gen|er|ate
gen|er|ate «JEHN uh rayt»,
transitive verb, -at|
ed,
-at|
ing.
1. to cause to be; bring into being;
produce: »
Heating water can generate steam.
SYNONYM(S): make.
3. Mathematics. to form (a line,
surface,
figure, or solid) especially by moving a point or line.
4. Linguistics. to derive or produce (a grammatical sentence) from more basic forms by a set of rules of operation or transformation: »
Surface structures—the sentences we actually speak and hear—are not “like” the kernels from which they are generated by transformational rules (New Yorker).
╂[< Latin
generāre (with English
-ate1) <
genus, -eris race; see etym. under
genus (
Cf. ↑
genus)]
Useful english dictionary.
2012.