Philosophy Terms Glossary

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Absolute, the

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That which is unconditioned and uncaused by anything else; it is frequently thought of as God, a perfect and solitary, self-caused eternal being that is the source or essence of all that exists but that is itself beyond the possibility of conceptualization or definition

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Absolute Idealism

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The early nineteenth-century school of philosophy that maintained that being is the transcendental unfolding or expression of thought or reason

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Academics

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Philosophers of the third and second centuries B.C.E. in what had been Plato's Academy; they had the reputation of maintaining that all things are inapprehensible

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Act-utilitarianism

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A form of utilitarianism (subscribed to by Bentham) in which the rightness of an act is determined by its effect on the general happiness

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Aesthetics

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The philosophical study of art and of value judgments about art and of beauty in general

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Alterity

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The condition of being "Other" to the center of power and authority

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Analytic philosophy

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The predominant twentieth-century philosophical tradition in English-speaking countries; analytic philosophy has its roots in British empiricism and holds that analysis is the proper method of philosophy

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Analytic statement

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(Quine): A statement that holds come what may

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Anarchism

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A utopian political theory that seeks to eliminate all authority and state rule in favor of a society based on voluntary cooperation and free association of individuals and groups

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Antirepresentationalism

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A philosophy that denies that the mind or language contains or is a representation of reality

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Appeal to emotion

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Trying to establish a position by playing on someone's emotions

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Applied ethics

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Moral theory applied to specific contemporary moral issues, such as abortion, affirmative action, pornography, capital punishment, and so on

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A priori/a posteriori pair

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In the philosophy of Saul Kripke, an a priori truth is a statement known to be true independently of any experience, and its opposite, an a posteriori truth, is a statement known to be true through experience

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A priori principle

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A proposition whose truth we do not need to know through sensory experience and that no conceivable experience could serve to refute

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Argument

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A reason for accepting a position

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Argument by analogy

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As in an argument for the existence of God: the idea that the world is analogous to a human contrivance and therefore, just as the human contrivance has a creator, the world must also have a creator

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Argument from design

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A proof for the existence of God based on the idea that the universe and its parts give evidence of purpose or design and therefore require a divine designer

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Argumentum ad hominem

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The mistaken idea that you can successfully challenge any view by criticizing the person whose view it is

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Ataraxia

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The goal of unperturbedness and tranquility of mind that was considered the highest good by ancient thinkers such as the Skeptics

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Atomism

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The ancient Greek philosophy that holds that all things are composed of simple, indivisible minute particles

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Authenticity

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In Sartre's philosophy, a way of understanding the essential nature of the human being by seeing it as a totality

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Bad Faith

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In the philosophy of Jean-Paul Sartre, essentially self-deception or lying to oneself, especially when this takes the form of blaming circumstances for one's fate and not seizing the freedom to realize oneself in action

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Begging the question

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The fallacy of assuming as a premise the very conclusion of the argument is intended to prove

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Behaviorism

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The methodological principle in psychology according to which meaningful psychological inquiry confines itself to psychological phenomena that can be behaviorally defined; the theory in philosophy that when we talk about a person's mental states, we are referring in fact to the person's disposition to behave in certain ways

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Buddhism

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A philosophical tradition, founded by Gautama Siddhartha Buddha in the fifth century B.C.E., that took on various forms as a religion and spread throughout Asia; Buddhism attempts to help the individual conquer the suffering and mutability of human existence through the elimination of desire and ego and attainment of the state of nirvana

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Bushido

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The way or ethic of the samurai warrior, based on service and demanding rigorous training, usually both in the military and literary arts

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Capabilities approach

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In the philosophy of Martha Nussbaum, the principle that all nations and governments should provide for the core ingredients of human dignity

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Capitalism

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An economic system in which ownership of the means of production and distribution is maintained mostly by private individuals and corporations

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Categorical imperative

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Immanuel Kant's formulation of a moral law that holds unconditionally, that is, categorically; in its most common formulation, states that you are to act in such a way that you could desire the principle on which you act to be a universal law

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Clear and distinct criterion

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René Descartes' criterion of truth, according to which that, and only that, which is perceived as clearly and distinctly as the fact of one's own existence is certain

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Code Pink

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A third wave women's grassroots peace and justice movement that opposes any kind of military force

