Where does term collide?

In the theory of the syllogism set out by Aristotle in the Prior Analytics (composed around 350 B.C.E.), a term is one of the two parts into which a premise can be broken: the subject that something is said about, and the predicate that is said of it. Aristotle used the Greek word horos, a boundary, for these parts, because a premise is bounded by the two things it links. Each syllogism is built from three such terms, the major, the minor, and the middle, and its validity depends only on how they are arranged. This referent is a component of a logical statement, labeled subject or predicate, and it is not a quantity added in a sum, a word listed in a specialized vocabulary, or the length of a loan.[1]

Unit

One term, the subject or the predicate of a single premise

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Identified by parsing a premise into its subject and predicate and labeling each as the major, minor, or middle term

In Euclid's Elements (composed around 300 B.C.E.), the two quantities that make up a ratio, the one compared and the one it is compared to, are called its terms, again translating the Greek horos for a boundary. In later algebra the word widened to name each of the separate quantities joined by plus or minus to build an expression, and each numbered entry that makes up a series or sequence. Thomas Heath's 1926 edition, The Thirteen Books of Euclid's Elements, is the standard English text for the original ratio meaning. This referent is a piece of a mathematical expression, counted by its position and coefficient, and it is distinct from the subject of a premise, a word in a specialized vocabulary, or a span of time on a bond.[2]

Unit

One term, a single quantity within an expression, ratio, or series

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Read off by separating an expression at its plus and minus signs, or by indexing the entries of a series

In the study of terminology founded by Eugen Wüster in his 1931 dissertation Internationale Sprachnormung in der Technik (International Language Standardization in Technology), a term is a word or fixed phrase chosen to designate one clearly defined concept within a specialized field. Wüster started from the concept and asked which single word should name it, so that a discipline can speak precisely, which is the reverse of an ordinary dictionary that starts from words. A term in this meaning belongs to a controlled vocabulary and is judged by how exactly it fixes its concept. This referent is a naming unit in a technical language, and it is not a part of a logical premise, a quantity in an expression, or the maturity of a bond.[3]

Unit

One term, a single word or fixed phrase tied to one concept

Recovery means

Not applicable

Measured by

Recorded in term banks and glossaries and assessed by how consistently it maps to its concept across texts

In finance the word names how long a loan or bond runs, the time from now until it must be repaid, its maturity. Friedrich Lutz's 1940 article The Structure of Interest Rates gave the first full account of why interest rates differ by this length, arguing that a long rate reflects what the market expects short rates to be over the loan's life. Oldrich Vasicek's 1977 An equilibrium characterization of the term structure later modeled the whole curve of rates across maturities. This referent is a span of contractual time, measured in days or years to maturity, and it has nothing to do with a part of a premise, a quantity in a sum, or a word in a specialized vocabulary.[4][5]

Unit

One term, the length of a single loan or bond, in days or years

Recovery means

The term runs down to zero at maturity, when the principal is returned and the contract closes

Measured by

Stated in the contract as a maturity date or number of years, and compared across maturities as the term structure of interest rates