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Definition of hallucination noun from the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary

hallucination

noun
 
/həˌluːsɪˈneɪʃn/
 
/həˌluːsɪˈneɪʃn/
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  1. [countable, uncountable] the fact of seeming to see or hear somebody/something that is not really there, especially because of illness or drugs
    • to have hallucinations
    • High temperatures can cause hallucination.
    • She was admitted to hospital suffering from hallucinations.
    Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadjective
    • mild
    • vivid
    • auditory
    verb + hallucination
    • experience
    • have
    • suffer
    See full entry
  2. [countable] something that is seen or heard when it is not really there
    • Was the figure real or just a hallucination?
    Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadjective
    • mild
    • vivid
    • auditory
    verb + hallucination
    • experience
    • have
    • suffer
    See full entry
  3. [countable, uncountable] wrong information created by artificial intelligence
    • A three-legged person is an example of the kind of hallucinations AI can produce.
    • The likelihood of hallucination is one of the drawbacks of AI.
    Topics Computersc2
  4. Some speakers do not pronounce the ‘h’ at the beginning of hallucination and use ‘an’ instead of ‘a’ before it. This now sounds old-fashioned.
    Word Originearly 17th cent.: from Latin hallucinatio(n-), from the verb hallucinari, from Greek alussein ‘be uneasy or distraught’.
See hallucination in the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary
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