Science & TechnologyGreek → English
Analogue
/ˈænəlɔːɡ/noun
A thing comparable to another, or a signal that varies continuously in proportion to what it represents.
The Greek roots
ἀνά
aná
according to, up
λόγος
lógos
ratio, proportion
Literally: “according to ratio”
The story of the word
ἀνάλογον was a mathematician's term meaning 'in proportion', and λόγος here is ratio, not word. Reasoning by analogy means claiming that two ratios match. The clipped form set against 'digital' is twentieth-century engineering, and it kept the old mathematics intact: an analogue signal is one whose shape stays proportional to the pressure, voltage or light that made it.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → French → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
analogylogiccataloguelogarithm
In a sentence
There is no clean analogue for this in any other language.
He records to tape because he prefers what analogue does to the noise.