Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Having no specific pattern, purpose, or objective: synonym: chance.
- adjective Mathematics & Statistics Of or relating to a type of circumstance or event that is described by a probability distribution.
- adjective Of or relating to an event in which all outcomes are equally likely, as in the testing of a blood sample for the presence of a substance.
- idiom (at random) Without a governing design, method, or purpose; unsystematically.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun In mining, the direction of a rake-vein.
- noun A rushing, as of a torrent; an impetuous course; impetuosity; violence; force: especially with great, as in the phrase a great random, with great speed or force.
- noun A rush; spurt; gush.
- noun A continuous flow of words; a harangue.
- noun An indeterminate course or proceeding; hence, lack of direction, rule, or method; haphazard; chance: used only in the phrase at random—that is, in a haphazard, aimless, and purely fortuitous manner.
- noun The distance traversed by a missile; range; reach.
- Proceeding, taken, done, or existing at random; aimless; fortuitous; haphazard; casual.
- noun Something done or produced without definite method, or with irregular or haphazard effect.
- noun In dyeing, clouded yarn. See
random yarn , under I.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun obsolete Force; violence.
- noun A roving motion; course without definite direction; want of direction, rule, or method; hazard; chance; -- commonly used in the phrase
at random , that is, without a settled point of direction; at hazard. - noun Distance to which a missile is cast; range; reach.
- noun (Mining) The direction of a rake-vein.
- adjective Going at random or by chance; done or made at hazard, or without settled direction, aim, or purpose; hazarded without previous calculation; left to chance; haphazard.
- adjective (Statistics) of, pertaining to, or resulting from a process of selection from a starting set of items, in which the probability of selecting any one object in the starting set is equal to the probability of selecting any other.
- adjective (Construction) of unequal size or shape; made from components of unequal size or shape.
- adjective in a manner so that all possible results have an equal probability of occurrence; for processes, each possible result is counted separately although the same type of result may occur more than once .
- adjective (Masonry) courses of stone of unequal thickness.
- adjective a shot not directed or aimed toward any particular object, or a shot with the muzzle of the gun much elevated.
- adjective (Masonry) stonework consisting of stones of unequal sizes fitted together, but not in courses nor always with flat beds.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective Having
unpredictable outcomes and, in theideal case, all outcomesequally probable ; resulting from such selection; lackingstatistical correlation . - adjective mathematics Of or relating to
probability distribution . - adjective computing
Pseudorandom in contrast totruly random; mimicking the result of random selection. - adjective
Representative andundistinguished ;typical andaverage ; selected for no particular reason. - adjective
Apropos of nothing; lackingcontext ;unexpected ; having apparent lack of plan, cause, or reason. - adjective colloquial Characterized by or often saying random things; habitually using
non sequiturs .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective lacking any definite plan or order or purpose; governed by or depending on chance
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
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Examples
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And the only choice other than random is *not random*.
Kicking the Legs Out From Under the Willfully Ignorant « Whatever 2007
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( "UPDATE login SET random = $random WHERE id = $id"
WebDeveloper.com 2010
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He said the sector remains too focused on charity -- what I call random acts of kindness -- rather than strategic investments.
Akhtar Badshah: Philanthropy on Trial: Is the Impact on Society Justifiable? Akhtar Badshah 2011
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"Mortgage rates follow what we call a random walk, and don't bounce back from lows like most people assume," he says.
Refinance Now? Maybe Not Jessica Silver-Greenberg 2011
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He said the sector remains too focused on charity -- what I call random acts of kindness -- rather than strategic investments.
Akhtar Badshah: Philanthropy on Trial: Is the Impact on Society Justifiable? Akhtar Badshah 2011
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Just hanging out and what we call random hallway parties.
Rules of Attraction 2007
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SARAH TEALE, FILMMAKER, "DEALING DOGS": A class-B dealer is someone who deals with what they call random-source dogs.
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But, she argues, we can still hold the former group, i.e., that which she calls a random collection of individuals, responsible for the violence done to victims, since, if they had tried, they could have come up with such decision-making procedures themselves.
