Glossary of concepts

Philosophy 233

• Advaita VedantaSchool of Hindu Vedanta holding that only Brahman is truly real and that the individual self is not distinct from it.
• AgnosticismThe position holding that it is not possible to know with certainty whether God exists, and that suspends judgment on the matter.
• AlienationThe experience of feeling estranged from what we do, from our own life, or from the world around us, even when everything seems in order.
• AnarchismPolitical philosophy that seeks to abolish the state and all coercive or hierarchical authority, replacing them with free and voluntary associations.
• Anti-realismThe position that a statement's truth depends on our capacity to demonstrate it, not on a reality independent of us.
• AntihumanismA critical current that rejects the notion of a universal human nature and the autonomous subject, regarding them as historical, ideological or metaphysical constructions.
• Argument from designArgument inferring the existence of an intelligent creator from the order, purpose and complexity observable in nature.
• AristotelianismPhilosophical tradition grounded in Aristotle's thought, emphasizing logic, teleology and virtue ethics.
• AsceticismA way of life and doctrine seeking spiritual purification through the voluntary renunciation of material pleasures and bodily needs.
• AtaraxiaA state of serenity and inner calm, free from disturbance, anguish and passions, sought by Scepticism, Epicureanism and Stoicism.
• AtheismThe position that denies, or does not believe in, the existence of deities, opposed to theism.
• Authentic existenceA way of living that responsibly embraces one's own freedom and its consequences, rather than conformity and self-denial.
• AutonomyThe capacity of a rational being to give itself the rules that govern its conduct, without submitting to others' desires or external authorities.
• Being and TimeMartin Heidegger's 1927 work that reopens the question of being through an analysis of the human being as Dasein, or "being-there".
• Being-in-the-worldThe fundamental way human beings exist, always already involved in a shared world, so that subject and world cannot be separated.
• BiocentrismMoral theory holding that every living being deserves respect and has inherent value, with life as the central criterion of ethics.
• BiopoliticsA form of power that manages the lives of individuals and populations, making life itself an object of politics.
• Categorical imperativeKant's rational moral command binding unconditionally: act only according to maxims you could will as universal laws.
• Christian gnosisChristian currents that give saving knowledge (gnosis) a central role in the soul's liberation from matter.
• Civil societyThe space of organized citizens and associations that act in public life independently of the state, the market and political parties.
• CivilizationA complex society marked by urban life, the state, specialized labour and writing as a system of record.
• Class consciousnessThe awareness a social class has of its common interests and its antagonism with other classes, and its capacity to act collectively on that basis.
• Collective consciousnessThe set of shared beliefs, values and moral attitudes that unites the members of a society and precedes individual thought.
• CommitmentThe degree of conviction and sustained effort with which a person or organisation pursues a goal or fulfils an obligation they have taken on.
• Common goodWhat benefits all members of a community and can be achieved only through shared action.
• CommunitarianismA philosophical current that places community and its bonds at the centre of personal identity and justice, in contrast to individualism.
• CommunityA group of people who share a place, values, culture or identity and feel united by a sense of belonging.
• CompassionFeeling that arises when we perceive another's suffering and moves us to relieve, reduce or prevent it.
• ConfucianismA system of thought, ethics and ritual that arose in ancient China from the teachings of Confucius, centred on virtue and social order.
• ConsequentialismEthical theory holding that an action's moral rightness depends on its consequences, especially the good or harm it produces.
• ConstructivismThe view that knowledge is actively built by the subject rather than passively mirroring an independent reality.
• ConventionalismThe view that certain scientific, logical, moral or legal principles are useful agreements or choices rather than truths imposed by reality.
• Cosmological argumentArgument inferring, from the universe and its causation or contingency, the existence of an uncaused first cause, traditionally identified with God.
• CosmopolitanismThe idea that all human beings belong to a single moral and political community, beyond nation, culture or city of origin.
• Critical rationalismKarl Popper's view that knowledge advances by subjecting theories to criticism and refutation rather than to justification.
• Critical theoryPhilosophical and social current that analyzes power relations in society and seeks to transform them through critique and action.
• Critique of languageA current of philosophical reflection examining the scope, limits and misunderstandings of language as a tool for thinking and communicating.
• Critique of reasonExamination of the scope and limits of human understanding: what it can know with certainty and where it needs other sources of knowledge.
• CultureThe set of customs, knowledge, beliefs, arts and norms that humans acquire and pass on within society.
• DaoismChinese philosophical and spiritual tradition proposing harmony with the Dao, the natural and unforced course of all things.
• DeconstructionA method of reading, initiated by Jacques Derrida, that exposes the hidden tensions and hierarchies in texts and concepts.
• Deep ecologyEnvironmental philosophy holding that all living beings have intrinsic value and that humans are integrated within, not above, nature.
• DeismThe belief in a creator God who, according to reason and nature, does not intervene in the world afterwards or reveal himself through religions.
• DemocracyA form of political organisation in which power resides with the citizens, who decide directly or through elected representatives.
• DeontologyBranch of ethics that judges actions right or wrong by duties and rules, regardless of their consequences.
