specific

Etymology

From Old French specifique, from Late Latin specificus (“specific, particular”), from Latin speciēs (“kind”) + faciō (“make”).

adj

1. explicit or definite.
2. (bioscience, taxonomy) pertaining to a species, as a taxon or taxa at the rank of species.
   Science and literature, then, are the two achievements of Homo sapiens that most convincingly justify the specific name. 2008, Richard Dawkins, The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing, Oxford, published 2009, page 3
3. special, distinctive or unique.
4. intended for, or applying to, a particular thing.
5. Serving to identify a particular thing (often a disease or condition), with little risk of mistaking something else for it.
   a highly specific test, specific and nonspecific symptoms
6. being a remedy for a particular disease on a deeper level, rather than just masking the symptoms
   Quinine is a specific medicine in cases of malaria.
   Any improvement in secondary sciatica is probably due to the analgesic action of the sodium salicylate, but in primary sciatica, in all likelihood “rheumatic,” the effect of the sodium salicylate appears to be specific rather than symptomatic.
   The study of specific medicines is too much disregarded now. No doubt, the hunting after specifics is a mark of ignorance and weakness in medicine, yet the neglect of them is proof also of immaturity ; for, in fact, all medicines will be found specific in the perfection of science. 1830-05-23, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Specific Medicines”, in Specimens of the Table Talk of the Late Samuel Taylor Coleridge, volume I, London: J. Murray, page 147
7. (immunology) limited to a particular antibody or antigen.
8. (physics) of a value divided by mass (e.g. specific orbital energy)
9. (physics) similarly referring to a value divided by any measure which acts to standardize it (e.g. thrust specific fuel consumption, referring to fuel consumption divided by thrust)
10. (physics) a measure compared with a standard reference value by division, to produce a ratio without unit or dimension (e.g. specific refractive index is a pure number, and is relative to that of air)

noun

1. A distinguishing attribute or quality.
2. A remedy for a specific disease or condition.
   I had no unreasonable fear of bats, […] yet I knew them too for carriers of the dread “Hydrophobia,” for which there was no specific. 1968, Charles Portis, True Grit
3. Specification
4. (in the plural) The details; particulars.