Quantity is a category that expresses the external, formal relationship of objects or their parts, as well as properties, relationships: their size , number , degree of manifestation of a particular property .
History of the concept
The first attempts at a special analysis of the problem of quantity go back to the Pythagoreans , who studied the nature of numbers.
As a special category, Aristotle considered quantity :
“Amount is what can be divided into its constituent parts, each of which, whether there will be two or more of them, is one thing given. This or that quantity is a multitude, if it can be counted, it is a quantity, if it can be measured. At the same time, what is called (potentially) divisible into parts not continuous is called “magnitude” —that ( divisible ) is continuous ”
- Met. V, 13, 1020a 7-14; rus per., M., 1934
In connection with the development of natural science and mathematics in the history of the new time, the problem of quantity holds a special place.
R. Descartes considered quantity as real spatial and temporal definiteness of bodies, which is expressed in terms of number , measure, quantity .
In the Hegelian and Marxist dialectic
According to Hegel , “quantity” differs from “ quality ” in that with a qualitative change a thing unambiguously becomes different, and a quantitative change for the time being may not transform a thing into another.
In the works of the classics of Marxism - Leninism , the category “quantity” is considered, first of all, in connection with the establishment of quantitative ( mathematical ) laws related to the qualitative transformations of things.
"... It is impossible to change the quality of any body without adding or taking away matter or movement, that is, without a quantitative change of this body"
- F. Engels, see K. Marx and F. Engels, Soch., 2nd ed., Vol. 20, p. 385
In Math and Physics
Each set of objects has a certain set . If it is finite, then it can be counted . Every bill consists in the repeated positioning of a unit . For example, the number "40" is a quantitative characteristic of any set of 40 items, whether it will be people or trees. Consequently, the numbers and values turn out to be formal, external, according to Hegel, the “indifferent” side of qualitative relations. There are things big and small, long and short, there are movements that are fast and slow, there is a degree of development of something high and low, and so on. All this can be measured using a specific standard: meters , seconds, and so on.
In order to establish the quantitative definiteness of an object, its constituent elements are compared — spatial dimensions, rate of change, degree of development — with a certain standard as a unit of counting and measuring. The more complex the phenomenon, the more difficult it is to study it using quantitative methods (for example, phenomena in the sphere of morality, politics, aesthetic perception of the world, etc.); in these cases, resort to various kinds of scales .
The process of knowledge of the real world, both historically and logically, is carried out in such a way that the knowledge of quality precedes the knowledge of quantitative relations. Science moves from qualitative assessments and descriptions of phenomena to the establishment of quantitative patterns .
Quantity is in unity with the qualitative definiteness of phenomena, things, processes; this unity is their measure . Changing the quantitative certainty of things to a certain extent does not affect their quality. Beyond these limits, quantitative changes are accompanied by a change in quality.
See also
- Quality
- Amount of substance
- Amount of movement
- Quantity of heat
- The laws of philosophy
- Measure