In particular in scientific writing, copulae using to be can not only be used to describe the properties of something but also to recapture a definition, to define something or to indicate complete identity. For example, the first of the following sentences gives the definition of a prime number, the second one just describes its properties:
A prime number is a natural number with exactly two divisors.
A prime number is a natural number.
Usually, it is clear from context how a copula is meant to be read, but now I am facing a case where it isn‘t. More specifically, I want a copula or syntactically similar construct to be clearly understood as describing only properties. I am thus looking for verbs or phrases meaning to have the property of being or similar (but less convoluted), i.e.:
A prime number has the property of being a natural number.
I searched thesauri (1, 2) for synonyms of to be and found no satisfying answer as only other meanings of to be, such as to exist, were covered.
I am aware, that as a last resort I can completely rephrase the sentence, e.g.:
Prime numbers are a subset of the natural numbers.
Finally note, that the above are only examples (my actual problem is more complicated and requires background knowledge), so I am not looking for answers specific to this.
Answer
A prime number is a natural number.
That statement is ambiguous because it could potentially apply to just one prime or a set of primes that you happen to be discussing.
The easiest transformation is:
Prime numbers are natural numbers.
You can make this even clearer by saying:
All prime numbers are natural numbers.
but, in grammatical terms, that is unnecessary as the two statements are equivalent.
Attribution
Source : Link , Question Author : Wrzlprmft , Answer Author : chasly – supports Monica