discontinuityn.
/ˌdɪskɒntᵻˈnjuːᵻti/, U.S. /ˌdɪˌskɑntəˈn(j)uədi/ 1. The quality, fact, or condition of being discontinuous in time or space; lack or failure of continuity; interrupted sequence or connection. Also: an instance of this.
ΘΚΠ
the world > relative properties > order > order, sequence, or succession > continuity or uninterruptedness > discontinuity or interrupted condition > [noun]
solution of continuity1543
discontinuity1570
discontinuation1605
discontiguity1632
discreteness1835
discontinuousness1837
brokenness1842
discretion1848
incontinuity1865
1570 J. Dee in H. Billingsley tr. Euclid Elements Geom. Math. Præf. sig. dj They will not be extended, to discontinuitie.
1626 F. Bacon Sylua Syluarum §846 The Second is the Stronger or Weaker Appetite, in Bodies, to Continuitie, and to flie Discontinuitie.
1672 H. More Brief Reply 123 Nor had we any need here to consider the continuity or discontinuity of places.
1779 S. Johnson Lives Eng. Poets I. 240 The discontinuity of the action might..have been easily forgiven, if there had been action enough.
1835 R. H. Froude Remains (1838) I. 408 I see such jumps and discontinuities as make me despair of ever being intelligible.
1837 Eclectic Rev. Mar. 271 If such discontinuity of force exists, it is unexampled in the Newtonian gravitation.
1870 J. R. Lowell Among my Bks. 1st Ser. 202 The resolution and persistence of the one..made shaky..by the other's infirmity of will and discontinuity of purpose.
1926 Nature 21 Aug. 271/1 Thus speciation through continuity stands in contrast with mutation through discontinuity.
1980 S. Berger & M. J. Piore Dualism & Discontinuity in Industr. Societies i. 2 The boundaries..between one [income or status] category and the next are essentially arbitrary..and do not reflect significant real discontinuities.
2001 K. Glowczewska tr. R. Kapuściński Shadow of Sun 20 The striking physical characteristic of civilization is its temporariness,..its material discontinuity. A hut put up only yesterday has already vanished.
2. A break in physical continuity in a substance or object; a gap, a crack, a void; = discontinuation n. 1b.
ΘΚΠ
the world > space > relative position > condition of being open or not closed > an opening or aperture > [noun] > opening or break in continuity
breakinga1300
breaka1400
interval1489
breach1530
gapa1616
discontinuity1676
puka1921
1676 H. More Remarks 2 Disc. 60 A Discontinuity or Discontiguity of matter.
1705 G. Cheyne Philos. Princ. Nat. Relig. ii. 198 Others have thought that within this outer Crust of Earth, there must be a Discontinuity, for some considerable distance.
1794 R. J. Sulivan View of Nature II. 413 The spots may also be..temporary holes, or discontinuities in the luminous meteor.
1873 A. T. Ritchie Dynamical Theory Formation of Earth (ed. 3) xxiv. 376 The fractures or discontinuities formed by the displacements of the strata.
1930 E. K. Rideal Introd. Surface Chem. (ed. 2) v. 180 A discontinuity in the surface of the crystal was produced by a scratch.
1955 W. Heisenberg in W. Pauli Niels Bohr & Devel. Physics 24 Schrödinger cannot hereby remove the element of discontinuity from the world, which is found everywhere in atomic physics.
2006 Gloucester Citizen (Nexis) 23 Aug. 10 Rail joints are discontinuities and therefore a weakness.
3. Mathematics. The property of a function or graph of being discontinuous (discontinuous adj. 4) at a point or points; an instance of this.
ΘΚΠ
the world > relative properties > number > algebra > [noun] > expression > function > property of
discontinuity1803
functionality1857
self-conjugation1866
covariance1878
symmetry1888
monogeneity1906
recursion1913
recursive definition1935
holomorphy1957
unateness1960
1803 J. Bonnycastle tr. C. Bossut Gen. Hist. Math. ix. 412 Other geometricians have thought, that this discontinuity [Fr. discontinuité] of the functions might be admitted, but that it should be subjected to some law.
1842 A. De Morgan Differential & Integral Calculus xx. 641 At the point where the discontinuity takes place, and a function which generally can have but one value might be expected to have two, it takes neither, and gives only the mean between them.
1889 Telegr. Jrnl. & Electr. Rev. 20 Dec. 707/1 The question of discontinuity of the curves about the ‘yield point’ was next discussed.
1931 Proc. National Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 17 534 Let us regard a plane discontinuity or ‘shock wave’ from the point of view of the observer moving with it.
1972 M. Kline Math. Thought xl. 949 Fourier..himself treated only functions with a finite number of discontinuities in any finite interval.
2004 Ambix 51 7 These plots yield a series of straight lines with discontinuities.
Compounds
discontinuity layer n. Oceanography and Limnology a layer of water between two others in a lake or the sea in which the temperature decreases rapidly with increasing depth; a thermocline separating an epilimnion from a hypolimnion.
ΚΠ
1907 E. M. Wedderburn in Nature 4 July 239/1 From August to November a ‘discontinuity temperature layer’ came into existence, the so-called Sprungschicht of the Austrian and German naturalists. Down to the depth of this discontinuity layer the temperature varied very slowly.
1931 Discovery June 199/2 In general the presence of the ‘discontinuity layer’ tends to prevent the free mixing of the layers [of water in the sea].
1942 P. M. Jenkin in Jrnl. Animal Ecol. 11 252 The term ‘Discontinuity Layer’ is revived to cover the layer of very variable thickness in which there is a sufficient temperature gradient to impede mixing of the epilimnion with the cool hypolimnion below.
2008 Mich. Messenger (Nexis) 1 Sept. In the summertime, the Great Lakes stratify—two distinct bodies of water, lying one over the top of the other, and a discontinuity layer between them where temperature drops rapidly.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2013; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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