extinction
part of speech
noun (extinction)
meaning for a pupil
1) When a kind of animal or plant dies out completely, so there are none left anywhere. tree →
2) Something being put out or ended, such as a fire or light. tree →
sense in the lessons
In science and nature lessons: dinosaurs, the dodo and the woolly mammoth suffered extinction. «Mass extinction» means many kinds dying out at once. «On the brink of extinction» or «facing extinction» means very close to dying out (endangered). Conservation protects species from extinction.
examples
- The dodo was hunted to extinction. tree →
- Many tigers are facing extinction. tree →
- A huge asteroid may have caused the extinction of the dinosaurs. tree →
- Zoos help save animals from extinction. tree →
- Pollution could push the frogs to extinction. tree →
- Extinction is forever — the animals never come back. tree →
- Scientists study fossils to learn about past extinctions. tree →
- I did not anticipate this immediate extinction of the species." tree →
note
Mostly uncountable; plural «extinctions» for separate events. Adjective: extinct (dead out). Not the same as «endangered» (still alive but at risk). An extinct volcano will not erupt again; a dormant one is only sleeping.
In the corpora
- Beavers were hunted to extinction in Britain about 400 years ago for their fur and are now being brought back to some rivers.
- The biggest mass extinction, about 252 million years ago, wiped out about 90% of sea species.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «extinction» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.