polymorphism
n. C / Un. the ability of a single thing to exist in many different forms. In biology, it means a species has several different physical types. In math or coding, it means a function or object can work in many different ways.
n. the occurrence of different forms, stages, or types of an organism, object, or concept. In biology, it refers to the presence of two or more genetically determined forms in the same population; in mathematics and computer science, it refers to the ability of a single interface to represent different underlying data types.
The butterfly species shows polymorphism with two different wing patterns.
In object-oriented programming, polymorphism allows a single method to be used across multiple classes with different implementations.
The genetic polymorphism observed in the peppered moth population during the industrial revolution provided a clear example of natural selection acting on heritable variation.
From poly- + -morphism.