cardinality

American  

[kahr-dn-al-i-tee] / ˌkɑr dnˈæl ɪ ti /

noun

Mathematics.

plural

cardinalities

1. (of a set) the cardinal number indicating the number of elements in the set.

---

cardinality British  

/ ˌkɑːdɪˈnælɪtɪ /

noun

1. maths the property of possessing a cardinal number

2. maths logic (of a class) the cardinal number associated with the given class. Two classes have the same cardinality if they can be put in one-to-one correspondence

---

Etymology

Origin of cardinality

First recorded in 1930–35; cardinal + -ity

Example Sentences

In this way, Cantor also studied the cardinality of infinite sets.

From Scientific American • Jul. 13, 2023

In my own past research with young children, it seemed to me that their thinking about numbers was more closely related to Giuseppe Peano's basic concept of “successor” than cardinality or quantity.

From Scientific American • Jul. 1, 2023

As Cantor was able to show, the cardinality of the natural numbers is the smallest possible infinity.

From Scientific American • May 23, 2023

The converse is not true: a subset of the x-y plane with a large cardinality need be neither measurable nor of large measure.

From Scientific American • Aug. 16, 2021

People of those times thought in terms of the old-style equivalence of cardinality and ordinality.

From "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" by Charles Seife