Adjective

(en adjective)

Not the same; exhibiting a difference.

*

* 1971 , William S. Burroughs, , page 6

Enter the American tourist. He thinks of himself as a good guy but when he looks in the mirror to shave this good guy he has to admit that "well, other people are different from me and I don't really like them." This makes him feel guilty toward other people.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-19, author= Ian Sample

, volume=189, issue=6, page=34, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= Irregular bedtimes may affect children's brains , passage=Irregular bedtimes may disrupt healthy brain development in young children, according to a study of intelligence and sleeping habits.  ¶ Going to bed at a different time each night affected girls more than boys, but both fared worse on mental tasks than children who had a set bedtime, researchers found.}}

Various, assorted, diverse.

* 2006 , Delbert S. Elliott et al., Good Kids from Bad Neighborhoods: Successful Development in Social Context , Cambridge University Press, ISBN 9780521863575, page 19:

In any case, poor black respondents living in high-poverty neighborhoods are most likely to view their neighborhood as a single block or block group and to use this definition consistently when asked about different neighborhood characteristics and activities.

Distinct, separate; (used for emphasis after numbers and other determiners of quantity).

* {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=May-June, author= Charles T. Ambrose

, title= Alzheimer’s Disease , volume=101, issue=3, page=200, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=Similar studies of rats have employed four different intracranial resorbable, slow sustained release systems—surgical foam, a thermal gel depot, a microcapsule or biodegradable polymer beads.}}

Unlike most others; unusual.

Adjective

(en adjective)

Being only one of a larger population.

A singular experiment cannot be regarded as scientific proof of the existence of a phenomenon.

Being the only one of the kind; unique.

She has a singular personality.

* Addison

These busts of the emperors and empresses are all very scarce, and some of them almost singular in their kind.

* Chaucer

And God forbid that all a company / Should rue a singular man's folly.

(Francis Bacon)

Distinguished by superiority; eminent; extraordinary; exceptional.

a man of singular gravity or attainments

Out of the ordinary; curious.

It was very singular ; I don't know why he did it.

* Denham

So singular a sadness / Must have a cause as strange as the effect.

* Milton

His zeal / None seconded, as out of season judged, / Or singular and rash.

(grammar) Referring to only one thing or person.

(linear algebra, of matrix) Having no inverse.

(linear algebra, of transformation) Having the property that the matrix of coefficients of the new variables has a determinant equal to zero.

(set theory, of a cardinal number) Not equal to its own .

(legal) Each; individual.

to convey several parcels of land, all and singular

(obsolete) Engaged in by only one on a side; single.

* Holinshed

to try the matter thus together in a singular combat