Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Appetence.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun Fixed and strong desire; esp. natural desire; a craving; an eager appetite.
- noun Specifically: An instinctive inclination or propensity in animals to perform certain actions, as in the young to suck, in aquatic fowls to enter into water and to swim; the tendency of an organized body to seek what satisfies the wants of its organism.
- noun Natural tendency; affinity; attraction; -- used of inanimate objects.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Strong
desire ; craving; powerful instinct.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a feeling of craving something
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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It is that sense of life-preserving and life-enhancing appetency which is the conscious accompaniment of struggle.
The Approach to Philosophy Ralph Barton Perry 1916
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I must further observe that to say the palæotherium has graduated into equus by "natural selection" is an explanation of the process of the same kind and value as that by which the secretion of bile was attributed to the "appetency" of the liver for the elements of bile.
The World's Greatest Books — Volume 15 — Science Various 1909
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"There is also a further use," says Paley, "to be made of this present example, and that is as it precisely contradicts the opinion, that the parts of animals may have been all formed by what is called appetency,
Evolution, Old & New Or, the Theories of Buffon, Dr. Erasmus Darwin and Lamarck, as compared with that of Charles Darwin Samuel Butler 1868
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"appetency" of the liver, it was said, was for the elements of bile, and "biliosity," or the "hepatic sensation," guided the gland to their secretion.
Darwin, and After Darwin (Vol. 1 and 3, of 3) An Exposition of the Darwinian Theory and a Discussion of Post-Darwinian Questions George John Romanes 1871
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Perhaps "need" is too strong of a word; perhaps I'm looking for something like "hankering for" or "appetency".
October 2008 2008
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Perhaps "need" is too strong of a word; perhaps I'm looking for something like "hankering for" or "appetency".
In Which I Buy More Shoes (But Not Loafers, This Time) - A Dress A Day 2008
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For some months I had been ill in health, but was now convalescent, and, with returning strength, found myself in one of those happy moods which are so precisely the converse of ennui—moods of the keenest appetency, when the film from the mental vision departs … and the intellect, electrified, surpasses as greatly its everyday condition, as does the vivid yet candid reason of Leibnitz, the mad and flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias.
Touched with Fire Kay Redfield Jamison 1993
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For some months I had been ill in health, but was now convalescent, and, with returning strength, found myself in one of those happy moods which are so precisely the converse of ennui—moods of the keenest appetency, when the film from the mental vision departs … and the intellect, electrified, surpasses as greatly its everyday condition, as does the vivid yet candid reason of Leibnitz, the mad and flimsy rhetoric of Gorgias.
Touched with Fire Kay Redfield Jamison 1993
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At the milder end of the continuum of perceptual change, Poe gave a fictional account of moods “of the keenest appetency”:
Touched with Fire Kay Redfield Jamison 1993
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At the milder end of the continuum of perceptual change, Poe gave a fictional account of moods “of the keenest appetency”:
Touched with Fire Kay Redfield Jamison 1993
qms commented on the word appetency
If a boob should protrude ‘accidentally’
She cannot help what he happens to see.
I’ll give you few clues
As to what then ensues
But mention in passing his appetency.
December 27, 2018