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Contract vs Dichotomy - What's the difference?

contract | dichotomy |

As nouns the difference between contract and dichotomy

is that contract is an agreement between two or more parties, to perform a specific job or work order, often temporary or of fixed duration and usually governed by a written agreement while dichotomy is a separation or division into two; a distinction that results in such a division.

As an adjective contract

is (obsolete) contracted; affianced; betrothed.

As a verb contract

is (ambitransitive) to draw together or nearer; to shorten, narrow, or lessen.

contract

Etymology 1

From (etyl), from (etyl) contract, from (etyl) contractum, past participle of .

Noun

(en noun)
  • An agreement between two or more parties, to perform a specific job or work order, often temporary or of fixed duration and usually governed by a written agreement.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist), author=Lexington
  • , title= Keeping the mighty honest , passage=British journalists shun complete respectability, feeling a duty to be ready to savage the mighty, or rummage through their bins. Elsewhere in Europe, government contracts and subsidies ensure that press barons will only defy the mighty so far.}}
  • (legal) An agreement which the law will enforce in some way. A legally binding contract must contain at least one promise, i.e., a commitment or offer, by an offeror to and accepted by an offeree to do something in the future. A contract is thus executory rather than executed.
  • (legal) A part of legal studies dealing with laws and jurisdiction related to contracts.
  • (informal) An order, usually given to a hired assassin, to kill someone.
  • (bridge) The declarer's undertaking to win the number of tricks bid with a stated suit as trump.
  • Hypernyms
    * (agreement that is legally binding) agreement
    Hyponyms
    * (agreement that is legally binding) bailment
    Derived terms
    * contractual * fixed-term contract * contract of employment

    Adjective

    (-)
  • (obsolete) Contracted; affianced; betrothed.
  • (Shakespeare)
  • (obsolete) Not abstract; concrete.
  • * Robert Recorde, , 1557:
  • But now in eche kinde of these, there are certaine nombers named Ab?tracte'': and other called nombers ''Contracte .

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl), from (etyl) contracter, from (etyl) contractum, past participle of . the verb developed after the noun, and originally meant only "draw together"; the sense "make a contract with" developed later.

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (ambitransitive) To draw together or nearer; to shorten, narrow, or lessen.
  • The snail's body contracted into its shell.
    to contract one's sphere of action
  • * Wordsworth
  • Years contracting to a moment.
  • * Dr. H. More
  • In all things desuetude doth contract and narrow our faculties.
  • (grammar) To shorten by omitting a letter or letters or by reducing two or more vowels or syllables to one.
  • The word "cannot" is often contracted into "can't".
  • To enter into a contract with. (rfex)
  • To enter into, with mutual obligations; to make a bargain or covenant for.
  • * Hakluyt
  • We have contracted an inviolable amity, peace, and league with the aforesaid queen.
  • * Strype
  • Many persons prohibited by law.
  • To make an agreement or contract; to covenant; to agree; to bargain.
  • to contract for carrying the mail
  • To bring on; to incur; to acquire.
  • She contracted the habit of smoking in her teens.
    to contract a debt
  • * Alexander Pope
  • Each from each contract new strength and light.
  • * Jonathan Swift
  • Such behaviour we contract by having much conversed with persons of high stature.
  • To gain or acquire (an illness).
  • * 1999 , Davidson C. Umeh, Protect Your Life: A Health Handbook for Law Enforcement Professionals (page 69)
  • An officer contracted hepatitis B and died after handling the blood-soaked clothing of a homicide victim
  • To draw together so as to wrinkle; to knit.
  • * Shakespeare
  • Thou didst contract and purse thy brow.
  • To betroth; to affiance.
  • * Shakespeare
  • The truth is, she and I, long since contracted , / Are now so sure, that nothing can dissolve us.
    Synonyms
    * (lessen) abate, decrease, lessen, reduce * (shorten) shorten, shrink * catch, get
    Antonyms
    * (lessen) increase, expand * (shorten) grow, lengthen

