Word.ws English Dictionary

preformationism

preformationism noun: the theory that all organisms start their existence already in a predetermined form upon conception and this form does not change in the course of their lifetime (as opposed to epigenesis).

Noun

preformationism (uncountable)

  1. the theory that all organisms start their existence already in a predetermined form upon conception and this form does not change in the course of their lifetime (as opposed to epigenesis)

Origin of preformationism

From preformation + -ism.

Questions about preformationism

What does preformationism mean?
Preformationism means the theory that all organisms start their existence already in a predetermined form upon conception and this form does not change in the course of their lifetime (as opposed to epigenesis).
What part of speech is preformationism?
Preformationism is a noun.

Words near preformationism in the dictionary

  1. preformant
  2. preformants
  3. preformat
  4. preformation
  5. preformationary
  6. preformationism
  7. preformationist
  8. preformationists
  9. preformations
  10. preformative
  11. preformatives

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: preformationism (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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