reflection

EnglishEdit

Alternative formsEdit

EtymologyEdit

From Middle French reflexion, reflection, and its source Late Latin reflexio, from the participle stem of reflectō. The current spelling is influenced by reflect.

PronunciationEdit

  • IPA(key): /ɹɪˈflɛkʃən/
  • (file)
  • Hyphenation: re‧flec‧tion
  • Rhymes: -ɛkʃən

NounEdit

 
A water reflection - meanings 2 and 3

reflection (countable and uncountable, plural reflections)

  1. The act of reflecting or the state of being reflected.
  2. The property of a propagated wave being thrown back from a surface (such as a mirror).
  3. Something, such as an image, that is reflected.
    The dog barked at his own reflection in the mirror.
  4. Careful thought or consideration.
    Synonyms: see Thesaurus:consideration
    After careful reflection, I have decided not to vote for that proposition.
    • 1959, Georgette Heyer, chapter 1, in The Unknown Ajax:
      But Richmond, his grandfather's darling, after one thoughtful glance cast under his lashes at that uncompromising countenance appeared to lose himself in his own reflections.
  5. An implied criticism.
    It is a reflection on his character that he never came back to see them.
  6. (computing) The process or mechanism of determining the capabilities of an object at run-time.
    • 2002, Java Enterprise Best Practices (O'Reilly)
      DynamicMBeanFacade uses Java's reflection API to introspect the managed resource and discover data type information for attributes.
  7. (anatomy) The folding of a part; a fold.

Derived termsEdit

Related termsEdit

TranslationsEdit

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

See alsoEdit