simulation
(sɪmjʊˈleɪʃən)
Forms: 4–5 simil-, symylacioun (5 -acioune, -acion), 7 similation; 5–6 symulacion, -acyon (5 -acioun), 4–6 simulacion, 6– simulation.
[a. OF. simulacion, -ation (= Prov. and Sp. simulacion, It. simulazione), ad. L. simulātiōn-em, noun of action f. simulāre to simulate.]
1. a. The action or practice of simulating, with intent to deceive; false pretence, deceitful profession.
| 1340 Ayenb. 23 And þerof wexeþ uele zennes, ase ariȝthalf; þet is to wytene: lozengerie, simulacion. c 1400 Rom. Rose 7230 He nys no full good champioun That dredith such similacioun. 1412–20 Lydg. Chron. Troy iv. 4504 Amonge hem silfe to bringe in tresoun, Feyned trouþe and symulacioun. 1542 Udall Erasm. Apoph. 170 He..did with mutual simulacion on his partie cover & kepe secrete the colorable dooyng of the saied feloe. 1577 tr. Bullinger's Decades (1592) 319 This precept doth commaunde vs..that..wee doe our neighbor harme..neither by simulation nor dissimulation. 1611 Speed Hist. Gt. Brit. vi. (1632) 114 His nature relishing too much of the Punick craft and simulation. 1692 South Serm. (1697) I. 525 A Deceiving by Actions, Gestures, or Behaviour, is called Simulation, or Hypocrisie. 1711 Steele Tatler No. 213 ¶1 Simulation is a Pretence of what is not, and Dissimulation a Concealment of what is. 1788 Wesley Wks. (1872) VII. 43 Simulation is the seeming to be what we are not; dissimulation, the seeming not to be what we are. 1836 Landor Pericles & Aspasia Wks. 1846 II. 379, I wish he were as pious as you are: occasionally he appears so. I attacked him on his simulation. 1872 Shipley Gloss. Eccl. Terms 71 Fraud.., whether it consists in simulation or dissimulation. |
b. Tendency to assume a form resembling that of something else; unconscious imitation.
| 1870 March Anglo-Saxon Gram. 28 Simulation. The feigning a connection with words of similar sound is an important fact in English and other modern languages: asparagus > sparrow-grass. |
2. A false assumption or display, a surface resemblance or imitation, of something.
| c 1380 Wyclif Wks. (1880) 392 For als miche as it is done by symylacion of holynes, þe whiche is double wickidnes. 1471 Caxton Recuyell (Sommer) II. 650 How Anthenor and Eneas..dyde hit vnder symylacion of peas. 1532 More Confut. Tindale Wks. 357/2 Woulde God they would ones rather folow him truely in faith & good workes, then in simulacion of like santytie. a 1667 Cowley Ess., Liberty, So by the artificial simulation of some virtues, he made a shift to ensnare some honest..persons. 1873 Mivart Elem. Anat. 12 A solid partition or simulation of a notochord. 1876 M. E. Braddon J. Haggard's Dau. I. 74 Miserly as the arrangements of the household were, it was kept up with a faint simulation of a gentleman's establishment. |
3. The technique of imitating the behaviour of some situation or process (whether economic, military, mechanical, etc.) by means of a suitably analogous situation or apparatus, esp. for the purpose of study or personnel training. Freq. attrib.
| 1947 Jrnl. Inst. Electr. Engineers XCIV. iia. 117/1 The ensuing sections will..describe the simulations of the separate [servo] units. 1958 Business Week 29 Nov. 76/3 Men began to raise questions..about their models of the real world. They did this by inventing games such as chess and checkers to simulate battle, games like back-gammon and Parcheesi to simulate racing. H. J. R. Murray, in his History of Board Games (Oxford, 1952), finds that such simulation games go back to the beginning of recorded history and are found in every culture. 1966 A. Battersby Math. in Managem. vii. 159 Simulation enables a manager to study the system which he controls by imitating or ‘simulating’ its behaviour. 1972 Computers & Humanities VII. 38 The application of computer simulation techniques to the modeling of archaeological situations is one of the newest developments in computer use in archaeology. 1978 Nature 28 Sept. 305/1 Simulation studies on the towing of unprotected icebergs to southern continents suggest that the towing distance, ocean currents and the iceberg deterioration rate are of major importance. |