• DialecticA method of reasoning that advances by overcoming the contradictions of an idea or reality toward a broader understanding.
• Discourse ethicsMoral theory holding that a norm is valid if all those affected could accept it after free and equal deliberation.
• Divine loveLove that God feels toward humanity or that believers direct toward God, central to spiritual life in many religious traditions.
• DualismA doctrine explaining reality through two distinct and irreducible principles or substances, such as mind and body, or good and evil.
• EclecticismAn intellectual attitude that combines doctrines from different schools, choosing what seems true or useful without adhering to a single system.
• EcofeminismCurrent uniting feminism and ecology, holding that the domination of women and the exploitation of nature share a common root.
• EgoismDoctrine that places one's own interest at the centre of action as motivation and standard, either as a described fact or as a moral norm.
• EmotivismMetaethical theory holding that moral judgments express emotions or attitudes and aim to influence others, without describing facts or being true or false.
• EmpiricismPhilosophical view holding that knowledge comes primarily from sensory experience and empirical evidence rather than from innate ideas.
• EnlightenmentEuropean intellectual movement of the eighteenth century that championed reason, science and liberty against ignorance, superstition and absolutism.
• EpicureanismPhilosophical school founded by Epicurus that aims at a moderate happiness, based on the absence of pain and fear.
• Epistemological holismThe thesis that only a whole set of statements, rather than an isolated claim, can be confirmed or refuted by experience.
• EpistemologyBranch of philosophy that studies the nature, origin and limits of knowledge and the justification of beliefs.
• EpochéSuspension of judgment: the state of neither affirming nor denying anything about an uncertain matter, central to skepticism and transformed by phenomenology.
• EqualityThe condition of those who share the same value, status or right under a given criterion, and the demand that they be treated alike.
• EschatologyThe branch of theology and philosophy that studies ideas about the end of time, of human history, or of the world.
• Ethics of careEthical theory that locates morality in interpersonal relationships, attention to concrete needs and compassion, rather than in general rules.
• Ethics of responsibilityMoral current requiring that one answer for the consequences of one's actions, especially when power is exercised over others.
• EugenicsSet of beliefs and practices aiming to improve a population's genetic quality by favouring the reproduction of those deemed fit and restricting that of others.
• EvolutionismDoctrine that understands the world, life and society as processes of progressive development, from simpler toward more complex forms.
• ExistentialismPhilosophical movement holding that existence precedes essence and that each person defines themselves through freedom, choice and responsibility.
• ExperienceConscious events through which a subject perceives or lives the world, and the practical knowledge derived from them.
• Faith and reasonThe relationship between two forms of conviction, faith and reason, which may be harmonised, opposed, or kept in separate domains.
• FallibilismThe view that no knowledge is absolutely guaranteed, so any belief may be mistaken and open to revision.
• FalsificationismKarl Popper's thesis that a theory is scientific if experience could refute it, though it can never be definitively confirmed.
• FeminismRange of movements, theories and philosophical perspectives defending political, economic and social equality between men and women.
• FormalismA current that gives primacy to form, structure or rules over content or meaning, across philosophy, mathematics, art and law.
• Four Noble TruthsBuddhist statement describing suffering, its origin, its possible cessation, and the path to achieve that cessation.
• Free willThe capacity to choose and be responsible for one's actions, whose compatibility with a deterministic universe is a matter of debate.
• FreedomThe capacity to act and decide by one's own will, free from undue coercion by others or by power.
• Freedom of conscienceThe right of each person to form, hold and change their moral or religious convictions free from coercion, and not to act against them.
• Freedom of expressionThe right to express and disseminate opinions and ideas without fear of censorship or reprisal, subject to limits justified by protecting other rights.
• FreethoughtAttitude holding that beliefs should rest on reason and evidence rather than on authority, tradition or dogma.
• German idealismGerman philosophical movement of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries that, starting from Kant, held that reason and the activity of the subject shape the reality we know.
• GnosticismReligious and philosophical movements of late antiquity that sought salvation through direct, inward knowledge of the divine.
• GraceFavour or help received without prior merit, especially divine benevolence; also charm or elegance.
• HabitusA set of lasting dispositions, acquired through socialisation, that guide how people perceive and act, almost spontaneously.
• HappinessA lasting, subjective positive state of mind that combines pleasant emotions with an overall sense that one's life is full and meaningful.
• HedonismA family of philosophical theories holding that pleasure plays a central role in behavior, value, or what we ought to do.
• HegelianismHegel's philosophical system, which conceives the absolute as a reason that unfolds historically until it achieves freedom.
• HegemonyThe political, economic, military or cultural predominance of a state, group or class over others, sustained by force or by consent.
• HermeneuticsThe art and theory of interpreting texts and any form of communication, focused on understanding meaning.
• Hermeneutics of suspicionA style of reading that approaches texts with skepticism, seeking hidden or repressed meanings beneath their apparent sense.
• HesychasmEastern Christian tradition of inner prayer and stillness, centred on repeating the Jesus Prayer in search of union with God.
• HistoricismCurrent holding that ideas, institutions and values can only be fully understood through their historical development.
