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Definition of "error" []

  • An act, assertion, or belief that unintentionally deviates from what is correct, right, or true. (noun)
  • The condition of having incorrect or false knowledge. (noun)
  • The act or an instance of deviating from an accepted code of behavior. (noun)
  • A mistake. (noun)
  • Mathematics The difference between a computed or measured value and a true or theoretically correct value. (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.

Use "error" in a sentence
  • "The record of that court tells us that it _did_; and if we are to see whether there be any error on that record, and adopt the unanimous opinion of the judges, that those six counts, or the findings on them, are so bad that no judgment upon them would be good, how can we give judgment for the defendant, and thereby declare that there is _no error_ in the record?"
  • "The error was clearly the real cause of the banishment; what precisely this _error_ was Ovid does not reveal, but it appears from _Tr_ II 103-4 and _Tr_ III v 49-50 to have been the witnessing of some action that was embarrassing to the imperial family."
  • "But an error it most certainly was: and to that _error_, the _accident_ described in the last preceding paragraph _would have_ very materially conduced, and it may have very easily done so."