cognize

English

Alternative forms

• cognise (non-Oxford British spelling)

Etymology

Back-formation of cognizance.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈkɑɡˌnaɪz/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈkɒɡnʌɪz/, /ˌkɒɡˈnaɪz/

• Audio (Southern England):

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• Audio (Southern England):

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Verb

cognize (third-person singular simple present cognizes, present participle cognizing, simple past and past participle cognized)

1. To know, perceive, or become aware of.
   • 1934, George Henry Weiss, The Mentanicals:

     [T]hey must possess organs of sight—some method of cognizing their environment—akin to that of vision in man.

2. To make into an object of cognition (the process of acquiring knowledge through thought); to cogitate.
   • 2011, Usha Goswami, The Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of Childhood Cognitive Development:

     Cognizing about mind is a ubiquitous human activity; we consistently construe each other as agents undertaking intentional action based on our underlying beliefs and desires (and not as "bags of skin stuffed into pieces of cloth")

   • 2015, Devon E. Hinton, Byron J. Good, Culture and PTSD: Trauma in Global and Historical Perspective:

     “Thinking a lot” also involves other types of cognizing as well, such as cognizing about depressive themes such as being left by a wife for another man or being separated from relatives.

   • 2016, Robbie Davis-Floyd, P. Sven Arvidson, Intuition: The Inside Story: Interdisciplinary Perspectives, page 28:

     The act of consciously knowing about consciousness is the act of the brain mirroring its own organizations, cognizing about its own cognizing.

Derived terms

• cognizable
• cognization
• cognizer
• hypercognize
• miscognize
• precognize
• recognize (re-cognize)
• uncognized

Related terms

• recognize

Translations

to know or be aware of

• Bulgarian: узнавам (bg) (uznavam), забелязвам (bg) (zabeljazvam)
• French: connaître (fr)

  Middle French: connoistre, cognoistre

• Swedish: känna till (sv)
• Turkish: sadınmak