• History of philosophyThe systematic study of the historical development of philosophical thought, its doctrines, authors and schools.
• HolismThe view that a system has properties as a whole that cannot be reduced to the sum of its parts.
• Human dignityThe inherent worth every person possesses by virtue of being a free human being, regardless of social status, sex, race or merit.
• Human rightsEntitlements inherent to every person by virtue of being human, universal and inalienable, protected by national and international law.
• HumanismA current of thought placing human dignity, reason and the development of human capacities at the centre of reflection and life.
• HumilityA virtue of knowing one's own limitations, accepting them without vanity, and acting accordingly, far from arrogance.
• Idealist dialecticView holding that reality and history advance by overcoming internal contradictions, driven by the idea or reason.
• IdeologyA set of shared ideas, values and beliefs held by a group that interprets reality and guides action to transform or preserve it.
• Ideology and utopiaKarl Mannheim's distinction: ideology sustains the existing order, while utopia looks to the future with the will to transform it.
• InductionReasoning that moves from observed particular cases to a general conclusion, whose premises support it without guaranteeing it.
• IntentionalityThe property of mental states of always being directed at something, that is, of being about an object, real or imagined.
• IntersectionalityAn approach analysing how categories such as gender, race and class intersect, producing specific forms of oppression and privilege.
• IntuitionA form of direct, immediate knowledge that appears self-evident without passing through explicit reasoning.
• IntuitionismCurrent in the philosophy of mathematics holding that mathematical objects are mental constructions, existing only if they can be constructed.
• Jesus PrayerA brief prayer repeated in Eastern Christian tradition, centered on invoking the name of Jesus as a path of purification and union with God.
• Just warEthical and legal doctrine setting the conditions under which resort to war, and conduct within it, may be considered morally legitimate.
• JusticeThe principle or virtue of giving each person what is due to them and treating individuals fairly.
• KabbalahEsoteric school of Jewish mysticism that interprets the relationship between God, the universe and humanity through symbols such as the sefirot.
• Kantian ethicsKant's ethical theory holding that an action is moral when performed from duty and its maxim can hold as a universal law.
• KarmaIndian principle of cause and effect whereby a person's actions and intentions shape their present life and, in many doctrines, their future lives.
• KnowledgeFamiliarity, awareness, or understanding of facts, skills, or objects, studied by epistemology.
• Language gamesWittgenstein's concept that the meaning of words depends on their use within concrete human practices.
• Li (principle)Neo-Confucian concept designating the ordering reason or inner principle underlying nature and its forms.
• LiberalismPolitical, philosophical and economic doctrine defending individual liberty, equality before the law, tolerance and limited government.
• LibertarianismPolitical philosophy defending individual liberty, private property and a state limited to protecting people's rights.
• LifeworldThe background of taken-for-granted certainties and shared experiences in which we live and make sense of the world before any theoretical reflection.
• Logical analysisA philosophical method that clarifies problems by breaking propositions into their parts and examining their logical form.
• LogicismThe doctrine that mathematics is reducible to logic, and therefore knowable a priori through logical principles.
• LogosGreek term meaning reason, discourse or the ordering principle of the world, central to philosophy, rhetoric and Christian theology.
• LoveA bond of affinity and affection that philosophy has understood above all as a virtue: willing the good of another.
• Mahayana BuddhismBranch of Buddhism centred on the bodhisattva ideal, seeking awakening to liberate all sentient beings.
• MarxismTheory and method that explain history through material conditions and class struggle, and that propose overcoming capitalism.
• MaterialismDoctrine holding that matter is the only fundamental substance and that everything, including the mind, depends on material processes.
• Mathematical intuitionismPhilosophical current holding that mathematics consists of human mental constructions, where existence amounts to the possibility of construction.
• MechanismDoctrine holding that all natural phenomena can be explained by physical causes, without appeal to purposes or immaterial principles.
• MessianismA tendency that expects a decisive change in history through a messiah, savior or hero who will inaugurate a new and fulfilled order.
• Mind-body dualismPhilosophical view holding that the mental and the bodily are distinct, either as separate substances or as irreducible properties.
• MiracleAn extraordinary event, unexplainable by natural laws, attributed to a supernatural cause, often divine.
• Modal logicFormal system studying the deductive behaviour of "necessarily" and "possibly", using possible worlds and an accessibility relation.
• ModernityA historical period and set of ideas, values and practices arising in Europe after the Renaissance, based on reason, science and progress.
• MonismThe doctrine that reality reduces to a single principle or substance, whether material, spiritual or neutral.
• MoralityThe set of customs and norms a community considers good for guiding and judging human conduct.
• MulticulturalismThe coexistence of multiple cultures within one society, and the set of ideologies and policies that seek to respond to that diversity.
• MysticismAn experience of intimate union with the sacred or the absolute, and the spiritual path that leads to it.
• NationalismIdeology and movement holding that the nation should coincide with the state, govern itself, and preserve its identity and sovereignty.
• Natural selectionProcess by which individuals with more favourable heritable traits survive and reproduce more, accumulating changes in populations over generations.
• Natural theologyBranch of philosophy that seeks to demonstrate God's existence and attributes through reason alone, without appeal to revelation.
