Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective mathematics, physics Of or relating to certain systems that, given enough time, will eventually return to previously experienced state.
  • adjective statistics, engineering Of or relating to a process in which every sequence or sample of sufficient size is equally representative of the whole.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective positive recurrent aperiodic state of stochastic systems; tending in probability to a limiting form that is independent of the initial conditions

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

International Scientific Vocabulary erg- + -ode (+ -ic)

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word ergodic.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • It's almost disturbing that there are people in the world who require a word for 'positive recurrent aperiodic state of stochastic systems'.

    August 21, 2008

  • Probably from Greek ergos work, and thus related to ergatic.

    August 21, 2008

  • Indeed, from erg- "work" + hod- "path", and adapted from the German Ergoden coined in a somewhat different sense by Boltzmann (1884).

    August 21, 2008

  • I've actually studied what would be called ergodic systems, although that term wasn't use very often.

    August 22, 2008