exaptation
nounEtymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₁éǵʰ Proto-Indo-European *-s Proto-Indo-European *h₁éǵʰs Proto-Italic *eks Latin ex Latin ex-der. Middle French ex-bor. Middle English ex- English ex- Proto-Indo-European *h₂éd Proto-Italic *ad Proto-Italic *ad- Latin ad- Proto-Italic *aptos Latin aptus Proto-Indo-European *-h₂ Proto-Indo-European *-éh₂ Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *-eh₂yéti Proto-Italic *-āō Latin -ō Latin apiō ▲ Latin -ō Latin -tō Latin aptō Latin adaptō Proto-Indo-European *-tis Proto-Indo-European *-Hō Proto-Indo-European *-tiHō Proto-Italic *-tiō Latin -tiō Medieval Latin adaptātiōbor. French adaptationbor. English adaptation blend English exaptation Blend of ex- + adaptation. Coined 1982 by palaeontologists Stephen Jay Gould and Elisabeth Vrba to avoid the perceived teleological baggage of the existing term preadaptation.
- derived from adaptō
- derived from adaptātiō
- borrowed from adaptation
Definitions
The use of a biological structure or function for a purpose other than that for which it…
The use of a biological structure or function for a purpose other than that for which it initially evolved.
- Birds initially developed wings and feathers as a means of heat regulation. The use of wings for flight is an example of exaptation.
The promotion of meaningless or redundant material so that it does new grammatical…
The promotion of meaningless or redundant material so that it does new grammatical (morphosyntactic or phonological) or semantic work.
- The process Haiman focuses on is exaptation, which he defines as "the promotion of meaningless or redundant material so that it does new grammatical (morphosyntactic or phonological) or semantic work" (p52).
The neighborhood
- neighborpreadaptation
Derived
Vish — recursive loop
No curated loop yet for exaptation. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA