per se
See also: perse, Perse, and persé
English
Etymology
Borrowed from Latin per sē (“by itself”), from per (“by, through”) and sē (“itself, himself, herself, themselves”).
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): /pəˈseɪ/
Audio (Southern England) (file) - (General American) IPA(key): /pɚˈseɪ/, /pɚˈsiː/
- Rhymes: -eɪ, (General American) -iː
Adverb
per se (not comparable)
- In and of itself; by itself; without determination by or involvement of extraneous factors; as such
- Synonyms: see Thesaurus:intrinsically
- 2007, Tima Smith, Per Se: An Anthology of Fiction, page 176:
- It's not that I've got anything against kids per se, but I believe in discipline.
- Some people say that a hangover is caused by impurities in the drink, not by the alcohol per se.
- (philosophy) Being a thing that posits itself and is a principle of its own determination.
- 1988, J. van Rijen, Aspects of Aristotle’s Logic of Modalities, page 137:
- Everything not applying per se in one of these two senses is called an accident.
- 2015, Gaven Kerr, Aquinas's Way to God: The Proof in De Ente et Essentia:
- Thus, unless there exists some being that exists per se, the origination of esse in a chain of composites itself remains unexplained and quite mysterious. And the existence of a being that exists per se is affirmed through a denial of an infinite regress of essence-esse composites causing other such composites.
-
- (law) Not leaving discretion to the judge to take into account additional factors that could rebut the judgment, deriving the qualification from the statute.
- The law makes drunk driving illegal per se
- 1981, Hugh Laurence Ross, Deterrence of the Drinking Driver: An International Survey, Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Transportation, page 80:
- Until recently Denmark hesitated to adopt a formal per se law, preferring to give more discretion to its judges, but the general practice was to take blood tests and to convict those accused under the classical law if the blood alcohol concentration was greater than 100 mg./100 ml.
- 1986, Administrative Per Se: A Summary of State Forms and Procedures:
- In an effort to assist states that may have recently adopted or expect to adopt administrative per se, NHTSA has collected sample copies of forms and a brief description of the administrative procedures from selected states with in-place programs.
- 2006, Sheldon Kimmel, How and why the Per Se Rule Against Price-fixing Went Wrong, page 1:
- CBS (441 U.S. 1 [1979]) explains, the per se rule against price-fixing isn't to be taken literally.
Usage notes
- Because this is originally a Latin phrase, it is sometimes italicized when it is written.
Synonyms
- ipso facto, in and of itself, as such (certain senses)
Translations
by itself
|
as such; as one would expect from the name
|
Adjective
per se (not comparable)
- (philosophy) Positing itself and being a principle of its own determination.
- 1988, J. van Rijen, Aspects of Aristotle’s Logic of Modalities, page 137:
- Before stating at 74b5ff. that the connection between the subject and predicate of the premisses of scientific inferences must not be accidental but per se, he introduces the technical terms 'about all' ( 'kata pantos' ) and 'per se' (' kath' hauto ') in order to clarify the meaning of this proviso.
- 2014, Barrie Fleet, Simplicius: On Aristotle Physics 2, page 97:
- The per se cause of the house is the building skill and the craftsman who exercises it, while the per accidens cause is the fair-skinned or the artistic man. Alexander says: 'Aristotle says that just as anything that exists is one thing per se and another per accidens (by “being what it is per se” he means the substance, and by "what is per accidens" he means the attributes of the substance), so a cause is one thing per se and another per accidens.
- 2015, Gaven Kerr, Aquinas's Way to God: The Proof in De Ente et Essentia:
- They hold to the impossibility of an actual per se infinity, because in a per se series the effects have a dependence on their causes, in which case if the series were infinite, the ultimate effect would be dependent on an infinite chain of causes; and since an infinity cannot be traversed, the being of such an effect would never be explained.
-
Anagrams
- Esper, Peers, Prees, Reeps, Spree, esper, peers, pères, speer, spere, spree
Dutch
Alternative forms
- (obsolete since spelling reform of 1995) persé
Etymology
From Latin per sē (“by itself”), from per (“by, through”) and sē (“itself, himself, herself, themselves”).
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /pɛrˈseː/
Audio (file)
Adverb
per se
- necessarily, absolutely, without fail
- on purpose
- (rare) per se
Usage notes
The ‘necessity’ meaning is the usual one; the original Latin meaning as in English is rarely used and can be misunderstood.
Anagrams
- prees
- speer
Polish
Etymology
Unadapted borrowing from Latin per sē.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈpɛr ˈsɛ/
Preposition
per se
- (literary) per se (by itself)
Further reading
- per se in Wielki słownik języka polskiego, Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
- per se in Polish dictionaries at PWN
Portuguese
Adverb
per se (not comparable)
- per se (without considering extraneous factors)
Spanish
Adverb
per se
- per se
Further reading
- “per se”, in Diccionario de la lengua española, Vigésima tercera edición, Real Academia Española, 2014