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Communism

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(capital "c") The ideology of the Communist Party; (lowercase "c") an economic system

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Communitarian

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One who holds that there is a common good defined by one's society, the attainment of which has priority over individual liberty

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Conceptualism

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The theory that universals are concepts and exist only in the mind

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Confucianism

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A philosophical tradition that began with Confucius in the sixth century B.C.E. and continues to the present day; Confucianism is a practical philosophy that hopes to establish a better world order by means of moral perfection of the individual

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Consequentialism

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Ethical theories that evaluate actions by their consequences

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Conservatism

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A political philosophy based on respect for established institutions and traditions and that favors preservation of the status quo over social experimentation

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Continental philosophy

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The philosophical traditions of continental Europe; includes phenomenology, existentialism, hermeneutics, deconstruction, and critical theory

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Contractarian theory

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The political theory according to which a legitimate state exists only by virtue of an agreement or "contract" among the subjects of the state

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Contractualism

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Ethical theories according to which right and wrong are established by a societal agreement or social contract

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Copernican revolution in philosophy

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A new perspective in epistemology, introduced by Immanuel Kant, according to which the objects of experience must conform in certain respects to our knowledge of them

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Cosmological argument

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An argument for the existence of God according to which the universe and its parts can be neither accidental nor self-caused and must ultimately have been brought into existence by God

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Counterargument

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An argument that counters the given argument

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Critical theory

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A philosophical method that seeks to provide a radical critique of knowledge by taking into account the situation and interests involved

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Cultural relativism

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The theory that what is right (and wrong) is what your culture believes is right (and wrong)

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Cyberfeminism

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The idea that women can resist the patriarchy through their communication links in computer technology

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Cynicism

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A school of philosophy founded around the fifth century B.C.E., probably by Antisthenes of Diogenes; the Cynics sought to lead lives of total simplicity and naturalness by rejecting all comforts and conveniences of society

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Cyrenaicism

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The philosophy of Aristippus and others who lived in Cyrene about Plato's time; it emphasized seeking a life of as many intense pleasures as possible

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Deontological ethics

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Ethical theories according to which what I ought to do is whatever it is my moral duty to do

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Descriptive egoism

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The doctrine that maintains that in conscious action a person always seeks self-interest above all else

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Descriptive relativism

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The doctrine that the moral standards people subscribe to differ from culture to culture and from society to society

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Determinism

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The doctrine that a person could not have acted otherwise than as she or he did act

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Ding-an-sich

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German for "thing-in-itself": a thing as it is independent of any consciousness of it

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Divine-command ethics

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Ethical theory according to which what is morally right and good is determined by divine command

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Divine law

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In the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, God's gift to humankind, apprehended through revelation, that directs us to our supernatural goal, eternal happiness

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Double aspect theory

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The idea that whatever exists is both mental and physical; that is that the mental and physical are just different ways of looking at the same things, Spinoza, Benedictus de

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Dualism

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Two-ism; the doctrine that existing things belong to one or another but not both, of two distinct categories of things, usually deemed to be physical and nonphysical or spiritual

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Ecofeminism

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A branch of feminist philosophy that opposes any form of oppression that endangers nature

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Écriture féminine

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A "feminine" form of writing primarily invented by Cixous and Kristeva that is neither prose nor poetry, uses metaphor to elide boundaries between theory and fiction, and disrupts masculinist discourse

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Egoism

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The doctrine that in conscious action one seeks (or ought to seek) self-interest above all else

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Egoistic ethical hedonism

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The theory that one ought to seek one's own pleasure above all else

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Eightfold Path

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The way or practice recommended in Buddhism that includes: Right View, Right Aim, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Living, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, and Right Contemplation

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Emotivism

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The theory that moral (and other) value judgments are expressions of emotions, attitudes, and feelings

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Empiricism

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The philosophy that all knowledge originates in sensory experience

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Epicureanism

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(capital "e") The philosophy of followers of Epicurus, who believed that personal pleasure is the highest good but advocated renouncing momentary pleasures in favor of more lasting ones

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Epistemological detour

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The attempt to utilize epistemological inquiry to arrive at metaphysical truths

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Epistemology

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The branch of philosophy concerned primarily with the criteria, nature, and possibility of knowledge

