Added 9 October 2026
recursion
/ɹɪˈkɜː(ɹ)ʒən/ noun
Latin root: recursiō Wiktionary
noun Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about recursion at Wordnik → Where our words come from →
- The act of recurring.
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The act of defining an object (usually a function) in terms of that object itself.
n! = n × (n − 1)! (for n > 0) or 1 (for n = 0) defines the factorial function using recursion.
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The invocation of a procedure from within itself.
This function uses recursion to compute factorials.
Origin
Borrowed from Latin recursiō (“the act of running back or again, return”), from recurrō (“run back; return”), from re- (“back, again”) + currō (“run”).
From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)