efficient
Pronunciation
- IPA: /ɪˈfɪʃ.ənt/, /əˈfɪʃ.ənt/[1]
Etymology
It is inherited from Middle English efficient, borrowed from Old French efficient and directly from Latin efficiēns (“effective, producing, active”), the present participle of efficere (“to work out, accomplish”),[2][3] from ex- (“out”) and facere (“to do”).[2] It is related to effect and efficacy.[3][4]
Earliest recorded meaning
Producing an immediate effect, causing: about 1380 in Chaucer's Boethius according to Barnhart, 1398 in the OED, chiefly in efficient cause, the cause that makes a thing what it is.[3][5][4]
Semantic evolution
The current sense, productive or competent, working well with little waste of effort, is from 1787.[2][5][4] In the 19th century a volunteer soldier qualified for service was an efficient (1864).[5] Efficiency is from 1593, in Hooker's Ecclesiastical Polity.[3]
Timeline
Modern meaning
Adjective
- Working or producing well with little waste of time, money or effort.
- Of a person, capable and competent.
- (philosophy) Producing a direct effect; causing.
Word family
- efficiently
- cost-efficient
- nonefficient
- superefficient
- efficient cause
Related words
- effect
- effective
- effector
- effectual
- effectuate
- efficacious
- efficacity
- efficacy
- efficiency
- deficient
- sufficient
References
- ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
- ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
- ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
- ^ a b c Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
- ^ a b c d Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press