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Epoche

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Suspension of judgment concerning the truth of falsity of a proposition

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Equivalence Thesis

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The idea that letting people die of starvation is as bad as killing them

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Esse est percipi

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Latin for "to be is to be perceived," a doctrine that George Berkeley made the basis of his philosophy. Only that which is perceived exists; Berkeley held, however, that the minds that do the perceiving also exist

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Essentialism

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The belief that there are natural, innate differences between women and men, a rejection of the idea that gender is a social construction

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Eternal law

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In the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, the divine reason of God that rules over all things at all times

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Ethical hedonism

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The doctrine that you ought to seek pleasure over all else

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Ethical naturalism

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The belief that moral value judgments are really judgments of the natural world

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Ethical relativism

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The theory that there are no absolute and universally valid moral standards and values and that therefore the moral standards and values that apply to you are merely those that are accepted by your society

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Ethical skepticism

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The doctrine that moral knowledge is not possible

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Ethics

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The branch of philosophy that considers the nature, criteria, sources, logic, and validity of moral value judgments

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Ethnophilosophy

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A systematically descriptive method of investigating the philosophical concepts that are important in a culture, especially a culture that is primarily transmitted through unwritten stories, rituals, and statements of belief

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Evil demon conjecture

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The conjecture used by Descartes that states: For all I know, an all-powerful "god" or demon has manipulated me so that all I take as true is in fact false

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Existence precedes essence (Sartre)

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Sartre's way of saying, you are what you make of yourself

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Existentialism

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A tradition of twentieth-century philosophy having its roots in the nineteenth century but coming to flower in Europe after World War II; of central concern is the question of how the individual is to find an authentic existence in this world, in which there is no ultimate reason why things happen one way and not another

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Ex nihilo

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Latin for "out of nothing"

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Extension

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A property by which a thing occupies space; according to Descartes, the essential attribute of matter

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Fallacy

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A mistake in reasoning

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False dilemma

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Offering only two options when in fact more than two options exist

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Fascism

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The totalitarian political philosophy of the Mussolini government in Italy, which stressed the primacy of the state and leadership by an elite who embody the will and intelligence of the people; the term is sometimes more generally used for any totalitarian movement

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Feminism

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Movement in support of the view that men and women should have equal social value and status

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First mover

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God, in St.Thomas's first proof of God's existence

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Five Ways

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St.Thomas Aquinas's five proofs of God's existence

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Form

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Aristotle’s theory of forms; in Plato’s philosophy that which is denoted by a general word, a word (such as “good”) that applies to more than a single thing

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Foundationalism

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The doctrine that a belief qualifies as knowledge only if it logically follows from propositions that are incorrigible (incapable of being false if you believe that they are true)

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Four Noble Truths

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Buddha's answer to the central problem of life: (1) There is suffering; (2) suffering has specific and identifiable causes; (3) suffering can be ended; (4) the way to end suffering is through enlightened living, as expressed in the Eightfold Path

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Free-market economy

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An economic system built around the belief that supply and demand, competition, and a free play of market forces best serve the interests of society and the common good

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Functionalism

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The doctrine that what a thing is must be understood and analyzed not by what it is made of but by its function; for example, anything that functions as a mousetrap is a mousetrap, regardless of what it is made of or how it looks or is assembled

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Gender

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A person's biological sex as constructed, understood, interpreted, and institutionalized by society

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General will

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In the philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the will of a politically united people, the will of a state

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Genus

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how a thing is similar to other things

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Hedonism

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The pursuit of pleasure

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Hellenistic age

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The period of Macedonian domination of the Greek-speaking world from around 335 B.C.E. to about 30 B.C.E.

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Hermeneutics

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Interpretive understanding that seeks systematically to access the essence of things

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Hinduism

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The Western word for the religious beliefs and practices of the majority of the people of India

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Human law

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In the philosophy of Thomas Aquinas, the laws and statutes of society that are derived from our understanding of natural law

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Hypothetical imperative

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An imperative that states what you ought to do if a certain end is desired

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Id

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In Sigmund Freud's theory, the part of the psyche that is the unconscious source of instinctive impulses and drives

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Idealism

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The doctrine that only what is mental (thought, consciousness, perception) exists and that so-called physical things are manifestations of mind or thought

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Identity, problem of

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What are the criteria of the sameness of an entity?

