continuum - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

Borrowed from Latin continuum, neuter form of continuus, from contineō (“contain, enclose”).

continuum (plural continuums or continua)

  1. A continuous series or whole, no part of which is noticeably different from its adjacent parts, although the ends or extremes of it are very different from each other.
    Near-synonym: spectrum
    • 2014, Torkild Thellefsen, Bent Sorensen, Charles Sanders Peirce in His Own Words:
      So, the white line implies Blacklessness and the black background implies Whitelessness – that is, once the white line, a continuum, has emerged from blackness, also a continuum, and the two continua engage in an “inter-penetrative” (Buddhist term) process.
    • 2019, Li Huang, James Lambert, “Another Arrow for the Quiver: A New Methodology for Multilingual Researchers”, in Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, →DOI, page 11:
      In fact, the influence of signage in a certain area may exist anywhere on a continuum from profoundly effective to utterly trivial or completely insignificant, irrespective of the intent motivating the signs.
  2. A continuous extent.
    • 2012 March, Henry Petroski, “Opening Doors”, in American Scientist‎[1], volume 100, number 2, pages 112–3:
      A doorknob of whatever roundish shape is effectively a continuum of levers, with the axis of the latching mechanism—known as the spindle—being the fulcrum about which the turning takes place.
  3. (mathematics) The nondenumerable set of real numbers; more generally, any compact connected metric space.
  4. (music) A touch-sensitive strip, similar to an electronic standard musical keyboard, except that the note steps are 1⁄100 of a semitone, and so are not separately marked.

continuous series or whole

continuous extent

set of real numbers

From English continuum.

continuum

  1. (music) continuum (type of electronic instrument)

continuum m (plural continuums)

  1. continuum

continuum

  1. inflection of continuus:
    1. nominative/accusative/vocative neuter singular
    2. accusative masculine singular

Unadapted borrowing from Latin continuum. Doublet of contínuo.

continuum m (plural continuuns or continua)

  1. continuum (series where neighbouring elements are very similar, but distant elements are very different)

Borrowed from Latin continuum.

continuum n (plural continuumuri)

  1. continuum

continuum m (plural continuums or **continuum)

  1. alternative form of continuo

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