Primary, secondary, tertiary, quaternary...

What comes next? Is there an ordinal word for fifth, sixth, and seventh in a series?

Welcome jkerr817 . Sorry to pick at nits, but aren't first, second, third, fifth, eighth, eleventh, etc ordinal numbers themselves? This is in contrast to cardinal numbers which are numbers like one, two, five, etc that can be used to describe a quantity of elements in a set. (See Merriam-Webster's number table at http://www.m-w.com/mw/table/number.htm.)

I don't think that words like "primary" or "secondary" are numbers per se. They are certainly related to order though. I'm not sure what they're called. And no doubt there are words of this kind for higher values, but as I know little Latin and less Greek I can't help you.

here's a link to the last thread that discussed this:
http://wordsmith.org/board/showflat.pl?Cat=&Board=words&Number=84563

Many thanks, Dr. Williams, for picking at nits...I appreciate the correction and will not make the same mistake in the future. The previous thread (pointed out by tsuwm) has the information I was seeking...so thank you to tsuwm, too.

Now I am better prepared to carry on with my ordinal stuff, primarily after I get back to work!

jkerr817

thanks jkerr817 -for giving me an oportunity to bring up a timely number joke--relating to octal and hexidecimal numbering systems..(old timers here will have already read it.)

Why to octal(UNIX) programers confuse Halloween and Christmas?

because OCT 31=DEC 25!
True nerds laugh out loud, the rest of the world doesn't get the joke.

I'm in between, thanks to the math education I've been getting from y'all these past few years. I sort of snorted.
...So I guess the world is indeed split up among three types, decimally speaking of course.

the world is indeed split up among three types

Those that count and those that don't count?

ba-da-bing

No, the world is made up of 10 types of people.

Those who understand binary and those who don't.

Why do octal(UNIX) programers confuse Halloween and Christmas?

because OCT 31=DEC 25!

Sometimes they mix them both up on Thanksgiving, too.

(...at least in the years when NOV 27 falls on a Thursday)