generalized discontent" [syn: generalised]
spread throughout a body or system; "generalized edema" [syn: generalised]
Wikipedia
Usage examples of "generalized".
An engaging but somewhat mechanical attempt to correlate the basic sun-sign character studies to dreaming and generalized tendencies of personality manifested in dreams.
Generalized muscular fasciculations then appeared, suggesting a hyperesthesia state.
My theory is that when a fetishist comes to some resolution -- usually through therapy -- about his early relationship to his mother, the fetishistic impulse diffuses from the sharp focus of the mother into a more generalized emphasis upon the symbols of women.
Gereth had long ago generalized the truth that the temperament of the frump is amply consistent with a certain usual prettiness.
I have said that there is a tabes of the inferior members and a generalized severe and progressive lowering of the whole constitution I have said all I can usefully say.
Idiot, the desire for an explanatory style gave way to a more generalized goal of conciseness.
They invite one to picture the first cell as built of proteinoid, every molecule of its substance a generalized enzyme of very low efficiency.
The tropisms of plants and the taxis of simple animals are generalized responses of an entire organism or of a major portion of one to a very generalized stimulus.
Victims whose assailants were unapprehended had a generalized terror, irrational even to them, that the next stranger they encountered, if he was the same race as their rapist, might be the person who was responsible for the crime.
I do know that the generalized Schmitt-Conway biprism will tile aperiodically in all dimensions of the form 3 times M.
Are we talking about organic life, or any kind of generalized autocatalytic feedback loop?
An ordinary girl, attractive in her no-nonsense way, with whom it had been demonstrated that I had so little in common that I felt a disconnectedness that had something uncanny about it, as if I were deprived all at once of the ability to sympathize, to comprehend, to invent, even to feel anything over and above a generalized confusion, as if I had committed an offence.
If any of my readers hunger and thirst for information concerning the descent of the cat through marsupial ancestors and mesozoic mammals to the generalized placental or monodelphous carnivora of to-day, let them consult St.
There are many technicalities, both mathematical and silvicultural, and unfortunately most of the available figures for the Northwest, obtained by the Forest Service, have not been generalized enough for wide popular value.
Aside from a few such generalized observations, it is almost impossible to say which group, much less which individual, deserves the major share of credit for solving the edition of the fleet cryptographic system then in force.