- published: 28 Nov 2015
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In the physical sciences, an intensive property (also called a bulk property, intensive quantity, or intensive variable), is a physical property of a system that does not depend on the system size or the amount of material in the system: it is scale invariant.
By contrast, an extensive property (also extensive quantity, extensive variable, or extensive parameter) is one that is additive for independent, noninteracting subsystems. It is directly proportional to the amount of material in the system.
For example, density is an intensive property of a substance because it does not depend on the amount of that substance; mass and volume, which are measures of the amount of the substance, are extensive properties. In general the ratio of two extensive properties (such as mass and volume) that scale in the same way is scale-invariant, and hence an intensive property (such as density).
There are also measured physical properties which are neither intensive nor extensive. See counterexamples below.
"The Man" is a slang phrase that may refer to the government or to some other authority in a position of power. In addition to this derogatory connotation, it may also serve as a term of respect and praise.
The phrase "the Man is keeping me down" is commonly used to describe oppression. The phrase "stick it to the Man" encourages resistance to authority, and essentially means "fight back" or "resist", either openly or via sabotage.
The earliest recorded use[citation needed] of the term "the Man" in the American sense dates back to a letter written by a young Alexander Hamilton in September 1772, when he was 15. In a letter to his father James Hamilton, published in the Royal Dutch-American Gazette, he described the response of the Dutch governor of St. Croix to a hurricane that raked that island on August 31, 1772. "Our General has issued several very salutary and humane regulations and both in his publick and private measures, has shewn himself the Man." [dubious – discuss] In the Southern U.S. states, the phrase came to be applied to any man or any group in a position of authority, or to authority in the abstract. From about the 1950s the phrase was also an underworld code word for police, the warden of a prison or other law enforcement or penal authorities.