In science and philosophy, a just-so story is an untestable narrative explanation for a cultural practice, a biological trait, or behavior of humans or other animals. The pejorative[1] nature of the expression is an implicit criticism that reminds the listener of the essentially fictional and unprovable nature of such an explanation. Such tales are common in folklore genres like mythology (where they are known as etiological myths – see etiology). A less pejorative term is a pourquoi story, which has been used to describe usually more mythological or otherwise traditional examples of this genre, aimed at children.
This phrase is a reference to Rudyard Kipling's 1902 Just So Stories, containing fictional and deliberately fanciful tales for children, in which the stories pretend to explain animal characteristics, such as the origin of the spots on the leopard.[2][3] It has been used to criticize evolutionary explanations of traits that have been proposed to be adaptations, particularly in the evolution–creation debates[4] and in debates regarding research methods in sociobiology[2] and evolutionary psychology.[1]
However, the first widely acknowledged use of the phrase in the modern and pejorative sense seems to have originated in 1978 with Stephen Jay Gould, a prominent paleontologist and popular science writer.[5] Gould expressed deep skepticism as to whether evolutionary psychology could ever provide objective explanations for human behavior, even in principle; additionally, even if it were possible to do so, Gould did not think that it could be proven in a properly scientific way.[5]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Just-so_story
Ipse dixit (Latin for "he said it himself") is an assertion without proof, or a dogmatic expression of opinion.[1][2]
The fallacy of defending a proposition by baldly asserting that it is "just how it is" distorts the argument by opting out of it entirely: the claimant declares an issue to be intrinsic, and not changeable.[3]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ipse_dixit
An origin myth is a myth that describes the origin of some feature of the natural or social world. One type of origin myth is the creation or cosmogonic myth, a story that describes the creation of the world. However, many cultures have stories set in a time after a first origin - such stories aim to account for the beginnings of natural phenomena or of human institutions within a preexisting universe.
In Graeco-Roman scholarship, the terms etiological myth and aition (from the Ancient Greek αἴτιον, "cause") are sometimes used for a myth that explains an origin, particularly how an object or custom came into existence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_myth
The "eternal return" is an idea for interpreting religious behavior proposed by the historian Mircea Eliade; it is a belief expressed through behavior (sometimes implicitly, but often explicitly) that one is able to become contemporary with or return to the "mythical age"—the time when the events described in one's myths occurred.[1] It should be distinguished from the philosophical concept of eternal return.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_return_(Eliade)
A hierophany is a manifestation of the sacred. The word is a formation of the Greek adjective hieros (Greek: ἱερός, 'sacred, holy') and the verb phainein (φαίνειν, 'to reveal, to bring to light').
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hierophany
In philosophy of science and epistemology, the demarcation problem is the question of how to distinguish between science and non-science.[1] It examines the boundaries between science, pseudoscience and other products of human activity, like art and literature and beliefs.[2][3] The debate continues after over two millennia of dialogue among philosophers of science and scientists in various fields.[4][5] The debate has consequences for what can be called "scientific" in fields such as education and public policy.[6]: 26, 35
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demarcation_problem
"Apodictic", also spelled "apodeictic" (Ancient Greek: ἀποδεικτικός, "capable of demonstration"), is an adjectival expression from Aristotelean logic that refers to propositions that are demonstrably, necessarily or self-evidently true.[1] Apodicticity or apodixis is the corresponding abstract noun, referring to logical certainty.
Apodictic propositions contrast with assertoric propositions, which merely assert that something is (or is not) true, and with problematic propositions, which assert only the possibility of something's being true. Apodictic judgments are clearly provable or logically certain. For instance, "Two plus two equals four" is apodictic, because it is true by definition. "Chicago is larger than Omaha" is assertoric. "A corporation could be wealthier than a country" is problematic. In Aristotelian logic, "apodictic" is opposed to "dialectic", as scientific proof is opposed to philosophical reasoning. Kant contrasted "apodictic" with "problematic" and "assertoric" in the Critique of Pure Reason, on page A70/B95.[2]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apodicticity
Hans Reichenbach, one of the founders of logical positivism, offered a modified version of Immanuel Kant's a priorism by distinguishing between apodictic a priorism and constitutive a priorism.[3]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apodicticity
Cicero's De Divinatione implicitly used five criteria of scientific demarcation that are also used by modern philosophers of science.[13]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demarcation_problem
Verificationism, also known as the verification principle or the verifiability criterion of meaning, is the philosophical doctrine which asserts that a statement is meaningful only if it is either empirically verifiable (i.e. confirmed through the senses) or a truth of logic (e.g., tautologies).