• Negative theologyAn approach that seeks to approach God by negating predicates, since his essence exceeds every human concept.
• Neo-ConfucianismChinese philosophical movement that revived Confucianism from roughly the tenth to the nineteenth century, adding a metaphysics influenced by Daoism and Buddhism.
• NeoplatonismLate ancient philosophical movement, starting with Plotinus, that holds all reality emanates from a single principle, the One.
• NirvanaState of liberation from suffering and from the cycle of rebirth, the central goal of Buddhism and a concept also present in other Indian traditions.
• NominalismThe doctrine that only concrete individuals exist, and universals are merely names or concepts rather than real entities.
• OccasionalismDoctrine holding that only God is the true cause of what happens, and that creatures are merely occasions for his action.
• Ontological argumentAn a priori argument that seeks to prove God's existence from the mere definition of God as the greatest conceivable being.
• PacifismA doctrine opposing war and violence, seeking to make peace a lasting condition of human relations.
• PantheismDoctrine holding that God and the universe, or nature as a whole, are identical, with no creator separate from the world.
• ParadoxAn idea or argument that seems self-contradictory or contrary to common sense, often revealing the complexity of a problem.
• PersonA rational, self-conscious being with a distinct and singular identity, understood in philosophy also as an end in itself.
• PersonalismPhilosophical current that places the person, free, relational and valuable in itself, at the centre of ethical, social and metaphysical reflection.
• PerspectivismDoctrine holding that all knowledge depends on a particular point of view, with no neutral and definitive vantage point on the world.
• PhenomenalismView holding that we can know only phenomena, as they appear to us, and not things in themselves.
• PhenomenologyPhilosophical movement that describes phenomena as they appear to consciousness, before any explanation of their causes.
• Phenomenology of spiritWork of 1807 in which Hegel shows how consciousness rises, through successive shapes, to absolute knowing.
• Philosophical RomanticismLate eighteenth-century current that valued sensibility, imagination and art as routes to the unity of spirit and nature.
• Philosophy of historyBranch of philosophy that studies the meaning, logic and foundations of the historical process and of historical knowledge.
• Philosophy of languageBranch of philosophy studying the nature of language, meaning, reference, and their relation to thought and the world.
• PlatonismDoctrine holding that eternal, unchanging forms or Ideas have real existence, independent of the sensible world and of the mind.
• PluralismPosition holding that reality, values or methods admit a legitimate diversity of elements, without a single measure or hierarchy ordering them.
• Political theologyThe study of the relations between theological or religious concepts and power, the state and society, with Carl Schmitt as a key figure.
• PositivismPhilosophical school holding that only knowledge verifiable through experience and logic counts as genuine, rejecting metaphysical and theological speculation.
• PostmodernismCultural and philosophical current of the second half of the twentieth century that questions universal truths, grand narratives and the emancipatory project of modernity.
• PoststructuralismA French philosophical current of the 1960s that questions the fixed structures and binary oppositions proposed by structuralism.
• PowerThe capacity to influence the conduct of people, collective decisions or the course of events.
• Practical reasonThe use of reason to decide how to act and what ought to be done, in contrast with theoretical reason, which concerns what is true.
• PragmatismAmerican philosophical movement that measures the meaning and truth of ideas by their practical consequences and usefulness.
• Private languageThe idea, criticised by Wittgenstein, of a language understandable by only one person and based on inner experiences; he argued it would be incoherent.
• ProbabilismA doctrine holding that, without certainty, judgments should be guided by plausibility; in moral theology, it allows following probable opinions in doubtful matters of conscience.
• ProgressThe idea that history and human life move towards states considered better, fairer or fuller.
• ProvidenceThe ordering action of God or a supreme rational principle that guides the world and history toward an end.
• PrudenceThe virtue of judging what is good in each circumstance and choosing the right means to achieve it.
• QiA vital, material and subtle energy or substance which, in Chinese thought, permeates and shapes all beings.
• QualiaThe subjective, qualitative features of experience, such as the redness of red or pain, as they are lived from the first person.
• QuietismA Christian mystical movement holding that perfection lies in inner stillness and the passive surrender of the will to God.
• RealismPhilosophical position holding that reality exists independently of the mind that knows it, and that knowledge refers to it.
• Rectification of namesConfucian doctrine holding that words should match reality and that each person must fulfil the duties belonging to their social role.
• ReferenceThe relation by which a linguistic expression points to an object, class or situation in the world, studied in philosophy of language since Frege.
• RelativismPhilosophical position denying absolute truths or values, holding that they depend on the framework, culture or viewpoint from which they are judged.
• Relativity of knowledgeThe thesis that what we know depends on point of view, conceptual framework or context, with no perspective being absolutely universal.
• ReliabilismEpistemological theory holding that a belief is justified or amounts to knowledge if it results from a process reliable in producing truths.
• RenThe central Confucian virtue of benevolence and humaneness in dealings with others.
• RepublicanismPolitical ideology and theory holding that the state is a public matter governed by its citizens, with popular sovereignty and no hereditary or despotic rule.
• ResponsibilityThe condition of being answerable for one's actions and bearing the consequences of one's decisions before oneself, others or a recognized authority.