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Identity theory

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The theory that mental states and events are brain states and events

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Incorrigible

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The property of a proposition that cannot be false if you believe it to be true

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Indeterminacy of translation

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In the philosophy of W. V. O. Quine, the idea that alternative incompatible translations of any language are compatible with the linguistic behavior of its speakers

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Individual relativism

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The theory that what is right (and wrong) is what you believe is right (and wrong)

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Inscrutability of reference

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In the philosophy of W. V. O. Quine, the idea that alternative conceptions of what objects a theory refers to are equally compatible with the totality of physical facts

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Instrumental end

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Something desirable as a means to an end, but not desirable for its own sake

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Instrumentalism

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A theory held by John Dewey, among others, that ideas, judgments, and propositions are not merely true or false; rather, they are tools to understand experience and solve problems

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Intelligent design or evolution

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The idea that the universe cannot be explained except on the supposition that it is the creation of an intelligent designer

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Interactionist dualism

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The theory that the physical body and the nonphysical mind interact with each other

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Intrinsic end

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Something that is desirable for its own sake and not merely as a means to an end

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Invisible-hand explanation

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An explanation of a phenomenon as an unforeseen indirect consequence of action taken for some other purpose

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Karma

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The idea that your point of departure in life is determined by your decisions and deeds in earlier lives

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Language game

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The context in which an utterance is made, which determines the purposes served by the utterance and hence its meaning; Wittgenstein believed that philosophical problems are due to ignoring the "game" in which certain concepts are used

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Law of the Father

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In Lacan's theory, a system that contains encoded patriarchal values in language

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Lawrence v.Texas

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A 2003 ruling by the United States Supreme Court that a Texas law prohibiting homosexual sodomy was unconstitutional

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Leviathan

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The coiled snake or dragon in the Book of Job in the Bible; in the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes, "that mortal God, to which we owe our peace and defense"; that is, the state (or its sovereign) created by social contract

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Liberalism

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A political philosophy whose basic tenet is that each individual should have the maximum freedom consistent with the freedom of others

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Libertarian

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Someone who believes in free will; alternatively, someone who upholds the principles of liberty of thought and action

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Logic

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The study of correct inference

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Logical atomism

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The metaphysical theory that the world does not consist of things but of facts, that is, things having certain properties and standing in certain relationship to one another. The ultimate facts are atomic in that they are logically independent of one another and are unresolvable into simpler facts; likewise, an empirically correct description of the world will consist ultimately of logically independent and unanalyzable atomic propositions that correspond to the atomic facts

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Logical positivism

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The philosophy of the Vienna Circle, according to which an purported statement of fact, if not a verbal truism, is meaningless unless certain conceivable observations would serve to confirm or deny it

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Logicism

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The thesis that the concepts of mathematics can be defined in terms of concepts of logic and that all mathematical truths can be proved from principles of formal logic

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Logocentrism

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A term coined by Derrida that refers to the traditional Western ways of thinking about truth, consciousness, and reason in language

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Marxism

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The socialist philosophy of Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and their followers that postulates the labor theory of value, the dialectical interplay of social institutions, class struggle, and dictatorship of the proletariat leading to a classless society

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Materialism

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The theory that only physical entities exist and that so-called mental things are manifestations of an underlying physical reality

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Means (forces) of production

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In Marxism the means of producing the satisfaction of needs

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Metaethics

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The philosophical investigation of the sources, criteria, meaning, verification, validation, and logical interrelationships of moral value

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Metaphysics

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The branch of philosophy that studies the nature and fundamental features of being

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Mirror stage

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In Lacanian theory, the stage of development when the child identifies itself with its own image, separate from its mother

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Modified skeptic

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A skeptic who does not doubt that at least some things are known but denies or suspends judgment on the possibility of knowledge about some particular subject

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Monad

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From the Greek word meaning "unit.'" Pythagoras used the word to denote the first number of a series, and Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz used the word to denote the unextended, simple, soul-like basic elements of the universe

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Moral argument for the existence of God

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The argument that maintains that morality, to be more than merely relative and contingent, must come from and be guaranteed by a supreme being, God

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Moral imperative

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Distinguished by Kant from a hypothetical imperative, which holds conditionally (e.g., "If you desire health, then eat well!"), a moral imperative holds unconditionally (e.g., "Do your duty!")

