[1] : The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48

polymorphism \pol`ymor"phism\, n.
   1. crystallog. same as pleomorphism.
      1913 webster

   2. biol.
      a the capability of assuming different forms; the
          capability of widely varying in form.
      b existence in many forms; the coexistence, in the same
          locality, of two or more distinct forms independent of
          sex, not connected by intermediate gradations, but
          produced from common parents.
          1913 webster
see also:
pleomorphism 

[2] : WordNet (r) 2.0

polymorphism
     n 1: chemistry the existence of different kinds of crystal of
          the same chemical compound syn: pleomorphism
     2: biology the existence of two or more forms of individuals
        within the same animal species independent of sex
        differences
see also:
pleomorphism 

[3] : The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (27 SEP 03)

polymorphism
     
         a concept first identified by
        christopher strachey 1967 and developed by hindley and
        milner, allowing types such as list of anything.  e.g. in
        haskell:
     
        	length :: a -> int
     
        is a function which operates on a list of objects of any type,
        a a is a type variable.  this is known as parametric
        polymorphism.  polymorphic typing allows strong type checking
        as well as generic functions.  ml in 1976 was the first
        language with polymorphic typing.
     
        ad-hoc polymorphism better described as overloading is the
        ability to use the same syntax for objects of different types,
        e.g. "+" for addition of reals and integers or "-" for unary
        negation or diadic subtraction.  parametric polymorphism
        allows the same object code for a function to handle arguments
        of many types but overloading only reuses syntax and requires
        different code to handle different types.
     
        see also generic type variable.
     
        in object-oriented programming, the term is used to describe
        a variable that may refer to objects whose class is not
        known at compile time and which respond at run time
        according to the actual class of the object to which they
        refer.
     
        2002-08-08
     
     
see also:
christopher strachey types haskell type variable ml overloading 
generic type variable object-oriented programming variable class compile time 
run time 

Polymorphism >> P Words
Polymorphism, definition of term: Polymorphism
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