Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In logic, the quality of being passive; the condition of being acted upon by another: the opposite of agency.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin patientia.

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Examples

  • Yet there will be, if teaching and learning are the same, and agency and patiency.

    Physics Aristotle 2002

  • Either (a) both are in what is acted on and moved, or (b) the agency is in the agent and the patiency in the patient.

    Physics Aristotle 2002

  • To generalize, teaching is not the same as learning, or agency as patiency, in the full sense, though they belong to the same subject, the motion; for the

    Physics Aristotle 2002

  • If on the other hand (a) both are in what is moved and acted on-both the agency and the patiency (e.g. both teaching and learning, though they are two, in the learner), then, first, the actuality of each will not be present in each, and, a second absurdity, a thing will have two motions at the same time.

    Physics Aristotle 2002

  • patiency’; and the outcome and completion of the one is an ‘action’, that of the other a

    Physics Aristotle 2002

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