• RevelationThe communication to humans of a truth inaccessible by their own means, usually coming from a deity.
• ScholasticismMedieval philosophical and theological movement that sought to reconcile Christian faith with reason, especially Aristotelian, through rigorous logical argument.
• SecularismThe principle that public power and civil affairs should be organised independently of any religion, guaranteeing freedom of conscience for everyone.
• Sense and referenceFrege's distinction between an expression's reference, the object it designates, and its sense, the mode in which it presents that object.
• SensualismEpistemological doctrine holding that all true knowledge originates in sensations and perception, without innate ideas.
• Set theoryBranch of mathematical logic studying collections of objects, their relations and operations, which serves as a foundation for much of mathematics.
• SkepticismAn attitude or theory that questions knowledge claims and demands evidence before accepting them as certain.
• SobornostRussian Slavophile concept denoting the spiritual and organic unity of a community grounded in shared faith and values rather than external authority.
• Social contractTheory holding that political authority and laws are legitimate because citizens, real or hypothetical, agree to give up some freedom in exchange for order and protection.
• Social DarwinismA set of pseudoscientific doctrines that applied natural selection to society to justify competition, inequality and, at times, racism.
• Social factA way of thinking, feeling or acting that is external to the individual, precedes them, and constrains their behaviour.
• SocialismDoctrine advocating social ownership of the means of production instead of private ownership, as an alternative to capitalism.
• SolidarityMutual support among members of a group, grounded in a sense of unity arising from shared goals, interests or needs.
• SolipsismDoctrine holding that only one's own mind is certain, while the external world is unknowable or depends on the self.
• SoulThe inner principle that gives life and form to a living being and, in humans, their immaterial or spiritual dimension.
• SovereigntyThe supreme, independent authority to make and change laws over a territory and its people, not subject to any higher power.
• SpeciesismMoral discrimination against beings based on their species membership, without a morally relevant reason to justify it.
• StateA political organization that, through lasting institutions, exercises sovereign authority and the legitimate monopoly of force over a population within a defined territory.
• StoicismHellenistic philosophical school holding that virtue is the only true good and that happiness consists in living in accordance with reason and nature.
• StructuralismAn approach that explains cultural and human phenomena through the relations that organise them within a system, rather than through isolated elements.
• Subjective idealismMetaphysical doctrine holding that only minds and their contents exist, and that reality depends on the subjects who perceive it.
• SufismThe spiritual and mystical dimension of Islam, centred on inner purification, love of God and the constant remembrance (dhikr) of His presence.
• ŚūnyatāThe absence of an intrinsic, independent essence in phenomena: everything exists dependently on causes and conditions.
• Symbolic violenceDomination exercised without visible physical coercion, through norms and values that the dominated themselves accept as natural.
• SynthesisThe combination of diverse elements, often from distinct traditions or doctrines, into a unified and coherent whole.
• Tabula rasaThe idea that the mind is born without innate content and that all its knowledge comes from experience.
• Tacit knowledgeKnowledge we possess and apply but cannot fully put into words or easily transmit in explicit form.
• TechnologyThe set of techniques, methods and processes humans use to produce goods and services or to achieve practical aims.
• TheismThe belief in the existence of at least one god or supreme being, in contrast to atheism and agnosticism.
• TheodicyThe branch of natural theology that seeks to explain why God, being good and all-powerful, permits evil in the world.
• Theory of descriptionsRussell's theory holding that phrases like "the present King of France" do not name objects but express conditions that something must satisfy.
• Theory of FormsPlatonic doctrine holding that eternal, unchanging Forms or Ideas are the true reality, while sensible things only imperfectly imitate them.
• TheosisThe union of human beings with God, understood in Eastern Christianity as participation in divine life through grace, without losing the distinction between Creator and creature.
• Thing-in-itselfKantian concept designating reality as it is in itself, independent of how it appears in experience.
• ThomismPhilosophical and theological school that continues the thought of Thomas Aquinas on being, causality, God and the soul.
• TolerationThe attitude of permitting beliefs, ideas or ways of life one disapproves of, refraining from imposing one's own view by force.
• Transcendental idealismKant's doctrine that we know objects only as phenomena, shaped by the forms of our sensibility and understanding, and not as they are in themselves.
• TranshumanismMovement proposing that science and technology be used to overcome human biological limits, toward beings with expanded capacities.
• TrinityChristian doctrine holding that God is one being existing in three persons: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
• Universal love (Mohism)Ethical doctrine of Mozi holding that one should care for all people equally, without privileging one's own family.
• UniversalsProperties, kinds or relations that many individuals can share; the debate is whether they exist in their own right or only in the mind or language.
• UtilitarianismAn ethical theory holding that the right action is the one that produces the greatest happiness or well-being for the greatest number of people.
• Value judgmentAn opinion that assesses something as right or wrong, good or bad, useful or useless, based on what we think it ought to be.
• VerificationismThe thesis that only empirically verifiable statements or analytic truths have cognitive meaning.
• VirtueMoral excellence: a stable disposition of character to act well, whose opposite is vice.
