duality
Americannoun
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a dual state or quality.
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Mathematics. a symmetry within a mathematical system such that a theorem remains valid if certain objects, relations, or operations are interchanged, as the interchange of points and lines in a plane in projective geometry.
noun
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the state or quality of being two or in two parts; dichotomy
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physics the principle that a wave-particle duality exists in microphysics in which wave theory and corpuscular theory are complementary. The propagation of electromagnetic radiation is analysed using wave theory but its interaction with matter is described in terms of photons. The condition of particles such as electrons, neutrons, and atoms is described in terms of de Broglie waves
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geometry the interchangeability of the roles of the point and the plane in statements and theorems in projective geometry
Other Word Forms
- nonduality noun
Etymology
Origin of duality
1350–1400; Middle English dualitie < Late Latin duālitās. See dual, -ity
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
"I'm a person of cultural duality," he told Associated Press.
From BBC • Feb. 14, 2026
The new duality, Li says, involves materials that can behave as both conductors and insulators.
From Science Daily • Nov. 9, 2025
Halloween, for all its associations with extremes of terror, is also bound up in the cozy innocence of childhood memories, and to my mind, few movies fit that duality better than “The Fog.”
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 29, 2025
Bringing that duality introduced a style that was both fresh and ancestral into a pop music scene still defined by the electronic splash of New Jack Swing artists like Boyz II Men, Saadiq’s group Tony!
From Salon • Oct. 19, 2025
In fact, they had encountered the same wave-particle duality of light that was confounding their elders in physics.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