Collective Responsibility Smiley, Marion 2005
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It was not that his spirits were visibly high — he would never, in the concert of pleasure, touch the big drum by so much as a knuckle: he had a mortal dislike to the high, ragged note, to what he called random ravings.
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It was not that his spirits were visibly high -- he would never, in the concert of pleasure, touch the big drum by so much as a knuckle: he had a mortal dislike to the high, ragged note, to what he called random ravings.
john commented on the word random
The kind of word you get when you click here, or on the 'random word' link that's now at the bottom of every page.
July 11, 2007
reesetee commented on the word random
Thanks, John! I noticed you also expanded our dictionary/reference selection (two Google links!). What fun!
July 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word random
Hey, that's cool! It's also reassuring to see how many words on the site don't have comments yet, when I start to think we might be running out of stuff to talk about. ;-)
July 11, 2007
reesetee commented on the word random
Yeah, that'll happen. :-)
July 11, 2007
jennarenn commented on the word random
Oh, how cool!!! I'm a big fan of the 'random word' function. :) Most of the words I've found are only listed by one or two people.
July 11, 2007
uselessness commented on the word random
Oh noes, the random word function done BROKED!!
October 8, 2007
john commented on the word random
I unbroke it. Has anyone else noticed that every time I add a new feature, I break three existing ones?
October 8, 2007
uselessness commented on the word random
No prob, at least you're quick to amend. ;-) Also, I saw jennarenn added , and I thought "that's pretty cool." Now I don't want to add it, but it's worthy of a favorite. But that generates a 500 error. :-(
October 9, 2007
seanahan commented on the word random
John, I have noticed that every time I fix anything I break three other things. Welcome to software development.
October 9, 2007
jennarenn commented on the word random
Oh no, did I delete a good list? I could only find two words, so I decided to chuck it. I'm such a minimalist!
Hee-hee.
October 9, 2007
sonofgroucho commented on the word random
Who would have though this word would have generated so much conversation?
November 11, 2007
kewpid commented on the word random
Oh noes, you clicked! What horrors hath thee unleashed?
June 12, 2008
bilby commented on the word random
Definitely my favourite rhyme for fandom.
June 12, 2008
Prolagus commented on the word random
wow so I'm here! I feel so alone, though...
June 13, 2008
Prolagus commented on the word random
New Wordies might be confused by this conversation, so the official Wordie historian will now explain that
in the past, the random feature URI was http://wordie.org/words/random, i.e. the same as this page.
September 9, 2008
dhuber commented on the word random
Way, way too much, "like wow! That was random..." going around these days. Though, thankfully, it seems to be a dying trend.
October 1, 2008
dontcry commented on the word random
Let's keep a good thought.
October 1, 2008
plethora commented on the word random
Pfft!
Noone says "like, wow."
:P
October 1, 2008
PossibleUnderscore commented on the word random
Summed up in two words: cow poo.
July 18, 2009
thesaraheffect commented on the word random
one of the most misused words in my experience, right up there with peruse: "OMG, why would you say that? You are so random, Sarah!"
(No, actually I said that on purpose.)
"Have you heard of this wordie site? Yeah, it's this great site that I randomly found when I googled 'wordie' the other day!"
(Randomly, really?)
September 17, 2009
seanahan commented on the word random
I have a lot of statistics, but I still find myself using random colloquially to mean a variety of things. Sometimes I refer to things as stochastic just to mix it up.
September 17, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word random
Learn English with Vexamples, and learn about technology at the same time!
Anyway: has anyone yet some across a page with whitespace in the word string while using the Random Word feature, or does it produce only single (and hyphenated) words? I'm beginning to suspect it's restricted in the same manner as Recently Viewed (though given the sheer size of the database now, it'll be hard to tell without confirmation from John & co.); and if it is, then it's clearly inferior to classic Wordie's.
November 26, 2009
vanishedone commented on the word random
Looking at the other examples, I am struck by how little randomness is in the selection of the 'random, horrific attack' ones.
November 26, 2009
alexz commented on the word random
I wonder how many words are in the 'random' pool. is it a million. Can I use 5 words to make a really good passphrase?
settlementsmisprintingpepcidsprogletschirped
November 6, 2017