Are mass, volume and density characteristic propertys of matter?
For ordinary matter we encounter in our daily life, yes. Mass is always a characteristic property of matter. Mass is the amount of material in a system, what ever fundamentally causes material to exist. Inertia (the type applicable to translational motion) is a property characteristic to matter. Translational inertia and mass are essentially the same thing. There is a slight distinction, but it is only applicable at ridiculously high speeds. Volume is characteristic to the matter we normally consider to be matter. Any object which takes up space has volume. Volume is by definition, the amount of 3-d space occupied by an object. If an object has both mass and volume, it obviously has density, because density is defined as the ratio of mass to volume. If volume is characteristic to all matter, it is not entirely. Particles smaller than the atom are thought of as point particles having zero size. Black holes are theorized to have infinite density in extreme cases, thus not occupying space