non-humanadj.n.
/nɒnˈhjuːmən/, U.S. /nɑnˈ(h)jum(ə)n/ A. adj.
1. That is not of the human race; not belonging to or characteristic of a human being.
ΘΚΠ
the world > people > [adjective] > relating to mankind > not
inhuman1568
subhuman1793
non-human1839
unhuman1861
dishuman1920
1839 J. Rogers Antipopopriestian vi. §2. 210 He is quite different from the whole human family, or is nonhuman.
1852 M. Arnold Empedocles on Etna, & Other Poems i. ii Though the non-human powers Of Nature harm us not.
1865 J. Lubbock Prehist. Times iv. 114 The non-human bones met with in their researches.
1878 Mind 3 105 But it is chiefly to the discovery of the organic connection between man and the non-human animals that the subject owes a scientific status.
1926 Ess. in Pop. Sci. vii. 68 Human as well as non-human life.
1964 Language 40 215 The proposal that there is a qualitative difference between human and nonhuman cognitive faculties.
1990 T. Hoyle Last Gasp 235 He stepped backwards as the nonhuman thing shambled towards him.
2. Not natural or appropriate to a human being.
ΘΚΠ
the world > people > [adjective] > not natural or appropriate to human being
subhuman1830
animal1852
non-human1853
1853 C. Kingsley Hypatia II. vi. 168 Celibacy and asceticism, utterly non-human as they were.
1891 T. Hardy Tess of the D'Urbervilles I. xx. 262 At these non-human hours they could get quite close to the waterfowl.
1979 F. Jameson Fables of Aggression vi. 119 The embodiment of a strange and nonhuman indifference.
1992 D. Levertov Evening Train 20 Would wilderness..have swept him wholly into its torrents of non-human grandeur?
B. n.
1. A non-human creature or organism, such as an animal, an alien, or a supernatural being.
ΚΠ
1906 Internat. Jrnl. Ethics 16 493 To humans and non-humans alike, sport, as Ruthven expressed it, is ‘the gift of God’.
1932 H. H. Price Perception iv. 72 If we were omnisentient beings,..able to sense all at once the sense-data which can ever be sensed by every sentient human or non-human.
1979 B. A. Freitas Illegal Aliens in O. Davis Omni Bk. Space (?1983) 310 The equivalent offense for sentient nonhumans could be called anthroposexus—unlawful sexual activity with human beings.
2001 Chapel Hill (N. Carolina) Her. (Nexis) 30 Nov. 5 Chickens won't be the only nonhumans in the parade. There'll be as many as 40 dogs in three groups.
2. With the: that which is non-human; that which is not natural or appropriate to a human being.
ΚΠ
1928 Philos. Rev. 37 396 The description of religion as fundamentally ethical and rational, a timely emphasis in view of the current interest in the non-human and mystical.
1982 M. Z. Bradley Mists of Avalon iv. iii. 679 Morgaine, looking into his dazzled face, saw something in his eyes, something that had never been there before—the touch of the nonhuman.
1992 M. Turner Trespasses 22 The non-human, miscalled evil, Broods around mountains That rise on every hand.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.n.1839