Dictionary

intension en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• (Southern-England) audio
• /ɪnˈtɛnʃən/

Etymology

From Latin intēnsiō (“straining, effort; intensifying”), from intēnsus (“stretched”), perfect passive participle of intendō (“strain or stretch toward”).

Meanings

1. (uncountable) Intensity or the act of becoming intense.
   • Sounds […] likewise do rise and fall with the intension or remission of the wind. 1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC:
2. (countable, uncountable) Intensification.
3. (countable) Any property or quality connoted by a word, phrase or other symbol, contrasted with actual instances in the real world to which the term applies.
   • 'Is a plant', 'has a trunk', 'has leaves' are intensions of the concept tree. Its extension is the set of all trees existing in the real world.
   • This law is, that the intension of our knowledge is in the inverse ratio of its extension. a. 1857, William Hamilton, edited by H[enry] L[ongueville] Mansel and John Veitch, Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood and Sons, published 1859–1860, →OCLC:
4. (countable, dated) A straining, stretching, or bending; the state of being strained.
   • the intension of a musical string

Forms

Antonyms

extension

Deriveds

cointension · intensional

Holonyms

comprehension

Translations (3)

bg напрежение (intensity) · bg интензивност (intensity) · pl intensja (intensity)