Other forms: experiments, experimented, experimenting
An experiment is a careful test done to find out if an idea is true. Run an experiment, a controlled experiment, experiment with.
What makes it an experiment rather than an observation is that something is deliberately changed while everything else is held still — the control is the whole design. A thought experiment is run in the head only. As a verb it means to try things out. Note experimental; and that the Latin root also gives experience and expert.
1nounexperimentA careful test done to find out if an idea is true.
“In today's experiment, we'll test whether plants grow faster with more light.”
2verbtryTo try things out.
“She loves to experiment with new recipes in the kitchen.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
experiment is a test.
Latin experimentum comes from experiri, to try — ex plus a root meaning to attempt. Experience, expert and peril come from the same trying.
Proto-Indo-European
*per-
Latin
experimentum — experience, attempt, experiment
Old French
esperiment
Middle English
experiment
English, today
experiment
Built from
From Middle English experiment, from Old French esperiment (French expérience), from Latin experimentum (“experience, attempt, experiment”), from experior (“to experience, to attempt”), itself from ex + perior, in turn from Proto-Indo-European per-.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA