Adjective

(en adjective)

Capable of being perceived very clearly.

* {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author= Fenella Saunders

, title= Tiny Lenses See the Big Picture, magazine=(American Scientist) , passage=The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail.}}

Different from one another (with the preferable adposition being "from").

* {{quote-book, year=1928, author=Lawrence R. Bourne, title=Well Tackled!

, chapter=13 citation , passage=“Yes, there are two distinct sets of footprints, both wearing rubber shoes—one I think ordinary plimsolls, the other goloshes,” replied the sergeant.}}

Noticeably different from others; distinctive.

Separate in place; not conjunct or united; with from .

* Clarendon

The intention was that the two armies which marched out together should afterward be distinct .

(obsolete) Distinguished; having the difference marked; separated by a visible sign; marked out; specified.

* Milton

Wherever thus created — for no place / Is yet distinct by name.

(obsolete) Marked; variegated.

* Spenser

The which [place] was dight / With divers flowers distinct with rare delight.

Adjective

(en adjective)

Necessary.

Very important; of high importance.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-05-17

, author=George Monbiot, authorlink=George Monbiot , title=Money just makes the rich suffer , volume=188, issue=23, page=19 , magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) citation , passage=In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. The welfare state is dismantled. Essential public services are cut so that the rich may pay less tax. […]}}

Being in the basic form; showing its essence.

Don’t mind him being grumpy. That’s the essential Fred.

Really existing; existent.

* Webster (1623)

Is it true, that thou art but a name, / And no essential thing?

Such that each complementary region is irreducible, the boundary of each complementary region is incompressible by disks and monogons in the complementary region, and no leaf is a sphere or a torus bounding a solid torus in the manifold.

(medicine) Idiopathic.