Meaning & use
automata
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Plural of 'automaton': mechanical devices designed to operate independently, following a predetermined set of instructions.
See it in a sentence
The museum's collection includes eighteenth-century automata that could write letters and play musical instruments.
In computer science, finite automata are used to model and analyze sequences of states and transitions.
A note on using this word
Borrowed from Greek, where 'automaton' literally means 'acting of one's own will'; in mathematics and computer science, 'automata theory' studies abstract machines and the problems they can solve.
Words with a similar meaning
robotsmechanisms
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