English

The Digesting Duck of Jacques de Vaucanson, hailed in 1739 as the first automaton capable of digestion.

A diagram of a formal automaton.

Noun

automaton ‎(plural automatons or automata)

1. A machine or robot designed to follow a precise sequence of instructions.
   • 2004, Alan Hollinghurst, The Line of Beauty, Bloomsbury, 2005, Chapter 9,

     Nick had heard her play through the very beginning of it a dozen times, until he was screaming at her in his head to go on. Well, now she did, watching her own hands busying up and down the keyboard as if they were astonishing automata that she had wound up and set in motion, in perfect synchrony, to produce this silvery flow of sound.

2. A person who acts like a machine or robot, often defined as having a monotonous lifestyle and lacking in emotion.

   Due to her strict adherence to her daily schedule, Jessica was becoming more and more convinced that she was an automaton.

   • Thomas Jefferson

     A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for a second, that second for a third, and so on 'til the bulk of the society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery, to have no sensibilities left but for sinning and suffering.

3. A formal system, such as finite automaton.
4. A toy in the form of a mechanical figure.

Derived terms

• auton
• cellular automaton

Related terms

• automat
• automatic
• automatization
• automatize
• automation

Hyponyms

• robot

Translations

Latin

Alternative forms

• automatum

Etymology

From Ancient Greek αὐτόματον ‎(autómaton), neuter of αὐτόματος ‎(autómatos, “self-moving, self-willed”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /au̯ˈto.ma.ton/, [au̯ˈtɔ.ma.tõ]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /au̯ˈto.ma.ton/, [au̯ˈtoː.ma.ton]

Noun

automaton

1. automaton.
2. contraption
3. device

Declension

Second declension, Greek type.