combination

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun The act of combining or the state of being combined.
• noun The result of combining.
• noun An alliance of persons or parties for a common purpose; an association.
• noun A sequence of numbers or letters used to open a combination lock.
• noun Mathematics One or more elements selected from a set without regard to the order of selection.

from The Century Dictionary.

• noun The act of uniting in a whole, or the state of being so united; a coming together so as to form a group, sum, product, etc.; especially, the union of related parts in a complex whole: as, a combination of wheels and springs in a watch; a combination of ideas; a combination of circumstances.
• noun The whole or complex thus formed; the product of combining: as, a soft combination of stops in organ-playing.
• noun Specifically The union or association of two or more persons or parties for the attainment of some common end; a league: as, a political or a criminal combination; success is possible only through combination.
• noun In chem., chemical union; the production of a chemical compound.
• noun In mathematics, the union of a number of individuals in different groups, each containing a certain number of the individuals.
• noun At ball-pool, a designed shot by which a cue-ball makes one or more object-balls drive another into a pocket; at ordinary billiards one that similarly effects a carom or pocket.
• noun In lace-manufacture, a complex arrangement of threads.
• noun Same as combination-room.
• noun Same as combination garment.
• noun Specifically, in organ-playing, whatever stops are drawn for use in a particular piece or passage, or the tonal effect thus produced. The process or art of choosing the stops to be used is registration, but each particular choice is a combination.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• noun The act or process of combining or uniting persons and things.
• noun The result of combining or uniting; union of persons or things; esp. a union or alliance of persons or states to effect some purpose; -- usually in a bad sense.
• noun (Chem.) The act or process of uniting by chemical affinity, by which substances unite with each other in definite proportions by weight to form distinct compounds.
• noun (Math.) The different arrangements of a number of objects, as letters, into groups.
• noun [U. S.] a railroad car containing two or more compartments used for different purposes.
• noun a lock in which the mechanism is controlled by means of a movable dial (sometimes by several dials or rings) inscribed with letters or other characters. The bolt of the lock can not be operated until after the dial has been so turned as to combine the characters in a certain order or succession.
• noun in the University of Cambridge, Eng., a room into which the fellows withdraw after dinner, for wine, dessert, and conversation.
• noun (Chem.) the act, process, or ratio by which gaseous elements and compounds unite in definite proportions by volume to form distinct compounds.
• noun (Chem.) the act, process, or ratio, in which substances unite in proportions by weight, relatively fixed and exact, to form distinct compounds. See Law of definite proportions, under Definite.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun The act of combining, the state of being combined or the result of combining.
• noun A sequence of numbers or letters used to open a combination lock.
• noun mathematics One or more elements selected from a set without regard to the order of selection.
• noun An association or alliance of people for some common purpose.
• noun billiards A combination shot; a billiard; a shot where the cue ball hits a ball that strikes another ball on the table.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun the act of arranging elements into specified groups without regard to order
• noun an alliance of people or corporations or countries for a special purpose (formerly to achieve some antisocial end but now for general political or economic purposes)
• noun the act of combining things to form a new whole
• noun a coordinated sequence of chess moves
• noun a sequence of numbers or letters that opens a combination lock
• noun a group of people (often temporary) having a common purpose
• noun a collection of things that have been combined; an assemblage of separate parts or qualities