• Virtue ethicsAn ethical theory that locates morality in character and virtues, stable dispositions to act well, rather than in rules or consequences.
• VitalismDoctrine holding that living beings possess an intrinsic force or impulse that cannot be reduced to physical and chemical laws.
• VolksgeistRomantic nationalist concept holding that each nation has a distinctive collective character, expressed in its language, customs, art and law.
• WisdomThe capacity to apply knowledge and experience to judge well and act prudently and justly.
• Wu weiDaoist principle of natural, spontaneous action, free of forced effort and artificial interference in the course of things.
• YogaA set of physical, mental and spiritual practices originating in India, aimed at controlling body and mind and attaining liberation.

Literature 32

• CarnivalizationCarnival-style reversal of hierarchies and norms in literature, marked by laughter, parody and multiple voices, after Mikhail Bakhtin.
• CatharsisThe purification and release of intense emotions, above all pity and fear, provoked by watching a tragedy.
• ClassicismA movement that takes the art and thought of ancient Greece and Rome as its model, valuing order, proportion, restraint and reason.
• DadaArtistic and literary movement born in Zürich in 1916 that rejected logic, the conventions of art and the values of the society that had caused the war.
• Death of the authorRoland Barthes's thesis that a work's meaning depends on the reader's interpretation, not on the intention or biography of its writer.
• Drama of ideasTheatrical genre in which the action mainly serves to present and debate philosophical, moral or political ideas.
• Écriture féminineA proposed way of writing specific to women that breaks with masculine discursive models and gives voice to female experience.
• EpicA long, usually verse narrative recounting a people's memorable deeds through a hero who embodies their values.
• EssayA brief, personal prose text that explores a subject freely and seeks to persuade the reader of a point of view.
• HeteronymyThe creation of imaginary authors with their own biography, voice and style, under whose name a work is written that is not the writer's own self.
• IntertextualityThe relationship a text maintains with other texts, shaping both how it is written and how it is read.
• Literary naturalismA late nineteenth-century literary movement that depicts reality with documentary rigour and sees human beings as shaped by heredity and environment.
• Literary realismLiterary movement that depicts everyday life and society faithfully and objectively, without idealization, arising as a reaction against Romanticism.
• Magical realismA narrative mode presenting the extraordinary or impossible as a natural part of a world with a realistic appearance.
• MetafictionNarrative that displays its own fictional nature and questions the boundary between the real and the invented.
• MetaphorA figure of speech that refers to one thing by naming another, based on a resemblance between them.
• MimesisThe representation or imitation of aspects of the real world, especially human actions, in literature and art.
• ModernismA set of cultural movements from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that broke with tradition and experimented with new forms of expression.
• MythA traditional sacred narrative that explains a people's origins, the world and its customs through supernatural beings.
• ReadymadeA mass-produced everyday object that the artist chooses and presents as a work of art, with little or no alteration.
• RhetoricThe art of speaking and writing effectively to persuade, move or delight the audience of a discourse.
• Romantic ironyA literary stance of early German Romanticism in which the work reflexively acknowledges its own limits and its distance from the truth it aims to express.
• RomanticismEuropean artistic and intellectual movement, emerging in the late eighteenth century, that exalts subjectivity, feeling, imagination and freedom over reason and classicism.
• SatireA literary genre, and a device in the arts, that mocks vices and abuses with critical, moralizing or playful intent.
• SaudadeA Portuguese and Galician feeling of melancholic longing for someone or something loved that is absent, mixed with desire for its return.
• Science fictionGenre of speculative literature that imagines possible futures, worlds or technologies grounded in scientific knowledge.
• SemioticsThe study of signs and of the processes through which something means something for someone.
• Stream of consciousnessA narrative technique that renders in writing the continuous flow of a character's thoughts and sensations, with associative leaps and often without conventional punctuation.
• StyleThe particular way a writer chooses and arranges words and sentences to communicate a message.
• SurrealismArtistic and literary movement that emerged in Europe after the First World War, seeking to express the unconscious and the irrational.
• The fantasticNarrative mode that keeps the reader torn between a rational and a supernatural explanation of an inexplicable event.
• The sublimeA quality of greatness beyond measure that arouses awe, admiration and a mixture of fear and pleasure.

Psychology 96

• Adversary psychology
• Analytical psychologyPsychological school founded by Carl Gustav Jung, focused on the collective unconscious, archetypes and the process of individuation.
• Anima and animusJungian archetypes: the anima is the unconscious feminine component of men, and the animus the unconscious masculine component of women.
• AnxietyAn emotional state of unease about a future or uncertain threat, which serves an alerting function and becomes pathological when out of proportion.
• ArchetypeAn original pattern or exemplary model from which other objects, ideas or behaviors derive; in psychology, an inherited image of the collective unconscious.
• AttachmentInnate emotional bond a child forms with its caregivers, providing protection, security and a base from which to explore the world.
• AttentionThe concentration of awareness on a particular task or stimulus while mostly excluding others.
• Basic emotionsA small set of emotions that, according to some theories, are innate, universal and recognizable across all cultures.