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Morality of intent

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It is not what you do that matters morally but the state of mind with which you do it

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Moral judgment

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A value judgment about what is morally right or wrong, good or bad, proper or improper

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Naturalist fallacy

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Thinking that a moral value judgment is entailed by a descriptive statement. Perhaps not really a fallacy

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Naturalized epistemology

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The view that the important epistemological problems are those that can be resolved by psychological investigation of the processes involved in acquiring and revising beliefs

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Natural law

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in Hobbes's philosophy, a value-neutral principle, discovered by reason, of how best to preserve one's life; in the Stoic philosophy, a principle of rationality that infuses the universe, to which human behavior ought to conform; in Thomas Aquinas's philosophy, God's eternal law as it applies to humans on earth and dictates the fundamental principles of morality

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Natural law political theory

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The view that questions of political ethics are to be answered by natural law, which alone determines what is right, good, just, and proper (and their alternatives)

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Natural right

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A right thought to belong by nature to all human beings at all times and in all circumstances

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Necessary being

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A being whose nonexistence is impossible

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Necessary/contingent pair

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In the philosophy of Saul Kripke, a necessary truth is a statement that could not possibly be false. A contingent truth is a statement that is true but could have been false

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Neoplatonism

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A further development of Platonic philosophy under the influence of Aristotelian and Pythagorean philosophy and Christian mysticism; it flourished between the third and sixth centuries, stressing a mystical intuition of the highest One or God, a transcendent source of all being

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Nihil in intellectu quod prius non fuerit in sensu

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Nothing is in the intellect that was not first in the senses; an epistemological principle formulated by Thomas Aquinas as an extrapolation of Aristotle's thinking

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Nihilism

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The rejection of values and beliefs

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Nirvana

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In Buddhism, the highest good; the extinction of will and of the accompanying ego, greed, anger, delusion, and clinging to existence. Achievement of nirvana means being freed from all future rebirths

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Nominalism

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The theory that only individual things are real

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Normative ethics

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A system of moral value judgments together with their justifications

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Normative questions

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Questions about the value of something. Norms are standards

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Noumena

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In the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, things as they are in themselves independent of all possible experience of them

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Nous

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A Greek word variously translated as "thinking," "mind," "spirit," and "intellect"

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Occasionalism

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A variant of parallelism according to which an act of willing your body to do something is the occasion for God to cause your body to do it

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Ontological argument

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The argument that God's existence is entailed by the definition or concept of God

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Ontology

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The branch of metaphysics that deals with the study of existence or being

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Original position

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John Rawls' name for a hypothetical condition in which rational and unbiased individuals select the principles of social justice that govern a well-ordered society

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Pan-African philosophy

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A cultural categorization of philosophical activity that includes the work of African thinkers and thinkers of African descent wherever they are located

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Paradox of hedonism

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Henry Sidgwick's term for the fact that the desire for pleasure, if it is too strong, defeats its own aim

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Parallelism

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The doctrine that there are two parallel and coordinated series of events, one mental and the other physical, and that apparent causal interaction between the mind and the body is to be explained as a manifestation of the correlation between the two series

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Patriarchy

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Second wave feminist term representing the set of institutions that legitimized universal male power

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Perception

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A modern word for what Thomas Hobbes called "sense," the basic mental activity from which all other mental phenomena are derived

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Personal identity, problem of

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What are the criteria of sameness of person?

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Perspectivism

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The idea that all perception and conceptualization takes place from a particular perspective

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Phallocentrism

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A Lacanian term that describes the symbolic order in which the phallus is privileged

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Phallus

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A symbolic representation of the penis

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Phenomena

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In Kant's philosophy, objects as experienced and hence as organized and unified by the categories of the understanding and the forms of space and time; things as they appear to us or, alternatively, the appearances themselves

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Phenomenalism

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The theory that we only know phenomena; in analytic philosophy, the theory that propositions referring to physical objects can, in principle, be expressed in propositions referring only to sense-data

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Phenomenological reduction

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A method of putting aside the ordinary attitude toward the world and its objects in order to see the objects of pure consciousness through intuition

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Phenomenology

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The objective philosophical investigation of essences or meanings developed by the philosopher Edmund Husserl (1859–1938)

