precision

precision, preciseness both denote the quality or character of what is precise. Precision denotes a quality that is sought for or is attained usually as a highly desirable thing. When used in reference to language it implies expression with such exactitude that neither more nor less than what applies to the thing under consideration is said

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defining words with utmost care, they fashioned their statements of doctrine with meticulous precision— Dinsmore

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a vague term of abuse for any style that is ... so evidently bad or second-rate that we do not recognize the necessity for greater precision in the phrases we apply to it— T. S. Eliot

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When used in reference to the arts and sciences, the term usually implies such clearness of definition or such sharpness in distinction or in distinguishing that there is no confusion about outlines, boundaries, dividing lines, or movements

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however we may disguise it by veiling words we do not and cannot carry out the distinction between legislative and executive action with mathematical precision— Justice Holmes

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acting, singing, and dancing seem to me the best methods of teaching aesthetic precision— Russeliy

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Precision is also used in reference to an instrument, a machine, or a part of a machine that must be made with such exactness of measurements that an infinitesimal fraction of an inch would debar it from fulfilling its function

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precision instruments

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tiny, Swiss-made replicas, they were precision machined and finely detailed, all scaled to perfection— Terry Southern

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Preciseness is rarely interchangeable with precision, since it carries so strong an implication of severity or of strictness, or sometimes of overnicety in the observance of religious laws, the code of one's profession, or the proprieties as dictated by one's class or social equals that it is depreciative as often as it is laudatory

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savoring of Puritanism and overstrict preciseness— Prynne

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the letter . . . had the preciseness of an imperial mandate— Meredith

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there was a certain amount of preciseness about the young man, and his approach to Texas was in the best striped-trousers tradition— T. D. Clark

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