Definition of "action" []

• The state or process of acting or doing: The medical team went into action. (noun)
• Something done or accomplished; a deed. See Usage Note at act. (noun)
• Organized activity to accomplish an objective: a problem requiring drastic action. (noun)
• The causation of change by the exertion of power or a natural process: the action of waves on a beach; the action of a drug on blood pressure. (noun)
• A movement or a series of movements, as of an actor. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Since 'to know' is not an action and since reduplication expresses a resultant state from an *action* as outlined above, naturally there can be no reduplicated forms possible for these stative verbs."
• "In particular, if in the EPR/B experiment the L-apparatus pointer has a definite position before the L-measurement and the R-particle temporarily comes to possess definite position during the L-measurement, then the GRW/Pearle models involve action at a distance and thus also action* at a distance."
• "If, on scientific principles, it can be proved that those verbs generally denominated neuter, _originally_ expressed action, their present, accepted meaning will still oppose the theory, for the generality of mankind do not attach to them the idea of _action_."