Definition of "indeterminate"

It bears an affinity to the problem of indeterminate architecture—the indeterminate residential area.

2014, David Oakley, The Phenomenon of Architecture in Cultures in Change, page 196

The form is linear, quadratic, cubic, biquadratic or quartic, quintic, &c., according to its order in respect of the indeterminates it contains; and binary, ternary, quaternary, &c., according to the number of its indeterminates. Thus x 2 + y 2 {\displaystyle x^{2}+y^{2}} is a binary quadratic form, x 3 + y 3 + z 3 − 3 x y z {\displaystyle x^{3}+y^{3}+z^{3}-3xyz} is a ternary cubic form.

1862, H. J. Stephen Smith, Report on the Theory of Numbers—Part III, Report of the 31st Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, British Association for the Advancement of Science, page 292

Such a factor is therefore an integral function of x {\displaystyle x} and the indeterminates u 1 , u 2 , … u n {\displaystyle u_{1},u_{2},\dots u_{n}} with coefficients belonging to the domain of rationality ( R ′ , R ″ , . ) {\displaystyle (R',R'',..)} and may be represented by g ( x , u 1 , u 2 , . u n ) {\displaystyle g(x,u_{1},u_{2},..u_{n})} .

1892, Henry B. Fine, Kronecker and His Arithmetical Theory of the Algebraic Equation, Thomas S. Fiske, Harold Jacoby (editors), Bulletin of the New York Mathematical Society, Volume 1, New York Mathematical Society, page 179

Let T = T σ {\displaystyle T=T_{\sigma }} and let S {\displaystyle S} be the polynomial R {\displaystyle R} -algebra in the set of indeterminates { y i , τ } i ∈ I , τ ∈ T {\displaystyle \left\{y_{i,\tau }\right\}_{i\in I,\tau \in T}} with indices from the set I × T {\displaystyle I\times T} .

2006, Alexander B. Levin, Difference Algebra, M. Hazewinkel, Handbook of Algebra, page 251