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Organism vs Pestiferous - What's the difference?

organism | pestiferous |

As a noun organism

is a discrete and complete living thing, such as animal, plant, fungus or microorganism.

As an adjective pestiferous is

containing organisms that cause contagious diseases.

organism

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • (biology) A discrete and complete living thing, such as animal, plant, fungus or microorganism.
  • *{{quote-magazine, date=2013-07-20, volume=408, issue=8845, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= Welcome to the plastisphere , passage=Plastics are energy-rich substances, which is why many of them burn so readily. Any organism that could unlock and use that energy would do well in the Anthropocene. Terrestrial bacteria and fungi which can manage this trick are already familiar to experts in the field.}}
  • (by extension) Any complex thing with properties normally associated with living things.
  • Hyponyms

    * See also

    Derived terms

    * free-living organism * organismal * organismic

    pestiferous

    English

    Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • containing organisms that cause contagious diseases
  • * 1589 : Richard Hakluyt, The Principal Navigations
  • because he hath vouchsafed to preserue our nation from such fountains, from serpents and venemous wormes, & from al other pestiferous & contagious creatures.
  • * 1792 : Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
  • In these solemn moments man discovers the germ of those vices, which like the Java tree shed a pestiferous vapour around--death is in the shade!
  • * 1853 : Charles Dickens, Bleak House
  • and bears the body of our dear brother here departed to a hemmed-in churchyard, pestiferous and obscene, whence malignant diseases are communicated to the bodies of our dear brothers and sisters who have not departed...
  • annoying, vexatious
  • * 1592 : William Shakespeare, King Henry VI, Part 1
  • No, prelate; such is thy audacious wickedness, / Thy lewd, pestiferous , and dissentious pranks, / As very infants prattle of thy pride.
  • * 1896 : Mark Twain, Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc
  • and if any could have hanged his hindering and pestiferous council and set him free, he would have answered Joan's prayer and set her in the field.
  • * 1938 : Jerome Siegel and Joe Shuster, "Superman" in Action Comics #7, page 2:
  • Lois rescues Clark from the pestiferous curly...

    Synonyms

    * pestilent

    References