Create object instance without invoking constructor?

Question

In C#, is there a way to instantiate an instance of a class without invoking its constructor?

Assume the class is public and is defined in a 3rd par

Answer 1

Contrary to what many believe, a constructor hasn't much to do with the instantiation of an object at all (pretty misleading term). A constructor is a special method that can be called after the instantiation of an object to allow that object to properly initialize itself. In C++ object instantiation allocates memory for the object, in .NET and Java it is both allocated and pre-initialized to default values depending on the type of fields (0, null, false etc.). Then the run-time calls the constructor. The new operator encapsulates these two separate actions into what appears to be a single operation. Deserialization could never had worked in .NET if it wasn't possible to create an instance without using a constructor. That said, the so called ConstructorInfo type acts as both a new operator and constructor when calling its Invoke(...) method.