EXTINCTION • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Extinction

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/ɪkstˈɪŋkʃən/ /ɪkstˈɪŋʃən/ Listen

noun

Extinction n.

1.

The act of extinguishing or making extinct; a putting an end to; the act of putting out or destroying light, fire, life, activity, influence, etc.

2.

State of being extinguished or of ceasing to be; destruction; suppression; as, the extinction of life, of a family, of a quarrel, of claim.

3.

Specifically: The ceasing to exist of a species of living organism, such as a plant or animal, whose numbers declined to the point where the last member of the species died and therefore no new members of the species could ever again be born. Note: Extinctions have occurred many times throughout the history of life on Earth, and abundant evidence of the prior existence of animals and plants are found as fossils in rock formations many millions of years old. It is believed by some that due to the influence of man on the environment and destruction of habitat, the rate of extinction of species is now higher than at any previous time on this planet. Extinctions of some animals in recent years have actually been reliably recorded, such as that of the dodo bird. A remarkable example of extinction is that of the passenger pigeon (Ectopistes migratorius) in North America, which once numbered in the billions, and the last living member of which species was recorded as dying in captivity in 1914.

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Etymology of 'Extinction'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Extinction" Quotes from Famous Books

... assurance of supernatural help, for which the growth of a knowledge of natural phenomena made it impossible for the mere scientist to be the sponsor. It became a question of faith rather than knowledge; and man's instinctive struggle against the risk of extinction impelled him to cling to this larger hope of salvation, and to embellish it with an ethical and moral significance which at first was lacking in the eternal search ...

— The Evolution of the Dragon • G. Elliot Smith

... "that is our life, or a great part of it. To complete it, here is that to which I really wish to devote my existence, and in which I instinctively feel Lady Corisande would sympathize with me—the extinction of pauperism." ...

— Lothair • Benjamin Disraeli

... he went on hotly, "this Republic that menaces our national life with commercial extinction, what past has she that is comparable? The daughter who left the old stock to be the light woman among nations, welcoming all comers, mingling her pure blood, polluting her lofty ideals until it is hard indeed ...

— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan

... The Duke and Duchess, and Lady Mabel Ashbourne, left for the Queen Anne house at Kensington, whereat the fashionable London papers broke out in paragraphs of rejoicing, and the local journals bewailed the extinction of ...

— Vixen, Volume II. • M. E. Braddon

... so impregnable to pestilence as the grave. So, had the vitality gone out of the nation's heart, had that lamp of love for freedom and justice and of homage to the being of man, which once burned in its bosom so brightly, already sunk into death-flicker and extinction, then in the sordid and icy dark that would remain there could be no war of like nature with this that to-day gives the land its woful baptism of blood and tears. Oh, no! there would have been peace—and putrefaction: peace, but without ...

— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XI., February, 1863, No. LXIV. • Various

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