• BehaviorismA school of psychology that studies observable behavior and its relation to the environment, without appealing to consciousness as an explanation.
• BiologismView that human behaviour and much of psychological and social life are determined by biological factors, especially genes.
• Childhood sexual traumaLasting psychological harm caused by sexual abuse or contact suffered in childhood or adolescence, when the victim cannot consent.
• Cognitive biasA systematic deviation in mental processing that can lead to inaccurate judgments or irrational decisions, often through the use of intuitive shortcuts.
• Cognitive dissonanceThe discomfort a person feels when their ideas, attitudes or behaviour contradict each other, prompting them to change one to restore coherence.
• Cognitive psychologyBranch of psychology that studies the mental processes of knowing, such as perception, memory, learning and reasoning.
• CognitivismBranch of psychology that explains behaviour through the internal mental processes of knowing, such as perception, memory and reasoning.
• ConnectionismAn approach that explains the mind as a network of simple interconnected units, whose learning consists in adjusting the strength of their connections.
• ConsciousnessThe awareness a being has of itself and its surroundings, and its capacity to notice its own experience.
• CountertransferenceThe unconscious feelings and reactions a therapist develops toward a patient, shaped by the therapist's own personal history.
• Death driveThe inherent tendency of living beings to return to an inorganic state; for Freud, the basis of aggression and repetition compulsion.
• Defense mechanismsLargely unconscious psychological processes by which the mind protects itself from anxiety and from internal or external conflicts.
• Depressive positionKleinian position in which the infant integrates good and bad qualities in one person, giving rise to guilt and the urge to make reparation.
• Depth psychologyPsychological approach studying the relationship between consciousness and the unconscious processes that motivate behaviour and mind.
• Developmental psychologyBranch of psychology that studies the psychological changes people undergo throughout their whole lives.
• DissociationA mental process by which experiences, memories or emotions become separated from the conscious self, ranging from mild detachment to loss of continuity in identity.
• DreamImages, scenes and emotions the mind produces, almost always involuntarily, during certain stages of sleep.
• EmotionA brief, intense psychophysiological reaction that organizes attention, behavior and biological systems in response to something important we perceive.
• Emotional intelligenceThe ability to recognize, understand and manage one's own and others' emotions, and to use them to think and act effectively.
• EnvyA feeling of resentful longing for what another person has or achieves that one lacks, sometimes wishing they lost it.
• Evolutionary psychologyApproach that explains human mental traits as products of natural selection, adapted to problems of survival and reproduction.
• FantasyMental representation of events, scenes or desires that do not exist in present reality, often idealized.
• GestaltPsychological concept holding that perception organizes experience into wholes whose properties cannot be reduced to the sum of their parts.
• Good-enough motherA caregiver who attends to her baby adequately without being perfect, introducing the frustrations the child needs to face in manageable doses.
• Group psychotherapyPsychological treatment in which one or more therapists work with a small group, using the group's own dynamics as a tool for change.
• HoldingThe physical and emotional support the environment, especially the mother, gives an infant; Winnicott's concept, which psychoanalysis applies to the therapeutic setting.
• Humanistic psychologyPsychological movement of the 1950s and 1960s that studies the person as a whole, focusing on freedom, meaning in life and the tendency toward growth.
• HypnosisA state of focused attention and heightened receptiveness to suggestion, induced by a hypnotist or self-induced, whose nature is still debated.
• HysteriaAn old medical diagnosis for symptoms without apparent organic cause, long blamed on the womb and later on mental disorders.
• IdIn Freud's theory, the unconscious instance of the psyche that gathers the drives and seeks immediate satisfaction of desires.
• Ideal selfThe image of what a person would like to be, with the qualities and values they consider desirable.
• Individual psychologyTherapeutic method and theory by Alfred Adler that understands the person as a goal-directed whole, centered on social belonging and the feeling of inferiority.
• IndividuationThe process of integrating the conscious and the unconscious through which a person becomes a psychological whole, distinct from the collective.
• Infantile sexualityThe expression of sexuality in childhood, before puberty, which Freud considered central to psychic development.
• IntelligenceThe mental capacity to perceive, retain and apply information to adaptive behaviour within a context.
• IntrospectionDirect examination by a person of their own mental states, the central method of early experimental psychology.
• LanguageA structured system of signs and combinatorial rules through which people communicate thoughts, emotions and experiences.
• LearningThe process by which knowledge, skills or behaviour are acquired in a relatively lasting way through experience.
• Logic of the signifierLacanian approach holding that the unconscious is structured like a language and that its effects are read through chains of signifiers.
• Mass psychologyBranch of social psychology that studies how people's behavior changes when they become part of a collective.
• MemoryThe capacity to encode, store and retrieve information, allowing the past to shape present action.
• Methodological behaviorismPsychological position holding that science should study only observable, measurable behavior, excluding internal mental states as objects of inquiry.
• Mirror stageStage of early childhood, around six to eighteen months, in which the infant recognizes itself as a unified whole in its reflected image, forming the basis of the ego.
• MotivationInternal state that activates, directs and sustains behavior toward a goal, explaining why we act.
• Multiple intelligencesHoward Gardner's theory that intelligence consists of several relatively independent capacities, such as linguistic, musical or interpersonal intelligence.
