Definition:Dissection

Definition

A dissection is a partition of a geometric figure into two or more components.

Also known as

Some sources use the term divide to mean dissect, but this has the obvious confusion with the term division, which contains within it the unspoken assumption that the parts are equal.

Also see

• Results about dissections can be found here.

Linguistic Note

The word dissection is commonly misparsed and consequently mispronounced.

It is surprisingly common to conflate it with bisection, which (in certain contexts) means dissection into two equal parts.

Consequently it can be seen pronounced di-section, where the first syllable is sounded as the English word die.

In extreme cases, it can often also be seen spelt disection, which is always incorrect.

In fact, accurate parsing shows that the first syllable is dis, so pronounced, having the same linguistic purpose as the same syllable as dismember, disassociate, dismiss and so on.