different between necessity vs unnecessariness

English

Etymology

From Middle English necessite, from Old French necessite, from Latin necessit?s (“unavoidableness, compulsion, exigency, necessity”), from necesse (“unavoidable, inevitable”); see necessary.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /n??s?s?ti/

Noun

necessity (countable and uncountable, plural necessities)

2. The quality or state of being necessary, unavoidable, or absolutely requisite.
3. The condition of being needy; desperate need; lack.
   • 1863, Richard Sibbes, The Successful Seeker, in The Complete Works of Richard Sibbes, D.D., Volume VI, James Nichol, page 125,

     For it is in vain for a man to think to seek God in his necessity and exigence, if he seek not God in his ordinances, and do not joy in them.

4. Something necessary; a requisite; something indispensable.
   • 20th century, Tenzin Gyatso (attributed)

     Love and compassion are necessities, not luxuries. Without them humanity cannot survive.

5. Something which makes an act or an event unavoidable; an irresistible force; overruling power.
   • 1804, Wordsworth, The Small Celandine

     I stopped, and said with inly muttered voice,

     'It doth not love the shower, nor seek the cold:

     This neither is its courage nor its choice,

     But its necessity in being old.

6. The negation of freedom in voluntary action; the subjection of all phenomena, whether material or spiritual, to inevitable causation; necessitarianism. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
7. (law) Greater utilitarian good; used in justification of a criminal act.

8. (law, in the plural) Indispensable requirements (of life).

Synonyms

• (state of being necessary): inevitability, certainty

Antonyms

• (state of being necessary): impossibility, contingency
• (something indispensable): luxury

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Further reading

• necessity in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• necessity in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Anagrams

• cysteines

English

Etymology

unnecessary +? -ness

Noun

unnecessariness (uncountable)

1. The state or characteristic of being unnecessary.
   • 1808, Works of Joseph Hall, D.D, Vol. 9, edited by Josiah Pratt, London, p. 9:

     The unavoidableness of which effects hath carried some of their Casuists into an opinion, of the unnecessariness of devotion in these holy businesses: so as one says . . . "Though it be convenient, that the Communicant should have actual devotion; yet, it is not necessary."

   • 1913, Arnold Bennett, The Human Machine, p. 73:

     A disciplined brain will at once show the unnecessariness of most ambitions, and will ensure that the remainder shall be conducted with reason.

   • 2007, Karen von Hahn, "Unnecessary Accessories of the Rich and Famous," Globe and Mail, 15 June (retrieved 30 Aug. 2009):

     In the sad case of Paris Hilton, whose sheer unnecessariness epitomizes her career, her unnecessary accessory of choice is an SUV.

Synonyms

• gratuitousness, needlessness

Antonyms

• necessariness
• necessity