intrinsic

English

Alternative forms

• intrinsick (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle French intrinsèque, from Latin intrīnsecus (“on the inside, inwardly”), from *intrim, an assumed adverbial form of inter (“within”) + secus (“by, on the side”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɪnˈtɹɪn.zɪk/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Adjective

intrinsic (comparative more intrinsic, superlative most intrinsic)

1. Innate, inherent, inseparable from the thing itself, essential.

   Synonyms: essential, inherent, innate, proper to; see also Thesaurus:intrinsic, Thesaurus:innate

   Antonym: extrinsic

   the intrinsic value of gold or silver

   the intrinsic merit of an action

   • 1832, [Isaac Taylor], Saturday Evening. […], London: Holdsworth and Ball, →OCLC:

     He was better qualified than they to estimate justly the intrinsic value of Grecian philosophy and refinement.

2. (anatomy, of a body part) Situated, produced, secreted in, or coming from inside an organ, tissue, muscle or member.
3. (programming, of a function or operator) Built-in.
   • 1997, Jeanne C. Adams, Walter S. Brainerd, Jeanne T. Martin, Brian T. Smith, Jerrold L. Wagener, Fortran 95 Handbook: Complete ISO/ANSI Reference, MIT Press, →ISBN, page 192:

     In addition to the Fortran operators that are intrinsic (built in), there may be user-defined operators in expressions.

Derived terms

• for all intrinsic purposes
• intrinsic brightness
• intrinsic motivation
• intrinsicoid
• intrinsic protein
• intrinsic reward
• intrinsic semiconductor
• intrinsic value
• intrinsify

 

Related terms

• intrinsicality
• intrinsically

Translations

inherent

• Bulgarian: присъщ (bg) (prisǎšt), свойствен (bg) (svojstven)
• Catalan: intrínsec
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 本質的, 本质的／本质 (zh) (běnzhì de)

• Danish: indre, egentlig, iboende
• Dutch: intrinsiek (nl)
• Estonian: sisemine
• Finnish: olennainen (fi), luontainen (fi), erottamaton (fi)
• French: intrinsèque (fr), inhérent (fr), immanent (fr)
• Galician: intrínseco
• German: intrinsisch (de), in sich, an sich (de), von sich
• Greek: εγγενής (el) (engenís)
• Italian: intrinseco (it)
• Korean: 본질적인 (bonjiljeogin)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: iboende (no), indre (no)

  Nynorsk: ibuande

• Occitan: intrinsec (oc)
• Polish: wewnętrzny (pl), rzeczywisty (pl)
• Portuguese: intrínseco (pt)
• Romanian: intrinsec (ro)
• Russian: прису́щий (ru) (prisúščij), свойственный (ru) (svojstvennyj), имманентный (ru) (immanentnyj)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: интринзичан, сво̀јствен,, прирођен, у̀рођен

  Roman: intrìnzičan, svòjstven (sh), prìrođen (sh), ùrođen (sh)

• Spanish: intrínseco (es)
• Swedish: inneboende (sv)

situated or produced inside an organ

• Bulgarian: вътрешен (bg) (vǎtrešen)
• Catalan: intrínsec
• French: intrinsèque (fr)
• Greek: σύμφυτος (el) (sýmfytos)
• Italian: intrinseco (it)
• Portuguese: intrínseco (pt)
• Russian: составляющий (ru) (sostavljajuščij)
• Spanish: intrínseco (es)

Noun

intrinsic (plural intrinsics)

1. (computing, programming) A built-in function that is implemented directly by the compiler, without any intermediate call to a library.

   SIMD intrinics

   • 2021, Robert Robey, Yuliana Zamora, Parallel and High Performance Computing, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, page 190:

     Crappy loops, we got them: Use vector intrinsics¶ For troublesome loops that just don't vectorize even with hints, vector intrinsics are another option.

2. (video games) An ability possessed by a character and not requiring any external equipment.

   You can acquire the fire-resistance intrinsic by eating dragon meat.

Further reading

• “intrinsic”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “intrinsic”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• Intrinsic and extrinsic properties on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• citrinins