How to Use automaton in a Sentence

automaton

noun
Definition of automatonnext
  • The automatons even shake and stir the drink before pouring into the glass, which is then pushed through a slot at the end of the bar.
    — Andrew Craft, Fox News, 7 July 2017
  • And — reading on — the flutes made of bone, the zoos, the purple dye made from snails, the roulette, the automatons of digesting and defecating ducks, and Minecraft.
    — Virginia Heffernan, New York Times, 22 Nov. 2016
  • And stocks always glitch—to the delight of those bond-buying automatons.
    — Andy Kessler, WSJ, 13 Jan. 2019
  • In a world of cookie-cutter pop-music stars and automatons, Sinéad O’Connor was a one-off.
    — George Varga, San Diego Union-Tribune, 26 July 2023
  • The Flute Player was a sort of pre-robot called an automaton.
    — Kat Eschner, Smithsonian, 24 Feb. 2017
  • At the time, the idea of an automaton being used to commit crime was a novelty.
    — Philip Bump, Washington Post, 12 June 2017
  • This is not to say that the men Trump pardoned in November were victims or automatons.
    — Gil Barndollar, Twin Cities, 12 Dec. 2019
  • That is not to say that periodization wants to produce teams of automatons.
    — Rory Smith, New York Times, 26 Apr. 2017
  • To show that young North Koreans are not brainwashed automatons and are not just victims.
    — Anna Fifield, Washington Post, 15 Dec. 2017
  • This two-armed automaton did not recognize any of this stuff, but that did not matter.
    — Cade Metz, New York Times, 10 Sep. 2017
  • Civilian kitchens aren’t equipped with machines that have automaton-like limbs to bring together a dough.
    — New York Times, 10 Oct. 2019
  • The automaton dances in dainty circles to the rhythm of a drip algorithm as hot water trickles into the filter.
    — NBC News, 20 May 2020
  • Look out, too, for a reproduction of an 18th-century automaton in the form of a life-size turbaned figure sitting at a chess board.
    — Washington Post, 10 Jan. 2020
  • The equities side of Wall Street, including me, always writes off bond investors as automatons.
    — Andy Kessler, WSJ, 13 Jan. 2019
  • Our attachment to these automatons is all the more remarkable because they weren’t designed to forge human connections; they were built to do a job.
    — Daniel Oberhaus, Wired, 30 Apr. 2020
  • Most people, though, thought that Maelzel’s chess player was a fake—not a thinking machine at all, but a simple automaton controlled by a human.
    — Kat Eschner, Smithsonian, 20 July 2017
  • Take, for example, one of the most extraordinary of all Greek myths, the story of the giant bronze automaton Talos.
    — Peter Thonemann, WSJ, 7 Dec. 2018
  • Blitz, a Parisian automaton from 1850 and a family heirloom.
    — E. Alex Jung, Vulture, 7 July 2021
  • Chomsky defined levels of a hierarchy and the automatons that can handle the grammars for each level.
    — Caroline Delbert, Popular Mechanics, 9 Jan. 2020
  • The most advanced engineering in the world was devoted to these automata in the 18th century.
    — National Geographic, 11 Dec. 2016
  • Little automatons toured the country—dolls controlled by clockwork.
    — Alexander Sammon, Harper's Magazine, 8 Apr. 2022
  • The 20-inch-tall model of our solar system follows a centuries-long tradition of exquisite automatons that inject awe into the daily lives of a lucky few.
    — Camille Okhio, ELLE Decor, 3 July 2023
  • The game is set in a kind of computational universe called a cellular automaton.
    — The Physics Arxiv Blog, Discover Magazine, 13 Dec. 2023
  • But even if a treacherous automaton had wormed its way into that position, a human would have to program, monitor and maintain the thing.
    — Greg Jefferson, ExpressNews.com, 14 Feb. 2020
  • But such techniques never overwhelm the sheer presence of the actors, whose vitality seems amplified by the imposing automatons on either side of the stage.
    — New York Times, 12 Sep. 2019
  • The automatons are also in charge of moving supplies around, and those that have to enter areas with humans are outfitted with sensors that keep them from causing collisions.
    — Jonathan M. Gitlin, Ars Technica, 21 Nov. 2023
  • In recent years, he’s lightened up a bit, stopped speaking with that automaton confidence, and even hinted at retirement.
    — Jason Gay, WSJ, 24 Sep. 2018
  • The purpose of bureaucracy is to turn people into automatons.
    — Robert Zubrin, National Review, 18 Sep. 2019
  • Lucero, if nothing else, is a robotic outrage automaton, like many of his contemporaries.
    — Prem Thakker, The New Republic, 27 June 2023
  • Like The Turk, Silicon Valley is an impressive automaton hiding a con job.
    — Shuja Haider, The New Republic, 3 May 2018

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'automaton.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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