    dichotomy

    Noun

    (dichotomies)
  • A separation or division into two; a distinction that results in such a division.
  • * 1989', Carole Pateman, ''6: Feminist Critiques of the Public/Private '''Dichotomy'' , ''The Disorder of Women: Democracy, Feminism, and Political Theory , page 118,
  • The dichotomy' between the private and the public is central to almost two centuries of feminist writing and political struggle; it is, ultimately, what the feminist movement is all about. Although some feminists treat the ' dichotomy as a universal, trans-historical and trans-cultural feature of human existence, feminist criticism is primarily directed at the separation and opposition between the public and private spheres in liberal theory and practice.
  • * 2003 , Thérèse Encrenaz et al''., Storm Dunlop (translator), ''The Solar System'' [''Système Solaire ], page 232,
  • The dichotomy between maria and highlands dominates lunar mineralogy.
  • * 2005 , S. P. Naidu, Public Administration: Concepts And Theories , page 55,
  • Despite some contradictions found in the essay, its major emphasis is laid on the politics-administration dichotomy' theory. It is largely devoted to the argument concerning the separability of politics and administration. The politics-administration ' dichotomy initiated by Wilson was later elaborated by Frank J. Goodnow in his work, “Politics and Administration” (1900).
  • * 2008 , N. Gregory Mankiw, Principles of Economics , 6th Edition, page 723,
  • All of this previous analysis was based on two related ideas: the classical dichotomy' and monetary neutrality. Recall that the classical ' dichotomy is the separation of variables into real variables (those that measure quantities or relative prices) and nominal variables (those measured in terms of money).
  • Such a division involving apparently incompatible or opposite principles; a duality.
  • (logic) The division of a class into two disjoint subclasses that are together comprehensive, as the division of man'' into ''white'' and ''not white .
  • * 2011 , Patrick J. Hurley, A Concise Introduction to Logic , page 162,
  • But in the fallacy of false dichotomy , not only do the two alternatives fail to be jointly exhaustive, but they are not even likely. As a result, the disjunctive premise is false, or at least probably false.
  • * 2011 , Tomasz A. Gorarzd, Jacek Krzaczkowski, The Complexity of Problems Connected with Two-Element Algebras'', Pawe? M. Idziak, AndrzejWronski, ''Reports on Mathematical Logic: No. 46 , page 92,
  • One can ask if for any algebra the considered problem is always in P or NP-complete (P or coNP-complete)? For example, the problem of the satisfiability of a system of polynomial equations over a group G is in P if G is abelian and NP-complete otherwise ([7, 13]).
    One of the most widely known subclasses of NP which exhibits such a dichotomy', is the class of constraint satisfaction problems (CSP) on the set {0,1}, see [16]. Recently Bulatov proved the ' dichotomy for CSP on a three-element set [3].
  • (biology, taxonomy) The division of a genus into two species; a division into two subordinate parts.
  • (astronomy) A phase of the moon when it appears half lit and half dark, as at the quadratures.
  • * 1854 , Edward Greswell, Origines Kalendariæ Italicæ: Tables of the Roman Calendar , Volume 1, page 261,
  • The Ides of Januarius indeed, the preceding month, must have fallen on March 1 at midnight, two days before the first dichotomy of the mean new moon of that month, March 3 at midnight.
  • (biology) Successive division and subdivision; successive bifurcation, as of a stem of a plant or a vein of the body into two parts as it proceeds from its origin.
  • (biology) A fork (bifurcation) in a stem or vein.
  • * 1969 , J. F. Rigby, Permian Sphenopsids from Antarctica'', ''Geological Survey Professional Paper 613-F , page F-9,
  • In one forked leaf there is a distinct vein dichotomy', and the leaf boundary commences 1.5 mm above the ' dichotomy .
  • * 2010 , V. Singh, P. C. Pande, D. K. Jain, Text Book Of Botany: Diversity Of Microbes And Cryptogams , 4th Edition, page 511,
  • In most of the creeping species with dorsiventral stems (e.g., S. kraussiana'', ''S. laevigata'') roots arise at or close to the point of dichotomy'''; in species like ''S. rupestris'' and ''S. wallichii'' they arise at the point of '''dichotomy as well as other positions and in ''S. selaginoides'' and ''S. spinulosa they arise from knot like swellings present at the basal portion of the stem.

    Synonyms

    * (division into parts) partition, trichotomy

    Derived terms

    * dichotomic * dichotomically * dichotomise * dichotomous * false dichotomy

    See also

    * bifurcation * bisection * duality * law of the excluded middle * partition (Webster 1913)