The shape (Old English: gesceap, created thing) of an object located in some space is a geometrical description of the part of that space occupied by the object, as determined by its external boundary – abstracting from location and orientation in space, size, and other properties such as colour, content, and material composition.
Mathematician and statistician David George Kendall writes:
In this paper ‘shape’ is used in the vulgar sense, and means what one would normally expect it to mean. We here define ‘shape’ informally as ‘all the geometrical information that remains when location, scale and rotational effects are filtered out from an object.’
Simple shapes can be described by basic geometry objects such as a set of two or more points, a line, a curve, a plane, a plane figure (e.g. square or circle), or a solid figure (e.g. cube or sphere). Most shapes occurring in the physical world are complex. Some, such as plant structures and coastlines, may be so arbitrary as to defy traditional mathematical description – in which case they may be analyzed by differential geometry, or as fractals.
Read more about Shape: Rigid Shape Definition, Non-rigid Shape Definition, Colloquial Shape Definition, Philosophical Skepticism of Definitions, Shape Analysis, Similarity Classes
Famous quotes containing the word shape:
“We cannot shape our children according to our ideas,
We must keep and love them as God gave them to us.”
—Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)
“An unlicked bear”
—Trans. by Johanna Prins.
Dutch expression meaning “a boor”: from the old belief that bear cubs are licked into shape by their mothers.
“In the multitude of middle-aged men who go about their vocations in a daily course determined for them much in the same way as the tie of their cravats, there is always a good number who once meant to shape their own deeds and alter the world a little.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)