Verificationism rejects statements of metaphysics, theology, ethics, and aesthetics, as "cognitively meaningless".[citation needed] Such statements may be meaningful in influencing emotions or behavior, but not in terms of conveying truth value, information, or factual content.[1] Verificationism was a central theme of logical positivism, a movement in analytic philosophy that emerged in the 1920s by philosophers who sought to unify philosophy and science under a common naturalistic theory of knowledge.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verificationism
In philosophy of science and in epistemology, instrumentalism is a methodological view that ideas are useful instruments, and that the worth of an idea is based on how effective it is in explaining and predicting phenomena. According to instrumentalists, a successful scientific theory reveals nothing known either true or false about nature's unobservable objects, properties or processes.[1] Scientific theory is merely a tool whereby humans predict observations in a particular domain of nature by formulating laws, which state or summarize regularities, while theories themselves do not reveal supposedly hidden aspects of nature that somehow explain these laws.[2] Instrumentalism is a perspective originally introduced by Pierre Duhem in 1906.[2]
Rejecting scientific realism's ambitions to uncover metaphysical truth about nature,[2] instrumentalism is usually categorized as an antirealism, although its mere lack of commitment to scientific theory's realism can be termed nonrealism. Instrumentalism merely bypasses debate concerning whether, for example, a particle spoken about in particle physics is a discrete entity enjoying individual existence, or is an excitation mode of a region of a field, or is something else altogether.[3][4][5] Instrumentalism holds that theoretical terms need only be useful to predict the phenomena, the observed outcomes.[3]
There are multiple versions of instrumentalism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumentalism
Ramsey sentences are formal logical reconstructions of theoretical propositions attempting to draw a line between science and metaphysics. A Ramsey sentence aims at rendering propositions containing non-observable theoretical terms (terms employed by a theoretical language) clear by substituting them with observational terms (terms employed by an observation language, also called empirical language).
Ramsey sentences were introduced by the logical empiricist philosopher Rudolf Carnap. However, they should not be confused with Carnap sentences, which are neutral on whether there exists anything to which the term applies. [1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramsey_sentence
Scientific anti-realism
In philosophy of science, anti-realism applies chiefly to claims about the non-reality of "unobservable" entities such as electrons or genes, which are not detectable with human senses.[20][21]
One prominent variety of scientific anti-realism is instrumentalism, which takes a purely agnostic view towards the existence of unobservable entities, in which the unobservable entity X serves as an instrument to aid in the success of theory Y and does not require proof for the existence or non-existence of X.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-realism#Scientific_anti-realism
Moral anti-realism
In the philosophy of ethics, moral anti-realism (or moral irrealism) is a meta-ethical doctrine that there are no objective moral values or normative facts. It is usually defined in opposition to moral realism, which holds that there are objective moral values, such that a moral claim may be either true or false. Specifically the moral anti-realist is committed to denying one of the following three statements: [22][23]
- The Semantic Thesis: Moral statements have meaning, they express propositions, or are the kind of things that can be true or false.
- The Alethic Thesis: Some moral propositions are true.
- The Metaphysical Thesis: The metaphysical status of moral facts is robust and ordinary, not importantly different from other facts about the world.
Different version of moral anti-realism deny different statements: specifically, non-cognitivism denies the first claim, arguing that moral statements have no meaning or truth content,[24] error theory denies the second claim, arguing that all moral statements are false,[25] and ethical subjectivism denies the third claim, arguing that the truth of moral statements is mind dependent.[26]
Examples of anti-realist moral theories might be:[27]
There is a debate as to whether moral relativism is actually an anti-realist position. While many versions deny the metaphysical thesis, some do not, as one could imagine a system of morality which requires you to obey the written laws in your country.[28] Such a system would be a version of moral relativism, as different individuals would be required to follow different laws, but the moral facts are physical facts about the world, not mental facts, so they are metaphysically ordinary. Thus, different versions of moral relativism might be considered anti-realist or realist.[29]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-realism#Scientific_anti-realism
In philosophy, the term idealism identifies and describes metaphysical perspectives which assert that reality is indistinguishable and inseparable from perception and understanding; that reality is a mental construct closely connected to ideas.[1] Idealist perspectives are in two categories: subjective idealism, which proposes that a material object exists only to the extent that a human being perceives the object; and objective idealism, which proposes the existence of an objective consciousness that exists prior to and independently of human consciousness, thus the existence of the object is independent of human perception.
