Gross
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The term gross may mean:
- before deductions, e.g. gross domestic or national product, or gross profit or income. In this sense, it may appear, separated by a comma, following the noun it modifies, e.g., "earned two million dollars, gross". Compare: net;
- flagrant, in criminal law or in tort law, e.g. gross indecency or gross negligence;
- count of 144, in commercial contexts implying quantity of items (= 12 × 12; a dozen dozen). A count of 1728 or 12 gross equals a great gross. Though a gross is often said to mean simply "144", it is subject to usage rules different from those for numbers.:
- it is always preceded by an article or a number;
- when the preceding word is a number, it often implies multiplication rather than combining that number of separate counts, e.g. "two gross" can refer equally to a single container into which 288 items were counted, or to a pair of containers into each of which 144 were counted
- normally (i.e., outside situations justifying extreme brevity), specifying the kind of objects being counted may not be done by positioning the kind directly following "gross", but requires that the word "of" intervene, e.g. "288 apples", but "two gross of apples"
- can also mean "disgusting." For example, "That was a gross picture."
- In mysticism, the gross realm is the physical, bodily realm, as opposed to the subtle realm of mind, the causal realm of all manifestation, and the nonduality.