humanity

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English humanyte, humanite, humanitye. By surface analysis, human + -ity. Partly displaced mankind, from Old English mancynn (literally “human race”).

noun

1. Humankind; human beings as a group.
   Then he commenced to talk, really talk. and inside of two flaps of a herring's fin he had me mesmerized, like Eben Holt's boy at the town hall show. He talked about the ills of humanity, and the glories of health and Nature and service and land knows what all. 1913, Joseph C. Lincoln, chapter 4, in Mr. Pratt's Patients
   At last the concourse is relatively clear of humanity and the task of clearing up can begin. 1962 April, J. N. Faulkner, “Summer Saturday at Waterloo”, in Modern Railways, page 265
   It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: […]; perhaps to moralise on the oneness or fragility of the planet, or to see humanity for the small and circumscribed thing that it is; […]. 2013-06-07, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, page 36
2. The human condition or nature.
3. The quality of being benevolent; humane traits of character; humane qualities or aspects.
4. Any academic subject belonging to the humanities.
   Philosophy is a humanity while psychology is a science.