The philosopher George Berkeley said that the essence of an object is to be perceived. By contrast, Immanuel Kant said that idealism "does not concern the existence of things," but that "our modes of representation" of things such as space and time are not "determinations that belong to things in themselves," but are essential features of the human mind.[2] In the philosophy of "transcendental idealism" Kant proposes that the objects of experience relied upon their existence in the human mind that perceives the objects, and that the nature of the thing-in-itself is external to human experience, and cannot be conceived without the application of categories, which give structure to the human experience of reality.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idealism
In philosophy, nomology refers to a "science of laws" based on the theory that it is possible to elaborate descriptions dedicated not to particular aspects of reality but inspired by a scientific vision of universal validity expressed by scientific laws.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomology
The deductive-nomological model (DN model) of scientific explanation, also known as Hempel's model, the Hempel–Oppenheim model, the Popper–Hempel model, or the covering law model, is a formal view of scientifically answering questions asking, "Why...?". The DN model poses scientific explanation as a deductive structure, one where truth of its premises entails truth of its conclusion, hinged on accurate prediction or postdiction of the phenomenon to be explained.
Because of problems concerning humans' ability to define, discover, and know causality, this was omitted in initial formulations of the DN model. Causality was thought to be incidentally approximated by realistic selection of premises that derive the phenomenon of interest from observed starting conditions plus general laws. Still, the DN model formally permitted causally irrelevant factors. Also, derivability from observations and laws sometimes yielded absurd answers.
When logical empiricism fell out of favor in the 1960s, the DN model was widely seen as a flawed or greatly incomplete model of scientific explanation. Nonetheless, it remained an idealized version of scientific explanation, and one that was rather accurate when applied to modern physics. In the early 1980s, a revision to the DN model emphasized maximal specificity for relevance of the conditions and axioms stated. Together with Hempel's inductive-statistical model, the DN model forms scientific explanation's covering law model, which is also termed, from critical angle, subsumption theory.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deductive-nomological_model
Nomothetic literally means "proposition of the law" (Greek derivation) and is used in philosophy, psychology, and law with differing meanings.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nomothetic
The existence of God (or more generally, the existence of deities) is a subject of debate in theology, philosophy of religion and popular culture.[1] A wide variety of arguments for and against the existence of God or deities can be categorized as logical, empirical, metaphysical, subjective or scientific. In philosophical terms, the question of the existence of God or deities involves the disciplines of epistemology (the nature and scope of knowledge) and ontology (study of the nature of being, existence, or reality) and the theory of value (since some definitions of God include "perfection").
The Western tradition of philosophical discussion of the existence of God or deities began with Plato and Aristotle, who made arguments that would now be categorized as cosmological. Other arguments for the existence of God or deities have been proposed by St. Anselm, who formulated the first ontological argument; Ibn Rushd (Averroes) and Thomas Aquinas, who presented their own versions of the cosmological argument (the kalam argument and the first way, respectively); René Descartes, who said that the existence of a benevolent God or deities is logically necessary for the evidence of the senses to be meaningful. John Calvin argued for a sensus divinitatis, which gives each human a knowledge of God's existence. Atheists view arguments for the existence of God or deities as insufficient, mistaken or outweighed by arguments against it, whereas some religions, such as Jainism, reject the possibility of a creator deity. Philosophers who have provided arguments against the existence of God include Friedrich Nietzsche and Bertrand Russell.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existence_of_God
Objective idealism is a philosophical theory that affirms the ideal and spiritual nature of the world and conceives of the idea of which the world is made as the objective and rational form in reality rather than as subjective content of the mind or mental representation.[1][2] Objective idealism thus differs both from materialism, which holds that the external world is independent of cognizing minds and that mental processes and ideas are by-products of physical events, and from subjective idealism, which conceives of reality as totally dependent on the consciousness of the subject and therefore relative to the subject itself.