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Philosophy of mind

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That area of analytic philosophy concerned with the nature of consciousness, mental states, the mind, and the proper analysis of everyday psychological vocabulary

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Political philosophy

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The philosophical study of the state, its justification, and its ethically proper organization

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Postmodernism

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The period of twentieth-century Western culture following modernism that challenges traditional cultural values in a variety of ways

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Pragmatic theory of truth

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In Dewey's and William James's philosophies, a theory of justification according to which (roughly) a belief may be accepted as true if it "works,"; in Peirce's philosophy, a species of correspondence theory

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Pragmatism

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Philosophies that hold that the meaning of concepts lies in the difference they make to conduct and that the function of thought is to guide action

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Prescriptive egoism

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The doctrine that in all conscious action you ought to seek your self-interest above all else

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Prescriptive judgment

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A statement that assigns a value to a thing; a value judgment

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Pre-Socratic philosophers

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Greek philosophers who lived before Socrates - Anaxagoras; Anaximander; Anaximenes; Atomists, the; Democritus; Empedocles; Heraclitus; Leucippus; Parmenides; Pythagoras; Thales; Zeno of Elea

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Principle of noncontradiction

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The principle that a proposition and its contradictory cannot both be true and one or the other must be true

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Principle of reason

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See A priori principle

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Principle of sufficient reason

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The principle that there is a sufficient reason why things are exactly as they are and are not otherwise

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Principle of the identity of indiscernibles

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The principle according to which if entity X and entity Y have exactly the same set of properties, then X = Y

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Private language

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In the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein, a language that can be understood by only a single individual

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Productive relations

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In Marxism, social institutions and practices

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Psychoanalysis

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A psychological theory and therapeutic method developed by Sigmund Freud

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Psycholinguistics

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A branch of linguistics that studies psychological aspects of language

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Psychological hedonism

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The theory that pleasure is the object of a person's desire

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Pyrrhonists

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Members of a school of philosophical skepticism in the Hellenistic and Roman periods who attempted to suspend judgment on all knowledge claims

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Pythagoreans

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Pythagoras and his followers, whose doctrine—a combination of mathematics and philosophy—gave birth to the concept in metaphysics that fundamental reality is eternal, unchanging, and accessible only to reason

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Queer theory

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A theory that deconstructs binary oppositions/sexual boundaries

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Rationalism

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The epistemological theory that reason is either the sole or primary source of knowledge; in practice, most rationalists maintain merely that at least some truths are not known solely on the basis of sensory experience

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Realism

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The theory that the real world is independent of the mind; the theory that universals exist outside the mind

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Red herring

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The fallacy of addressing a point other than the one actually at issue

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Reductio ad absurdum

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Proving a proposition by showing that its nonacceptance would involve an absurdity

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Reductionism

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The idea that every meaningful statement reduces to the experience that would confirm or disconfirm it; See also Translatability thesis

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Representationalism

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The doctrine that true beliefs are accurate representations of the state of affairs they are about

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Representative realism

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The theory that we perceive objects indirectly by means of representations (ideas, perceptions) of them

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Rule-utilitarianism

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A form of utilitarianism (subscribed to by John Stuart Mill) in which the rightness of an act is determined by the impact on the general happiness of the rule or principle the action exemplifies

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Samurai

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The warrior aristocracy of Japan

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Semiotic

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The pre-Oedipal stage when the child does not distinguish between itself and its mother

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Sense-data

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That which you are immediately aware of in sensory experience; the contents of awareness

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Skeptic

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One who questions or suspends judgment on the possibility of knowledge

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Skepticism

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(capital "s") A school of philosophy that emerged in the Hellenistic and Roman periods after Plato; included the Academics and the Pyrrhonists; (lowercase "s") the doctrine that true knowledge is uncertain or impossible

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Social contract

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An agreement among individuals forming an organized society or between the community and the ruler that defines the rights and duties of each

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Socialism

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The theory that communal ownership of land, capital, and the means of production is the best way of serving the common good

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Social philosophy

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The philosophical study of society and its institutions; concerned especially with determining the features of the ideal or best society. See also Political philosophy

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Sophists

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Ancient Greek rhetoricians who taught debating skills for a fee

