heuristic

¹heu·ris·tic

adj \hyu̇-ˈris-tik\

Definition of HEURISTIC

: involving or serving as an aid to learning, discovery, or problem-solving by experimental and especially trial-and-error methods <heuristic techniques> <a heuristic assumption>; also : of or relating to exploratory problem-solving techniques that utilize self-educating techniques (as the evaluation of feedback) to improve performance <a heuristic computer program>

— heu·ris·ti·cal·ly \-ti-k(ə-)lē\ adverb

Examples of HEURISTIC

1. If Orbitz prevails, its online reservation process alone may blow away the competition. Unlike mainframe-based systems … , Orbitz uses racks of PCs to search fare data, making it easier to scale up computing power. And its intelligent … algorithms evaluate all the possible fares simultaneously instead of employing heuristic shortcuts designed to use as little computing power as possible. —Evan Ratliff, WIRED, September 2000
2. Because “tradition” has served as a powerful heuristic term, we are always in danger of reifying it … —Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Reading Black, Reading Feminist, 1990
3. Its heuristic principle would be St. Augustine's axiom that the Old Testament is revealed in the New and the New concealed in the Old … —V. B. Leitch, American Literary Criticism from the Thirties to the Eighties, 1988

Origin of HEURISTIC

German heuristisch, from New Latin heuristicus, from Greek heuriskein to discover; akin to Old Irish fo-fúair he found

First Known Use: 1821

Other Philosophy Terms

dialectic, dualism, epistemology, existentialism, metaphysics, ontology, sequitur, solipsism, transcendentalism

Rhymes with HEURISTIC

artistic, autistic, ballistic, Buddhistic, cladistic, cubistic, deistic, ekistic, eristic, faunistic, floristic, holistic, hubristic, juristic, linguistic, logistic, meristic, monistic, patristic, phlogistic, puristic, simplistic, sophistic, statistic, stylistic, Taoistic, theistic, Thomistic, touristic, tropistic, truistic, veristic, Yahwistic