Objective idealism starts with Plato’s theory of forms, which mantains that objectively existing but non-material "ideas" give form to reality, thus shaping its basic building blocks.[3]
Within German idealism, objective idealism identifies with the philosophy of Friedrich Schelling.[4] According to Schelling, the rational or spiritual elements of reality are supposed to give conceptual structure to reality and ultimately constitute reality, to the point that nature and mind, matter and concept, are essentially identical: their distinction is merely psychological and depends on our predisposition to distinguish the "outside us" (nature, world) from the "in us" (mind, spirit).[5][6] Within that tradition of philosophical thought, the entire world manifests itself through ideas and is governed by purposes or ends: regardless of the existence of a self-conscious subject, all reality is a manifestation of reason.[7]
The philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce defined his own version of objective idealism as follows:
The one intelligible theory of the universe is that of objective idealism, that matter is effete mind, inveterate habits becoming physical laws (Peirce, CP 6.25).
By "objective idealism", Pierce meant that material objects such as organisms have evolved out of mind, that is, out of feelings ("such as pain, blue, cheerfulness") that are immediately present to consciusness.[8] Contrary to Hegel, who identified mind with conceptual thinking or reason, Pierce identified it with feeling, and he claimed that at the origins of the world there was "a chaos of unpersonalized feelings", i.e., feelings that were not located in any individual subject.[8] Therefore, in the 1890s Pierce's philosophy referred to itself as subjective idealism because it held that the mind comes first and the world is essentially mind (idealism) and the mind is independent of individuals (objectivism).[8]
Objective idealism has also been defined[by whom?] as a form of metaphysical idealism that accepts Naïve realism (the view that empirical objects exist objectively) but rejects epiphenomenalist materialism (according to which the mind and spiritual values have emerged due to material causes), as opposed to subjective idealism denies that material objects exist independently of human perception and thus stands opposed to both realism and naturalism.[citation needed]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective_idealism
Epiphenomenalism is a position on the mind–body problem which holds that physical and biochemical events within the human body (sense organs, neural impulses, and muscle contractions, for example) are the sole cause of mental events (thought, consciousness, and cognition). According to this view, subjective mental events are completely dependent for their existence on corresponding physical and biochemical events within the human body, yet themselves have no influence over physical events. The appearance that subjective mental states (such as intentions) influence physical events is merely an illusion. For instance, fear seems to make the heart beat faster, but according to epiphenomenalism the biochemical secretions of the brain and nervous system (such as adrenaline)—not the experience of fear—is what raises the heartbeat.[1] Because mental events are a kind of overflow that cannot cause anything physical, yet have non-physical properties, epiphenomenalism is viewed as a form of property dualism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epiphenomenalism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Property_dualism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matter
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Material
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essence
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recursive
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In the philosophy of mind, mind–body dualism denotes either the view that mental phenomena are non-physical,[1] or that the mind and body are distinct and separable.[2] Thus, it encompasses a set of views about the relationship between mind and matter, as well as between subject and object, and is contrasted with other positions, such as physicalism and enactivism, in the mind–body problem.[1][2]
Aristotle shared Plato's view of multiple souls and further elaborated a hierarchical arrangement, corresponding to the distinctive functions of plants, animals, and humans: a nutritive soul of growth and metabolism that all three share; a perceptive soul of pain, pleasure, and desire that only humans and other animals share; and the faculty of reason that is unique to humans only. In this view, a soul is the hylomorphic form of a viable organism, wherein each level of the hierarchy formally supervenes upon the substance of the preceding level. For Aristotle, the first two souls, based on the body, perish when the living organism dies,[3][4] whereas remains an immortal and perpetual intellective part of mind.[5] For Plato, however, the soul was not dependent on the physical body; he believed in metempsychosis, the migration of the soul to a new physical body.[6] It has been considered a form of reductionism by some philosophers, since it enables the tendency to ignore very big groups of variables by its assumed association with the mind or the body, and not for its real value when it comes to explaining or predicting a studied phenomenon.[7]
Dualism is closely associated with the thought of René Descartes (1641), which holds that the mind is a nonphysical—and therefore, non-spatial—substance. Descartes clearly identified the mind with consciousness and self-awareness and distinguished this from the brain as the seat of intelligence.[8] Hence, he was the first documented Western philosopher to formulate the mind–body problem in the form in which it exists today.[9] Dualism is contrasted with various kinds of monism. Substance dualism is contrasted with all forms of materialism, but property dualism may be considered a form of emergent materialism or non-reductive physicalism in some sense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind%E2%80%93body_dualism
Hylomorphism is a philosophical doctrine developed by the Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle, which conceives every physical entity or being (ousia) as a compound of matter (potency) and immaterial form (act), with the generic form as immanently real within the individual.[1] The word is a 19th-century term formed from the Greek words ὕλη (hyle: "wood, matter") and μορφή (morphē: "form").[1] Hylomorphic theories of physical entities have been undergoing a revival in contemporary philosophy.[2]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hylomorphism
Material
Aristotle considers the material "cause" (ὕλη, hū́lē)[15] of an object as equivalent to the nature of the raw material out of which the object is composed. (The word "nature" for Aristotle applies to both its potential in the raw material and its ultimate finished form. In a sense this form already existed in the material: see potentiality and actuality.)
