population

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   the act of populating - causing to live in a place

   You deplored the population of colonies with convicted criminals.

2. 2
   noun

   (statistics) the entire aggregation of items from which samples can be drawn

   it is an estimate of the mean of the population

3. 3
   noun

   a group of organisms of the same species inhabiting a given area

   they hired hunters to keep down the deer population

4. 4
   noun

   the people who inhabit a territory or state

   the population seemed to be well fed and clothed

5. 5
   noun

   the number of inhabitants (either the total number or the number of a particular race or class) in a given place (country or city etc.)

   people come and go, but the population of this town has remained approximately constant for the past decade

6. 6
   noun

   The people living within a political or geographical boundary.

   The population of New Jersey will not stand for this!

7. 7
   noun

   The people with a given characteristic.

   India has the third-largest population of English-speakers in the world.

8. 8
   noun

   A count of the number of residents within a political or geographical boundary such as a town, a nation or the world.

   The town’s population is only 243.

Etymology

Borrowed from Late Latin populatio (“a people, multitude”), as if a noun of action from Classical Latin populus, equivalent to populate + -ion. Doublet of poblacion.