secondary quality

noun

, Epistemology.

1. one of the qualities attributed by the mind to an object perceived, such as color, temperature, or taste.

Word History and Origins

Origin of secondary quality¹

First recorded in 1690–1700

Example Sentences

Throughout the scientific revolutions of the 17th Century, color was dismissed, along with other aesthetic properties like scent, as a secondary quality — that is, one lacking the explanatory role in the behavior of physical objects of so-called primary qualities, like motion or size or shape.

From Salon

He seemed worlds different than the factory-produced bores of the PGA Tour, but his intelligence, far from being a secondary quality, was the practical kind he applied to the art of winning.

From Golf Digest

“About odor, which is what Locke would call a secondary quality of bodies. What is unexpected is that time has a smell, Octavian; how else might we explain that old men exude the scent of years?”

From Literature

My turnout is altogether elaborate, studiously particular—simply because I hold the people in too much esteem, to shab them off with anything of a secondary quality, while Providence has blessed me with the means of providing them the best.

From Project Gutenberg

The goods displayed in the windows are of a secondary quality, at best; and the people who throng the pavements are people who want second-rate articles.

From Project Gutenberg