different between quantity vs addibility

English

Etymology

From Middle English quantite, from Old French quantité, from Latin quantit?s (“quantity”), from quantus (“how much”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?kw?n.t?.ti/
• (General American) enPR: kw?n?(t)?t?, IPA^(key): /?kw?n(t)?ti/, [?k?w?n(?)??i], [?k?w?n(t?)?t?i]
  • Note: This is with a relaxed middle T, and is only used in colloquial contexts by many speakers.
• (Canada) IPA^(key): /?kw?nd?di/, /?kw?n???i/
• (obsolete) IPA^(key): /?kwæn.t?.ti/

Noun

quantity (countable and uncountable, plural quantities)

1. A fundamental, generic term used when referring to the measurement (count, amount) of a scalar, vector, number of items or to some other way of denominating the value of a collection or group of items.

2. An indefinite amount of something.

   Some soap making oils are best as base oils, used in a larger quantity in the soap, while other oils are best added in a small quantity.

3. A specific measured amount.

4. A considerable measure or amount.

5. (metrology) Property of a phenomenon, body, or substance, where the property has a magnitude that can be expressed as number and a reference.
6. (mathematics) Indicates that the entire preceding expression is henceforth considered a single object.
   • 2006, Jerome E. Kaufmann and Karen Schwitters, Elementary and Intermediate Algebra: A Combined Approach, p 89

     For problems 58-67, translate each word phrase into an algebraic expression. […] 65. x plus 9, the quantity squared

   • 2005, R. Mark Sirkin, Statistics For The Social Sciences, p137

     The second, ${\displaystyle (\sum x)^{2}}$, read "summation of x, quantity squared," tells us to first add up all the xs to get ${\displaystyle \sum x}$ and then square ${\displaystyle \sum x}$ to get ${\displaystyle (\sum x)^{2}}$.

   • 1985, Serge Lang, Math!: Encounters with High School Students, p54

     ANN. ${\displaystyle ra}$ quantity cubed.

     SERGE LANG. That's right, ${\displaystyle (ra)^{3}}$.

Usage notes

• In mathematics, used to unambiguously orate mathematical equations; it is extremely rare in print, since there is no need for it there.

Synonyms

• Qty

Derived terms

• unknown quantity

Related terms

Translations

See also

• measure
• unit

Further reading

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

English

Etymology

addible +? -ity

Noun

addibility (uncountable)

1. Capability of addition; capability of being added to or added together.

   Synonyms: increasability, increasableness

   Antonym: inaddibility

   • 1690, John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, London: Thomas Basset, Book 2, Chapter 28 “Of Clear and Obscure, Distinct and Confused Ideas,” p. 168,^[1]

     […] we have no more a clear Idea of infinite Parts in Matter, then we have a clear Idea of an infinite Number, by being able still to add new Numbers to any assigned Number we have: endless Divisibility giving us no more a clear and distinct Idea of actually infinite Parts, than endless Addibility (if I may so speak) gives us a clear and distinct Idea of an actually infinite Number:

   • 1731, Edmund Law, Notes in his translation of An Essay on the Origin of Evil by William King, Cambridge: W. Thurlbourn & J. Woodyer, Chapter 1, Section 3, p. 58,^[2]

     The generally receiv’d Notion of Eternity, as consisting in a continual addibility of successive Duration, is, I think, the very same thing as an infinite Series, and consequently liable to the same objections:

   • Late 18th–early 19th century, Jeremy Bentham, manuscript cited in Élie Halévy, La Formation du radicalisme philosophique, Paris: Félix Alcan, Volume 3, 1904, note 55, p. 481,^[3]

     ’Tis vain to talk of adding quantities which after the addition will continue distinct as they were before, one man’s happiness will never be another man’s happiness: a gain to one man is no gain to another: you might as well pretend to add 20 apples to 20 pears, after which you had done that could not be 40 of any one thing but 20 of each just as there was before. This addibility of happiness of different subjects, however when considered rigorously it may appear fictitious, is a postulation without the allowance of which all political reasoning is at a stand:

   • 1886, William Leonard Courtney, Constructive Ethics, London: Chapman & Hall, Part 2, Book 3, Chapter 2, p. 206,^[4]

     A magnified and non-natural man does not satisfy our idea of God: we cannot take the qualities of a limited individual, and supposing the qualities enormously exaggerated, flatter ourselves with the notion that we have imagined the Deity. In just the same way we cannot take an infinite addibility of moments to be the equivalent of eternity.