Synonyms:
spot, recognize, recognise, distinguish, discern, pick_out, make_out, tell_apart
Meaning: detect with the senses; "The fleeing convicts were picked out of the darkness by the watchful prison guards"; "I can't make out the faces in this photograph"
Usage examples
Cavendish could discern the fortress, then deserted and already falling into ruins.
The human mind continues to discern but one point upon the whole intellectual horizon, and that point is in continual motion.
Show them not freedom escaping from their grasp, whilst they are looking another way: they are blind--or rather, they can discern but one sole object to be desired in the universe.
The next morning, as soon as daylight appeared, and he could discern the nature of his situation, the well being broken down in several places, he saw a hole, by which he crept out with ease.
I went towards a dark spot, that, by what I could discern, seemed to be land, and proved to be a flat on the coast, which, when day appeared, I found to be a desert island, lying about twenty miles from Bussorah.
I tied myself strongly to it with my turban, in hopes that the roc next morning would carry me with her out of this desert island. After having passed the night in this condition, the bird flew away as soon as it was daylight, and carried me so high, that I could not discern the earth; she afterward descended with so much rapidity that I lost my senses.