Learn English – Is “potential” a countable noun

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Is "potential" a countable noun? Consider these sentences:

The teachings are dispensed according to the audience's potentials?

The teachings are dispensed according to the audience's levels of potential?

The teachings are dispensed according to the audience's potentials?

Best Answer

Yes, in some cases it is countable, example from Oxford Dictionary Online:

[count noun] ‘the potentials of the technology were never wholly controllable’

Also as a quantity (for example in physics or maths) it can be countable, example from Oxford Dictionary Online:

‘Electrical action potentials, osmotic perturbations or chemical signals may trigger these waves.’

In mathematics (or science in general) you could say scalar potentials to refer to more than one scalar potential. An example of this can be found here (lecture notes from the School of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Edinburgh).

Attribution: "Potential | Definition of Potential in English by Oxford Dictionaries." Oxford Dictionaries | English. Accessed April 03, 2018. https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/potential.

In your case, however, I would refer to this example from Oxford Dictionary Online and recommend the singular version in your sentence because you refer to the potential of the audience as a whole:

‘You could say that we can compare our capabilities and potential to that of an iceberg!’

So in your sentence that would be (without the s):

The teachings are dispensed according to the audience's potential

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