Whereas modern physics looks to simple bodies, Aristotle's physics took a more general viewpoint, and treated living things as exemplary. Nevertheless, he felt that simple natural bodies such as earth, fire, air, and water also showed signs of having their own innate sources of motion, change, and rest. Fire, for example, carries things upwards, unless stopped from doing so. Things formed by human artifice, such as beds and cloaks, have no innate tendency to become beds or cloaks.[16]
In traditional Aristotelian philosophical terminology, material is not the same as substance. Matter has parallels with substance in so far as primary matter serves as the substratum for simple bodies which are not substance: sand and rock (mostly earth), rivers and seas (mostly water), atmosphere and wind (mostly air and then mostly fire below the moon). In this traditional terminology, 'substance' is a term of ontology, referring to really existing things; only individuals are said to be substances (subjects) in the primary sense. Secondary substance, in a different sense, also applies to man-made artifacts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_causes#Material_cause
Teleology (from τέλος, telos, 'end,' 'aim,' or 'goal,' and λόγος, logos, 'explanation' or 'reason')[1] or finality[2][3] is a reason or an explanation for something which serves as a function of its end, its purpose, or its goal, as opposed to something which serves as a function of its cause.[4]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleology
Convergent evolution is the independent evolution of similar features in species of different periods or epochs in time. Convergent evolution creates analogous structures that have similar form or function but were not present in the last common ancestor of those groups. The cladistic term for the same phenomenon is homoplasy. The recurrent evolution of flight is a classic example, as flying insects, birds, pterosaurs, and bats have independently evolved the useful capacity of flight. Functionally similar features that have arisen through convergent evolution are analogous, whereas homologous structures or traits have a common origin but can have dissimilar functions. Bird, bat, and pterosaur wings are analogous structures, but their forelimbs are homologous, sharing an ancestral state despite serving different functions.
The opposite of convergence is divergent evolution, where related species evolve different traits. Convergent evolution is similar to parallel evolution, which occurs when two independent species evolve in the same direction and thus independently acquire similar characteristics; for instance, gliding frogs have evolved in parallel from multiple types of tree frog.
Many instances of convergent evolution are known in plants, including the repeated development of C4 photosynthesis, seed dispersal by fleshy fruits adapted to be eaten by animals, and carnivory.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convergent_evolution
Measuring homoplasy
Some measures attempt to measure the amount of homoplasy in a dataset with reference to a tree,[18] though it is not necessarily clear precisely what property these measures aim to quantify[19]
Consistency index
The consistency index (CI) measures the consistency of a tree to a set of data – a measure of the minimum amount of homoplasy implied by the tree.[20] It is calculated by counting the minimum number of changes in a dataset and dividing it by the actual number of changes needed for the cladogram.[20] A consistency index can also be calculated for an individual character i, denoted ci.
Besides reflecting the amount of homoplasy, the metric also reflects the number of taxa in the dataset,[21] (to a lesser extent) the number of characters in a dataset,[22] the degree to which each character carries phylogenetic information,[23] and the fashion in which additive characters are coded, rendering it unfit for purpose.[24]
ci occupies a range from 1 to 1/[n.taxa/2] in binary characters with an even state distribution; its minimum value is larger when states are not evenly spread.[23][18] In general, for a binary or non-binary character with , ci occupies a range from 1 to .[23]
Retention index
The retention index (RI) was proposed as an improvement of the CI "for certain applications"[25] This metric also purports to measure of the amount of homoplasy, but also measures how well synapomorphies explain the tree. It is calculated taking the (maximum number of changes on a tree minus the number of changes on the tree), and dividing by the (maximum number of changes on the tree minus the minimum number of changes in the dataset).
