autonomy

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   The right or condition of self-government; freedom to act or function independently.

   But while assiduously dismissing any though of its own autonomy and proclaiming its victims its judges, it outdoes, in its veiled autocracy, all the excesses of autonomous art.

2. 2
   noun

   The capacity of a system to make a decision about its actions without the involvement of another system or operator.

   ...[T]he fact that a scientific theory finds applications to a wide variety of different phenomena does not imply anything about the autonomy of this theory from deeper physical laws.

3. 3
   noun

   immunity from arbitrary exercise of authority: political independence

4. 4
   noun

   personal independence

5. 5
   noun

   A self-governing country or region.

6. 6
   noun

   The capacity to make an informed, uncoerced decision.

7. 7
   noun

   The status of a church whose highest-ranking bishop is appointed by the patriarch of the mother church, but which is self-governing in all other respects. Compare autocephaly.

Etymology

Borrowed from Ancient Greek αὐτονομῐ́ᾱ (autonomĭ́ā, “freedom to use its own laws, independence”), from αὐτόνομος (autónomos, “living under one's own laws, independent”) + -ῐ́ᾱ (-ĭ́ā, “-y, -ia”, nominal suffix). By surface analysis, auto- (“self”) + -nomy (“a system of rules or laws about a particular field”).