The plural of “hypothesis”
- Hypothesis is singular (sounds like hi-paw-thuh-sis).
- ”Hypotheses‘ is the plural of hypothesis.
What’s the meaning of hypothesis?
Hypothesis comes from the Greek word, meaning “base, groundwork, foundation”. Hypothesis is made up of the Greek root words, hypo + thesis: “hypo” meaning “under” or “placing under”; “thesis“, meaning “a placing, proposition” (from Etymonline).
So, based on the noun’s construction, hypothesis means to put or set forward a thesis or proposal to be subject to further investigation. According to Wikipedia, hypotheses are:
Tentative conjectures explaining an observation, phenomenon or scientific problem that can be tested by further observation, investigation and/or experimentation.
Wikipedia on the word hypothesis.
Why is “hypotheses” plural for “hypothesis”?
Many people confuse the plural of hypothesis, and it’s not tough to see why: hypothesis is an irregular plural noun form that omits the -s/-es of regular plural nouns. Apart from this, the way hypothesis modifies from singular to plural effectively changes the spelling and pronunciation of the word by substituting the -sis as a singular with –ses as a plural.
Most nouns add an -s/-es to denote plural. Hypothesis, and similar sounding nouns such as crisis, thesis, oasis, nemesis, diagnosis, analysis and so on, all change to -ses in their plural forms.
Nouns that end in “sis”
| singular | plural |
| crisis | crises |
| diagnosis | diagnoses |
| hypothesis | hypotheses |
| oasis | oases |
| synopsis | synopses |
| thesis | theses |
Practice using the verb in different tenses with example sentences to memorize the correct forms.
Hypothesis/hypotheses in sentences
| Sentences with “hypothesis” singular | Sentences with “hypotheses” plural |
| Other chemists rejected his hypothesis.
What we need is a general hypothesis to explain merger waves. Their hypothesis is that watching excessive amounts of television reduces a person’s ability to concentrate. The results of the experiment did not support his hypothesis. |
In the above work, we combine the redaction and source hypotheses.
Various hypotheses have been put forward to explain this increase. Such hypotheses attend to Aristotle’s philosophy at the neglect of his life. The hypotheses that carried it back to the early years of the Christian era have been wholly abandoned. |
Synonyms of “hypothesis”
- assumption
- supposition
- proposition
- guess
- conjecture
- explanation
- premise
- inference
- conclusion
- interpretation
- thesis
- theory
- supposition
- proposal
Learn about other nouns!
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- What’s the plural of crisis?
Origin of “hypothesis”
From etymonline:
1590s, “a particular statement;” 1650s, “a proposition, assumed and taken for granted, used as a premise,” from French hypothese and directly from Late Latin hypothesis, from Greek hypothesis.
Worksheet
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