The rescaled consistency index (RC) is obtained by multiplying the CI by the RI; in effect this stretches the range of the CI such that its minimum theoretically attainable value is rescaled to 0, with its maximum remaining at 1.[18][25] The homoplasy index (HI) is simply 1 − CI.
Homoplasy Excess Ratio
This measures the amount of homoplasy observed on a tree relative to the maximum amount of homoplasy that could theoretically be present – 1 − (observed homoplasy excess) / (maximum homoplasy excess).[22] A value of 1 indicates no homoplasy; 0 represents as much homoplasy as there would be in a fully random dataset, and negative values indicate more homoplasy still (and tend only to occur in contrived examples).[22] The HER is presented as the best measure of homoplasy currently available.[18][26]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cladogram#Measuring_homoplasy
In phylogenetics, basal is the direction of the base (or root) of a rooted phylogenetic tree or cladogram. The term may be more strictly applied only to nodes adjacent to the root, or more loosely applied to nodes regarded as being close to the root. Note that extant taxa that lie on branches connecting directly to the root are not more closely related to the root than any other extant taxa.[1][2][3]
While there must always be two or more equally "basal" clades sprouting from the root of every cladogram, those clades may differ widely in taxonomic rank,[n 1] species diversity, or both.[n 2] If C is a basal clade within D that has the lowest rank of all basal clades within D,[n 3] C may be described as the basal taxon of that rank within D.[n 4] The concept of a 'key innovation' implies some degree of correlation between evolutionary innovation and diversification.[4][5][6][n 5] However, such a correlation does not make a given case predicable, so ancestral characters should not be imputed to the members of a less species-rich basal clade without additional evidence.[1][2][7][8][n 6]
In general, clade A is more basal than clade B if B is a subgroup of the sister group of A or of A itself.[n 7] Within large groups, "basal" may be used loosely to mean 'closer to the root than the great majority of', and in this context terminology such as "very basal" may arise. A 'core clade' is a clade representing all but the basal clade(s) of lowest rank within a larger clade; e.g., core eudicots. Of course, no extant taxon is closer to the root than any other, by definition.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_(phylogenetics)
Metempsychosis (Greek: μετεμψύχωσις), in philosophy, is the transmigration of the soul, especially its reincarnation after death. The term is derived from ancient Greek philosophy, and has been recontextualised by modern philosophers such as Arthur Schopenhauer[1] and Kurt Gödel;[2] otherwise, the term transmigration is more appropriate. The word plays a prominent role in James Joyce's Ulysses and is also associated with Nietzsche.[3] Another term sometimes used synonymously is palingenesis.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metempsychosis
Eschatology (/ˌɛskəˈtɒlədʒi/ (
listen); from Ancient Greek ἔσχατος (éskhatos) 'last', and -logy) concerns expectations of the end of the present age, human history, or the world itself.[1] The end of the world or end times[2] is predicted by several world religions (both Abrahamic
and non-Abrahamic), which teach that negative world events will reach a
climax. Belief that the end of the world is imminent is known as apocalypticism, and over time has been held both by members of mainstream religions and by doomsday cults. In the context of mysticism, the term refers metaphorically to the end of ordinary reality and to reunion with the divine. Various religions treat eschatology as a future event prophesied in sacred texts or in folklore.
The Abrahamic religions maintain a linear cosmology, with end-time scenarios containing themes of transformation and redemption. In later Judaism, the term "end of days" makes reference to the Messianic Age and includes an in-gathering of the exiled Jewish diaspora, the coming of the Messiah, the resurrection of the righteous, and the world to come. Some forms of Christianity depict the end time as a period of tribulation that precedes the second coming of Christ, who will face the rise of the Antichrist along with his power structure and false prophets, and usher in the Kingdom of God. In Islam, the Day of Judgment is preceded by the appearance of the Masīḥ ad-Dajjāl, and followed by the descending of ʿĪsā (Jesus), which shall triumph over the false Messiah or Antichrist; his defeat will lead to a sequence of events that will end with the sun rising from the west and the beginning of the Qiyāmah (Judgment Day).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eschatology
The passive intellect (Latin: intellectus possibilis; also translated as potential intellect or material intellect), is a term used in philosophy alongside the notion of the active intellect in order to give an account of the operation of the intellect (nous), in accordance with the theory of hylomorphism, as most famously put forward by Aristotle.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_intellect
An intelligible form in philosophy refers to a form that can be apprehended by the intellect. According to Ancient and Medieval philosophers, the intelligible forms are the things by which we understand. These are genera and species, insofar as genera or species such as "animal", "man" or "horse" are not found in sensible nature, except as individual man or horse.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligible_form
In philosophy, intelligibility is what can be comprehended by the human mind in contrast to sense perception. The intelligible method is thought thinking itself, or the human mind reflecting on itself. Plato referred to the intelligible realm of mathematics, forms, first principles, logical deduction, and the dialectical method. The intelligible realm of thought thinking about thought does not necessarily require any visual images, sensual impressions, and material causes for the contents of mind. Descartes referred to this method of thought thinking about itself, without the possible illusions of the senses. Kant made similar claims about a priori knowledge. A priori knowledge is claimed to be independent of the content of experience.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligibility_(philosophy)
In logic, the law of non-contradiction (LNC) (also known as the law of contradiction, principle of non-contradiction (PNC), or the principle of contradiction) states that contradictory propositions cannot both be true in the same sense at the same time, e. g. the two propositions "p is the case" and "p is not the case" are mutually exclusive. Formally this is expressed as the tautology ¬(p ∧ ¬p). The law is not to be confused with the law of excluded middle which states that at least one, "p is the case" or "p is not the case" holds.
