primary qualities

British  

plural noun

1. (in empiricist philosophy) those properties of objects that are directly known by experience, such as size, shape, and number

---

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

primary qualities

This bus has primary qualities of solidity and space occupancy that exist independently of our perceptual machinery and that can do us injury.

From Scientific American ● Aug. 27, 2019

Even our knowledge of the persistence of force and of the primary qualities of matter is but of relative significance.

From A Candid Examination of Theism by George John Romanes

In the first rank among the primary qualities is solidity, which is given to you in the sensation of resistance, and inevitably accompanied by form, etc.

From Lectures on the true, the beautiful and the good by Victor Cousin

There remain, however, to be noticed two respects in which assertions concerning what things look in respect of colour agree with corresponding assertions in respect of the primary qualities.

From Kant's Theory of Knowledge by Harold Arthur Prichard

And of primary qualities, also, precisely the same thing may with equal confidence be alleged.

From Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics With Some of Their Applications by William Thomas Thornton