1. differential - Noun
2. differential - Adjective
Relating to or indicating a difference; creating a difference; discriminating; special; as, differential characteristics; differential duties; a differential rate.
Of or pertaining to a differential, or to differentials.
Relating to differences of motion or leverage; producing effects by such differences; said of mechanism.
An increment, usually an indefinitely small one, which is given to a variable quantity.
A small difference in rates which competing railroad lines, in establishing a common tariff, allow one of their number to make, in order to get a fair share of the business. The lower rate is called a differential rate. Differentials are also sometimes granted to cities.
One of two coils of conducting wire so related to one another or to a magnet or armature common to both, that one coil produces polar action contrary to that of the other.
A form of conductor used for dividing and distributing the current to a series of electric lamps so as to maintain equal action in all.
Source: Webster's dictionaryIf God has made the world a perfect mechanism, He has at least conceded so much to our imperfect intellect that in order to predict little parts of it, we need not solve innumerable differential equations, but can use dice with fair success. Max Born
Science is a differential equation. Religion is a boundary condition. Alan Turing
I never failed in mathematics. Before I was fifteen I had mastered differential and integral calculus. Albert Einstein
But how is one to make a scientist understand that there is something unalterably deranged about differential calculus, quantum theory, or the obscene and so inanely liturgical ordeals of the precession of the equinoxes. Antonin Artaud
...the differential element of non-Euclidean spaces is Euclidean. This fact, however, is analogous to the relations between a straight line and a curve, and cannot lead to an epistemological priority of Euclidean geometry, in contrast to the views of certain authors. Hans Reichenbach
Natural selection is all about the differential success of rival DNA in getting itself transmitted vertically in the species archives. Richard Dawkins