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Specific difference

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How a thing is specifically different from other things in the same genus

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Stoicism

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(capital "s") The ethical philosophy of the ancient Greek Stoics, who emphasized the serene or untroubled life as the highest good and thought it best reached through acceptance of the natural order of things; (lowercase "s") the practice of a stoic, one who is indifferent to pleasure and pain

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Straw man

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The fallacy of trying to refute someone's view by misrepresenting it

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Subjectivism

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In ethics, the doctrine that what is right is determined by what people believe is right; elsewhere, the theory that limits knowledge of conscious states

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Superego

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In Sigmund Freud's theory, that part of the psyche that functions as conscience

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Switching the burden of proof

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Trying to prove a position by asking an opponent to disprove it

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Synthetic truth (Quine)

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A true statement that is not such that it holds "come what may"

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Tabula rasa

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Latin for "blank tablet"; also, John Locke's metaphor for the condition of the mind prior to the imprint of sensory experience

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Tacit consent

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An implied rather than explicitly consent, as, for example, when you consent to the laws of your state by continuing to live in it

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Tao

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In Chinese philosophy, the Way: the ultimate and eternal principle of unity, meaning, and harmony in the universe; See also Taoism

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Taoism

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One of the great philosophical traditions in China, according to which the individual will find peace and tranquility through quietly following the Tao

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Teleological explanation

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An explanation of a thing in terms of its ends, goals, purposes, or functions

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Ten Tropes

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A collection of ten arguments by the Skeptic against the possibility of knowledge

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Theodicy

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A defense of God's goodness and omnipotence in view of apparent evil

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Theoretical posits

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Entities whose existence we hypothesize to explain our sensory experience

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Theory of Forms

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Plato's central metaphysical concept. See also Form

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Thesis-antithesis-synthesis

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In the philosophy of Hegel, to each thesis there is an antithesis (opposite), and the two are a unity in a higher synthesis

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Thing-in-itself

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English for Ding-an-sich: a thing as it is independent of any consciousness of it

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Third Man argument

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Aristotle's criticism of Plato's Theory of Forms, according to which there must be a third thing that ties together a Form with the particular things that exemplify it

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Thought

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According to Descartes, the essential attribute of mind

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Thought experiment

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Imagining a situation in order to extract a lesson of philosophical importance

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Total skeptic

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One who maintains nothing can be known or, alternatively, suspends judgment in all matters

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Transcendental phenomenology

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An epistemological method that seeks the certainty of a pure of consciousness of objects in the transcendental ego

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Translatability thesis

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The idea that, in theory, statements about the world could all be translated into statements that refer to immediate sensory experience

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Übermensch

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In the philosophy of Nietzsche, the "Superman" who escapes the triviality of society by embracing the will to power and rejecting the slave mentality that permeates society and dominates religion

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Universal

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That which is denoted by a general word, a word (such as "chair") that applies to more than a single thing

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Universalistic ethical hedonism

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The doctrine that one ought to seek, over everything else, the greatest pleasure for the greatest number of people; See also Utilitarianism

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Universal phenomenology of consciousness

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Attempts made by Hegel and Husserl to devise a pure science of knowing

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Utilitarianism

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The doctrine that the rightness of an action is identical with the happiness it produces as its consequence

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Value judgment

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A proposition that explicitly or implicitly assigns a value to something

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Veil of ignorance

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In Indian philosophy, the perspective from which the world is viewed as a multiplicity of things; in John Rawls's philosophy, the metaphor for the conditions under which rational individuals are to select the principles of justice that govern the well-ordered society

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Verifiability criterion (theory) of meaning

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The dictum that a sentence must express something verifiable if it is to express an empirically meaningful statement

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Vienna Circle

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A group of philosophers and scientists centered at the University of Vienna in the 1920s and 1930s who espoused logical positivism

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Virtue ethics

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Ethical theories according to which what I ought to do is what the virtuous person would do; for virtue ethics, the primary question is, What kind of person ought I to be?

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Zen Buddhism

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A form of Buddhism that reached its zenith in China and later developed in Japan, Korea, and the West; its name (Chinese Ch'an Japanese Zen) derives from Sanskrit Dhyana (meditation). In early China the central tenet of Zen Buddhism was meditation rather than adherence to a particular scripture