Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The quality of being better; superiority.
  • noun In minting, the amount by which a precious metal exceeds the standard of fineness.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun rare The quality of being better or superior; superiority.
  • noun The difference by which fine gold or silver exceeds in fineness the standard.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun uncountable The state or quality of being better; superiority.
  • noun countable The result or product of being better.
  • noun The amount by which a precious metal exceeds the the standard of fineness.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English betternes, equivalent to better +‎ -ness.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word betterness.

Examples

  • Indeed, it doesn't seem clear that there is any objective way of assessing 'betterness' in music.

    Reminding You That All Religions Were Once New James F. McGrath 2008

  • Dante stands in no class at all, nor does Milton, nor does Shelley; and though Shakespeare indulgently permits himself to be classed as an "Elizabethan dramatist," what strikes true critics most is again hardly more his "betterness" than his difference.

    A History of the French Novel, Vol. 1 From the Beginning to 1800 George Saintsbury 1889

  • This process also needs to be spiral so that we can continuously pursue "betterness" in various aspects of education.

    Academic Commons 2009

  • That sounds like a definite betterness indeed, and very encouraging.

    mrissa: What we call progress mrissa 2010

  • Her illness was psychosomatic, so her betterness has to be too.

    Zombies vs. Unicorns Justine Larbalestier 2010

  • I like Macs, but I wish the company was secure enough in its betterness to present itself simply as creating great products, not as a creating products that are better than everything else.

    Smug Ugly - Anil Dash 2007

  • I can attest to the fact that bicycle gearing shares a non-linear log exponential-type betterness factor with the earthquake Richter Scale: 11 is waaaaaay better than 10, and 10 is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than 9, and so on.

    The Irrelevancy of Time: Bicycle Products Don't Spoil BikeSnobNYC 2009

  • There are probably more such relations, e.g. temporal precedence and betterness.

    Tropes Bacon, John 2008

  • This view constitutes a more radical threat to the computation of intrinsic value than does the view that intrinsic betterness is not transitive.

    Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Value Zimmerman, Michael J. 2007

  • One response to these puzzles (eschewed by Parfit himself) is to adopt the thesis of the nontransitivity of intrinsic betterness.

    Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Value Zimmerman, Michael J. 2007

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.