systematic

comparative more systematic · superlative most systematic · alternative obsolete systematick

1. Carried out according to a planned, ordered procedure.

   The existence of a systematic nomenclature for the unknown elements does not deny the right of 'discoverers' of new elements to suggest other names to the Commission after their discovery has been established beyond all doubt in the general scientific community.

   2025 December 7 (last accessed), G. P. Moss, “Recommendations for the Naming of Elements of Atomic Numbers Greater than 100”, in IUPAC, archived from the original on 08 Jul 2025

2. broadlyMethodical; regular and orderly.

   1 more example

   Particular note, in this period, should be made of the actions of Joseph Denman, commander of the Northern Division of the Squadron, who went on an absolutely ruthless and systematic campaign along the African coast, burning so-called "slaving factories" to the ground and openly daring anyone who objected to try and stop him.

   2018 December 1, Drachinifel, 9:26 from the start, in Anti-Slavery Patrols - The West Africa Squadron, archived from the original on 29 Nov 2024

   Antonyms: chaotic, haphazard

3. Treating an object as a system or coherent whole.

   the systematic study of religious beliefs

4. biologyOf or relating to taxonomic classification.
5. chemistryOf, relating to, or in accordance with generally recognized conventions for the naming of chemicals.
6. archaicliteraryOf, relating to, or being a system.

   And Paruta’s work also suggests that Venetians in the generation following the battle of Lepanto, although without altogether abandoning systematic views, were tending increasingly to look to history for their understanding of human affairs.

   1968, William J. Bouwsma, Venice and the Defense of Republican Liberty: Renaissance Values in the Age of Counter Reformation, page 219

   1 more example

   But the systematic judgment is altogether unprofitable. Its author has not really his eye upon the professed object of his criticism at all, but upon something else, which he wants to prove by means of that object. […] As it is, all that he tells us is that he is no genuine critic, but a man with a system, an advocate.

   1878 January, “A French Critic on Goethe”, in The Quarterly Review, volume 145, number 289, page 145

comparative more systematic · superlative most systematic · alternative obsolete systematick

1. colloquialsystematically

   And say, when them Gogs started out to put a thing through they did it systematic and thorough.

   2019, Sewell Ford, Torchy and Vee

   1 more example

   "So soon as they've settled all our guns and ships, and smashed our railways, and done all the things they are doing over there, they will begin catching us systematic, picking the best and storing us in cages and things."

   1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann