AUTOMATON (automata)

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

Irregular inflected form: automata   

 Dictionary entry overview: What does automaton mean? 

• AUTOMATON (noun)
  The noun AUTOMATON has 2 senses:

1. someone who acts or responds in a mechanical or apathetic way

2. a mechanism that can move automatically

  Familiarity information: AUTOMATON used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• AUTOMATON (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Someone who acts or responds in a mechanical or apathetic way

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

automaton; zombi; zombie

Context example:

only an automaton wouldn't have noticed

Hypernyms ("automaton" is a kind of...):

individual; mortal; person; somebody; someone; soul (a human being)

Derivation:

automatic (resembling the unthinking functioning of a machine)

automatise; automatize (turn into an automaton)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A mechanism that can move automatically

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

automaton; golem; robot

Hypernyms ("automaton" is a kind of...):

mechanism (device consisting of a piece of machinery; has moving parts that perform some function)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "automaton"):

android; humanoid; mechanical man (an automaton that resembles a human being)

Derivation:

automatic (operating with minimal human intervention; independent of external control)

automatize (turn into an automaton)

 Context examples 

It was all wheels and cogs and oil-cups—a clever mechanism operated by automatons.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Mr. St. John spoke almost like an automaton: himself only knew the effort it cost him thus to refuse.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

At times his mind wandered farther afield, and he plodded on, a mere automaton, strange conceits and whimsicalities gnawing at his brain like worms.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

But she had become an automaton.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Do you think I am an automaton? —a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup?

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

Mason!—the West Indies! he said, in the tone one might fancy a speaking automaton to enounce its single words; Mason!—the West Indies! he reiterated; and he went over the syllables three times, growing, in the intervals of speaking, whiter than ashes: he hardly seemed to know what he was doing.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)