Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Having no boundaries or limits; impossible to measure or calculate. synonym: incalculable.
  • adjective Immeasurably great or large; boundless.
  • adjective Existing beyond or being greater than any arbitrarily large value.
  • adjective Unlimited in spatial extent.
  • adjective Of or relating to a set capable of being put into one-to-one correspondence with a proper subset of itself.
  • noun Something infinite.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In geometry, the plane on which lie all points at infinity and all straights at infinity.
  • Immeasurably or innumerably great; so great as to be absolutely incapable of being measured or counted.
  • All-embracing; lacking nothing; the greatest possible; perfect; absolute: applied only to Divinity.
  • Boundless; unbounded; endless; without limit; interminable. In this sense the surface of a pea is infinite, while a plane of immeasurable extent whose continuity is interrupted by one small hole is finite.
  • By hyperbole, indefinitely extensive; beyond our powers of measuring or reckoning.
  • [Tr. Gr. ἀόριστος: see aorist.] In logic, modified, as a term, by a sign of negation.
  • noun Anything which is infinite, in any sense.
  • noun A large number; a crowd.

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

  • noun That which is infinite; boundless space or duration; infinity; boundlessness.
  • noun (Math.) An infinite quantity or magnitude.
  • noun An infinity; an incalculable or very great number.
  • noun The Infinite Being; God; the Almighty.
  • adjective Unlimited or boundless, in time or space.
  • adjective Without limit in power, capacity, knowledge, or excellence; boundless; immeasurably or inconceivably great; perfect; ; -- opposed to finite.
  • adjective Indefinitely large or extensive; great; vast; immense; gigantic; prodigious.
  • adjective (Math.) Greater than any assignable quantity of the same kind; -- said of certain quantities.
  • adjective (Mus.) Capable of endless repetition; -- said of certain forms of the canon, called also perpetual fugues, so constructed that their ends lead to their beginnings, and the performance may be incessantly repeated.

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

  • adjective set theory, of a set Having infinitely many elements.
  • noun Infinitely many.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective total and all-embracing
  • adjective too numerous to be counted
  • adjective having no limits or boundaries in time or space or extent or magnitude
  • noun the unlimited expanse in which everything is located
  • adjective of verbs; having neither person nor number nor mood (as a participle or gerund or infinitive)

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English infinit, from Old French, from Latin īnfīnītus : in-, not; see in– + fīnītus, finite, from past participle of fīnīre, to limit; see finite.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin infinitus, from in- ("not") + finis ("end") + the perfect passive participle ending -itus.

Support

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

Examples

  • Although _Philosophers_ say, _No Number is infinite, because it can be numbred_; for _infinite_ is a quantity that cannot be taken or assigned, but there is (_infinitum quoad hos_) as they term it, that is _infinite_ in respect of our apprehension:

    Tintinnalogia, or, the Art of Ringing Wherein is laid down plain and easie Rules for Ringing all sorts of Plain Changes Richard Duckworth

  • When he explains that it is infinite and omnipresent, like poor Paddy's famed ale, the explanation 'thickens as it clears;' for being ourselves _finite_, and necessarily present on one small spot of our very small planet, the words _infinite_ and _omnipresent_ do not suggest to us either positive or practical ideas -- of course, therefore, we have neither positive nor practical ideas of an infinite and omnipresent Being.

    An Apology for Atheism Addressed to Religious Investigators of Every Denomination by One of Its Apostles Charles Southwell

  • There must then be obedience to an infinite law, or _infinite_ punishment for transgression.

    The Way of Salvation in the Lutheran Church 1887

  • ˜infinite™ and then indicating the different senses it can have depending on where it occurs in a proposition, he treats the infinite itself as a term.

    Albert of Saxony Biard, Joél 2009

  • ˜infinite™ is used categorematically, for in that case its signification is “Things that are infinite are finite.”

    Sophismata Pironet, Fabienne 2007

  • Without such an ultimate and immediate signification instantiated in the formal signification of the mental concept, there would be, as John Raulin remarks, an infinite regress (processus in infinitum) in any signification, something like a Peircean ˜infinite semeiosis™. [

    Medieval Semiotics Meier-Oeser, Stephan 2003

  • That's the kind of, oh, let's call it infinite diversity in infinite combination, that I've always loved about our genre.

    Archive 2008-08-01 Lou Anders 2008

  • That's the kind of, oh, let's call it infinite diversity in infinite combination, that I've always loved about our genre.

    Science Fiction Belongs to the World Lou Anders 2008

  • But Pentagon say and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld said that may get a reworking because some Muslim groups have said that the term infinite justice could be offensive to Muslims because in their religion, only Allah can dispense ultimate or infinite justice -- Wolf.

    CNN Transcript Sep 20, 2001 2001

  • The fact that, by the law of the series or of the process, _we_ may continue the operation _as long as we please_, does not justify the application of the term infinite to the operation itself; if any thing is infinite, it is the will which continues the operation, which is absurd if said of human wills.

    Christianity and Greek Philosophy or, the relation between spontaneous and reflective thought in Greece and the positive teaching of Christ and His Apostles 1852

Comments

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

  • Indeed an infinite number of infants indicates idiosyncratic insensitivities of the infertility indices.

    September 16, 2007

  • Impossible!

    September 17, 2007

  • "Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio: a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy" Hamlet, IV.i

    January 6, 2008

  • PROFESSOR

    That's right. Here -- sit right down here.

    That's it. Ha ha! This -- this is the same

    genuine, magic, authentic crystal used by

    the Priests of Isis and Osiris in the days

    of the Pharaohs of Egypt -- in which

    Cleopatra first saw the approach of Julius

    Caesar and Marc Anthony, and -- and so on

    -- and so on. Now, you -- you'd better

    close your eyes, my child, for a moment --

    in order to be better in tune with the

    infinite. We -- we can't do these things

    without....

    ...reaching out into the....

    ...infinite. Yes.

    June 11, 2010

  • "3. Boundless; unbounded; endless; without limit; interminable. In this sense the surface of a pea is infinite, while a plane of immeasurable extent whose continuity is interrupted by one small hole is finite."

    --Cent. Dict. (it makes more sense after you've read the first definition)

    August 16, 2011