Word.ws English Dictionary

underdescribed

underdescribed adjective: not described with sufficient precision.

Adjective

underdescribed (comparative more underdescribed, superlative most underdescribed)

  1. Not described with sufficient precision.
    • LaPorte shows that some of these cases—like Putnam’s Twin Earth—are seriously underdescribed; others—like the jade/jadeite/nephrite example–are historically inaccurate.2008 October 22, R. W. Fischer, “Joseph LaPorte, Natural Kinds and Conceptual Change”, in Erkenntnis, volume 69, number 3, →DOI
  2. (formal, not comparable) Described further on in the same document.

Forms of underdescribed

comparativemore underdescribed
superlativemost underdescribed

Origin of underdescribed

From under- + described.

Questions about underdescribed

What does underdescribed mean?
Underdescribed means not described with sufficient precision.
What part of speech is underdescribed?
Underdescribed is an adjective.

Words near underdescribed in the dictionary

  1. underdelivers
  2. underdelivery
  3. underdense
  4. underdensities
  5. underdensity
  6. underdescribed
  7. underdesigned
  8. underdetect
  9. underdetected
  10. underdetecting
  11. underdetection

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: underdescribed (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-underdescribed.wav.

Cite this entry: “underdescribed.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/underdescribed. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.