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natural

natural

135 3.0
Having a strong ability for something and needing little practice
  • adjective
  • /ˈnæʧərəl/
: innato
  • She's a natural.
  • a natural ability
  • a natural talent
  • a natural gift

I had a lot of natural, just fluid talent.

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Examples

  • And but I, I'm a natural born teacher.

  • Many of the members are natural leaders and well-respected by the rest of the school.

    Academic text (2013)
  • And I have a natural facility to speak.

  • The man is a natural.

  • You would be a natural.

  • I had a lot of natural, just fluid talent.

  • You guys are both athletes, natural born athletes.

  • It just takes lots of hard work and loads of natural talent.

  • You're a natural, kid.

  • She is a natural when it comes to playing the piano; her skills seem effortless.

Synonyms

innate
vsnatural
54 5.2

A quality present from birth that is not learned

focuses on talents that seem inherited and instinctive
connatural
vsnatural
  • Formal
1 9.9

Present from birth and natural to a person or animal

is the common modern word for inherited or instinctive talent

Antonyms

acquired
  • Specialized
23 4.1

Not present at birth but learned or developed later

learned
  • Specialized
20 4.4

Gained by experience or training rather than being natural

Compounds

natural gas
  • Specialized
197 2.7

A gas from underground that burns to make heat and electricity

natural resources
  • Specialized
64 2.1

Things from nature that people use for energy, food, or money

natural selection
  • Specialized
44 3.9

A process in which plants and animals better suited to their home survive and have more young

natural law
  • Formal
32 6.5

A set of moral rules that come from human nature and apply to everyone

A change that happens in the world without human help

natural habitat
  • Specialized
20 3.2

The place where a plant or animal normally lives and grows

20 5.6

The regular way the physical world follows rules not made by people

17 4.1

The condition of land, water, or wildlife left unchanged by people

natural history
  • Specialized
16 3.8

The study of plants and animals by watching them

An ability someone is born with to do something well

14 2.2

Light that comes from the sun, not from lamps

An event in nature not caused by people

A talent someone is born with that they do not learn

A branch of science that studies the physical world, like physics and biology

Giving birth with little medical help and no drugs to reduce pain or help the birth

natural language
  • Specialized
5 3.5

A system people use to speak and write to each other rather than computer code

natural immunity
  • Specialized
5 3.6

The body's protection from disease that a person has naturally without a vaccine or previous infection

natural fiber
  • Specialized
4 3.2

A material from plants or animals that people use to make cloth

natural resource
  • Specialized
4 3.0

A material found in nature that people use, like water or oil

A place where water from underground comes out

natural number
  • Specialized
2 3.4

A number used for counting that starts at one and goes up

2 8.4

The study of the physical world and its laws, like early physics

1 4.8

A way to avoid pregnancy by not having sex during a woman's fertile days, without using medicine or devices

A thing that exists without people making or changing it

The form of something made by nature, not changed by people

A person who studies plants, animals, and where they live

1 5.3

The way computers understand and work with human language

natural rubber
  • Specialized
1 2.9

An elastic material made from the sticky sap of certain trees used for many products

1 9.5

Study that uses reason and nature to learn about God, not holy books

natural logarithm
  • Specialized
1 5.0

A logarithm that uses the number e, about 2.718, as its base

natural endowment
  • Specialized
1 4.9

The natural resources a country has, like land or oil

1 9.9

A moral quality people can have by nature, not given by God, like justice

The original color of a person's hair before it is dyed

An ability a person has from birth

natural glass
  • Specialized
1 6.1

A shiny rock that forms when lava cools very fast

A low hollow in the ground that often holds water

natural resin
  • Specialized
1 4.4

A sticky material some plants make, like amber, that people use in varnish and glue

A person who wakes up early without an alarm

1 4.2

A normal relaxed way of speaking that sounds honest

An area of land surrounded by natural features like hills or trees

1 6.0

A computer program that understands and produces written or spoken language

A person who easily convinces other people to agree or act

natural demulcent
  • Specialized
8.1

A substance from nature that soothes irritated skin or throat

5.1

A player who moves the ball past opponents with skill and ease

9.9

A salt from Bad Ems mineral waters that treats throat and nose infections

A program that reads, understands, or writes human language text

An important English society that supports scientists and promotes science

How Talented

gifted
157 3.5
talented
525 1.0
natural
135 3.0
skilled
192 3.5
competent
134 3.6

Surface Forms

natural positive
naturally positive

Morphology

natural = nature (semi-transparent) = nature + al

The sense 'innately gifted' comes from the idea of something belonging to a person's nature, but it is a semantic extension.

Etymology

Natural comes from Latin natura 'birth' and is like the word native, so it can describe a talent someone seems to have from birth. That's why we call someone a natural when they are instinctively good at something.