black box
English
[edit]
Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]- Since c. 1945 in both main senses (that is, event recorders and objects with unknown innards), which are historically related to each other; for details, see black box § History and flight recorder § Terminology.
- (a type of theater): Such theaters are often painted black.
Pronunciation
[edit]- IPA(key): /ˈblæk.bɒx/
Audio (Southern England): (file)
Noun
[edit]black box (plural black boxes)
- (informal, aviation) A flight recorder; the brightly colored cockpit voice recorders and flight data recorders in an aircraft designed to aid in determining the cause of an accident.
- Synonyms: event recorder, opaque box, trip recorder
- Hypernym: box
- scrutinizing all utterances recorded by the black box
- (transport, by extension) Any similar device on motor vehicles, such as rail event recorders and ship trip recorders.
- Hyponyms: tachograph, tacho
- the pilothouse's analogue of an airliner's black box
- A theoretical construct or device with known input and output characteristics but unknown method of operation.
- The authentication method and its details can be treated as a black box for purposes of this security architecture overview.
- 2026 September 2, Robert Booth, “Uber drivers launch European class action over ‘soulless’ and ‘scary’ AI algorithm”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian[1], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2 September 2026:
- The case centres on an opaque “black box” algorithm fed on information about drivers, which sets a personalised rate for each ride. Drivers fear it pushes down fares to the minimum they are willing to accept.
- A device used in phreaking that prevents the calling party from being billed for the call placed.
- (drama, attributive) A type of theater characterized by a lack of decoration or complex mechanisms.
- Synonym of football (“the leather briefcase containing classified nuclear war plans which is always near the US President”)
Hyponyms
[edit](trip recorder):
Coordinate terms
[edit](trip recorder):
(colored boxes, especially electronic ones):
Related terms
[edit]- (event recorder): black box insurance
- (theoretical construct or device): black-box testing, black body
- (mysterious production of output): black magic
- (blackened rectangle): black box warning
Translations
[edit]recorders in an aircraft
|
theoretical construct or device
|
Verb
[edit]black box (third-person singular simple present black boxes, present participle black boxing, simple past and past participle black boxed)
- (web development, transitive) To focus on the inputs and outputs without worrying about the internal complexity.
Categories:
- English 2-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- English terms with audio pronunciation
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- English multiword terms
- English informal terms
- en:Aviation
- English terms with usage examples
- en:Transport
- English terms with quotations
- en:Drama
- English verbs
- en:Programming
- en:Web design
- English transitive verbs
- en:Nuclear warfare