• NarcissismA personality tendency centred on oneself and one's self-image, ranging from a healthy form to a pathological one.
• Obsessive disorderA condition marked by intrusive, recurrent thoughts or urges that cause distress, and by repetitive behaviours aimed at relieving it.
• Oedipus complexA set of unconscious, ambivalent desires a child feels toward its parents, a central concept of Freudian psychoanalysis.
• Operant conditioningLearning in which a voluntary behavior increases or decreases depending on its consequences, whether rewards or punishments.
• ParanoiaPersistent distrust and suspicion of others, which in extreme form become delusions of persecution.
• Paranoid-schizoid positionAn infant's state of mind, up to about four or six months, in which objects and the self are divided into good and bad.
• Penis envyFreudian concept holding that a girl, upon realizing she has no penis, desires one, a desire that shapes her psychosexual development.
• PerceptionThe process by which the brain identifies, interprets and organizes sensory information to represent the surrounding environment.
• PersonalityThe stable set of thoughts, feelings and behaviors that distinguishes each person and partly predicts how they will act.
• PhrenologyNineteenth-century pseudoscientific doctrine claiming to determine character and mental faculties from the shape of the skull.
• Primary narcissismIn Freud's account, the initial state in which libido is directed wholly toward the self before external objects are recognised.
• Projective identificationA defense mechanism in which a person projects unacceptable parts of themselves onto another, who comes to experience them as their own.
• PsycheThe totality of human mental processes, conscious and unconscious, forming the mind as a unified whole; from Greek, 'soul'.
• Psychic beingIn Sri Aurobindo's Integral Yoga, the inner, permanent divine presence in a person that guides outer life and evolves across successive lifetimes.
• PsychoanalysisA theory, therapy and research method founded by Sigmund Freud that studies unconscious mental processes and their influence on behavior.
• PsychopathologyThe study of disturbances that negatively affect the mind and of the mental disorders that result from them.
• PsychophysicsBranch of psychology that quantitatively studies the relationship between physical stimuli and the sensations or perceptions they produce.
• PsychosisA mental state in which contact with reality is lost, marked by hallucinations, delusions or disorganized thinking.
• PsychotherapyPsychological treatment that, through regular interaction between professional and person, seeks to change behaviour, relieve distress and improve well-being.
• ResilienceThe capacity of people to recover from emotional pain and adverse situations, reorganising their lives afterwards.
• SchizophreniaA group of serious, often chronic mental disorders that disturb perception of reality, thinking, emotion and behaviour.
• Self psychologyPsychoanalytic theory by Heinz Kohut that locates psychological suffering in a weakened self and emphasizes empathy and selfobjects as sources of repair.
• Self-actualizationThe full realization of a person's own potential, understood differently in Western psychology and in Indian religious traditions.
• Self-efficacyA person's belief in their capacity to carry out the actions needed to reach a specific result.
• ShadowIn Jung's psychology, the part of the personality that the individual does not recognise as their own and tends to project onto others.
• Social cognitionArea of psychology that studies how people process, store and apply information about others and social situations.
• Social psychologyScientific study of how people's thoughts, feelings, and behaviors are shaped by the real, imagined, or implied presence of others.
• Social selfThe dimension of the self that forms and is recognised through relationships with other people and the community one lives in.
• SublimationDefence mechanism by which an unacceptable impulse is channelled into socially valued activities such as art or work.
• SuggestionPsychological process by which an idea or stimulus guides thoughts, emotions or behaviour without conscious effort.
• SuperegoThe psychic agency that internalises moral norms and prohibitions, generating guilt and self-criticism.
• SynchronicityA meaningful coincidence in time of two events linked by significance rather than by cause and effect.
• The imaginaryIn Lacanian psychology, the register of identification with images, in which the ego forms by recognising itself in likenesses and reflections.
• The unconsciousThe part of mental life inaccessible to consciousness that influences thoughts, behaviour and emotions without the person being aware of it.
• Theory of mindThe capacity to attribute beliefs, desires, intentions and emotions to others, and to predict their behaviour from them.
• Transactional analysisPsychotherapy theory and method developed by Eric Berne that analyses interpersonal transactions and ego states (parent, adult, child) to understand behaviour.
• TransferenceUnconscious redirection onto a person in the present of feelings and desires originating in earlier relationships, especially childhood ones.
• Transitional objectA concrete item, such as a blanket or a soft toy, that a child uses for comfort when separated from its mother; for Winnicott, a bridge between self and world.
• Transpersonal psychologyA branch of psychology that integrates spiritual and transcendent human experience into psychological study and practice.
• TraumaA severe emotional injury caused by an adverse experience that a person cannot adequately process.
• True and false selfWinnicott's dualism: the true self is the spontaneous, authentic part of the person; the false self is an adaptive defence that protects it.
• Unconditional positive regardThe basic acceptance and support of a person without conditions, regardless of what they say or do; a pillar of Carl Rogers's client-centred therapy.
• VölkerpsychologieBranch of psychology that studies collective mental processes, such as language, myth or religion, through historical and comparative methods.