sift

present singular third person sifts · participle present sifting · participle past sifted · past sifted

1. transitiveTo sieve or strain (something).
2. transitiveTo separate or scatter (things) as if by sieving.
3. To examine (something) carefully.
   1. archaicdatedtransitiveTo scrutinize (someone or something) carefully so as to find the truth.

      It immediately occurred to him to sift her on the subject of Isabella and Theodore.

      1764, Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto, Strawberry Hill Press

      4 more examples

      As neere as I could ſift him on that argument, On ſome apparant danger ſeene in him, Aym‘d at your Highneſſe, no inueterate malice.

      1595 December 9 (first known performance), William Shakespeare, “The Life and Death of King Richard the Second”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene i], page 23, column 1

      But if we still carry on our sifting humour, and ask, What is the foundation of all conclusions from experience ? this implies a new question.

      1748, David Hume, Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral, London: Oxford University Press, published 1973, § 28

      “I fear that there is something more serious than accident here, Mr. Brently,” said the captain. “I wish that you would make a personal and very careful examination of Mr. Caldwell’s effects, to ascertain if there is any clew to a motive either for suicide or murder—sift the thing to the bottom.”

      1913, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Return of Tarzan, New York: Ballantine Books, published 1963, page 108

      Never, he said, in the course of his long experience, had he known a charge of murder rest on slighter evidence. Not only was it entirely circumstantial, but the greater part of it was practically unproved. Let them take the testimony they had heard and sift it impartially.

      1920, Agatha Christie, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, London: Pan Books, published 1954, page 162

   2. transitive[with through] To carefully go through a set of objects, or a collection of information, in order to find something.

      Sifting through the work of great orators like Philostratus and Quintilian they identify numerous examples of classical irony, metaphor, comparison, etc. which are missing in Paul.

      1996, Timothy B. Savage, Power Through Weakness: Paul's Understanding of the Christian Ministry in 2 Corinthians, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, page 70

      1 more example

      Britain’s police are especially zealous. Officers spend thousands of hours sifting through potentially offensive posts and arrest 30 people a day. Among those collared were a man who ranted about immigration on Facebook and a couple who criticised their daughter’s primary school.

      2025 May 15, “Europe’s free-speech problem”, in The Economist

4. datedtransitivecomputingTo move data records up in memory to make space to insert further records.

plural sifts

1. An act of sifting.

1. abbreviationinitialismcomputer graphicsInitialism of scale-invariant feature transform.
2. USabbreviationinitialismgovernmentInitialism of Selection Instrument Flight Training.