One reason to have this law is the principle of explosion, which states that anything follows from a contradiction. The law is employed in a reductio ad absurdum proof.
To express the fact that the law is tenseless and to avoid equivocation, sometimes the law is amended to say "contradictory propositions cannot both be true 'at the same time and in the same sense'".
It is one of the so called three laws of thought, along with its complement, the law of excluded middle, and the law of identity. However, no system of logic is built on just these laws, and none of these laws provide inference rules, such as modus ponens or De Morgan's laws.
The law of non-contradiction and the law of excluded middle create a dichotomy in "logical space", wherein the two parts are "mutually exclusive" and "jointly exhaustive". The law of non-contradiction is merely an expression of the mutually exclusive aspect of that dichotomy, and the law of excluded middle, an expression of its jointly exhaustive aspect.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_noncontradiction
The analogy of the divided line (Greek: γραμμὴ δίχα τετμημένη, translit. grammē dicha tetmēmenē) is presented by the Greek philosopher Plato in the Republic (509d–511e). It is written as a dialogue between Glaucon and Socrates, in which the latter further elaborates upon the immediately preceding analogy of the sun at the former's request. Socrates asks Glaucon to not only envision this unequally bisected line but to imagine further bisecting each of the two segments. Socrates explains that the four resulting segments represent four separate 'affections' (παθήματα) of the psyche. The lower two sections are said to represent the visible while the higher two are said to represent the intelligible. These affections are described in succession as corresponding to increasing levels of reality and truth from conjecture (εἰκασία) to belief (πίστις) to thought (διάνοια) and finally to understanding (νόησις). Furthermore, this analogy not only elaborates a theory of the psyche but also presents metaphysical and epistemological views.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analogy_of_the_divided_line
The objects or concepts that have intelligibility may be called intelligible. Some possible examples are numbers and the logical law of non-contradiction.
There may be a distinction between everything that is intelligible and everything that is visible, called the intelligible world and the visible world in e.g. the analogy of the divided line as written by Plato.[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligibility_(philosophy)#Usage
The Absolute is generally regarded as being only partially intelligible. The Absolute is the idea of an unconditional reality which transcends limited, conditional, everyday existence. It is sometimes used as a term for God or the Divine. Other similar concepts are The One and First Cause.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligibility_(philosophy)#Usage
Subjective idealism, or empirical idealism, is a form of philosophical monism that holds that only minds and mental contents exist. It entails and is generally identified or associated with immaterialism, the doctrine that material things do not exist. Subjective idealism rejects dualism, neutral monism, and materialism; indeed, it is the contrary of eliminative materialism, the doctrine that all or some classes of mental phenomena (such as emotions, beliefs, or desires) do not exist, but are sheer illusions.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjective_idealism
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Immaterialism&redirect=no
Incorporeality is "the state or quality of being incorporeal or bodiless; immateriality; incorporealism."[1] Incorporeal (Greek: ἀσώματος[2]) means "Not composed of matter; having no material existence.[3]"
Incorporeality is a quality of souls, spirits, and God in many religions, including the currently major denominations and schools of Islam, Christianity and Judaism. In ancient philosophy, any attenuated "thin" matter such as air, aether, fire or light was considered incorporeal.[4] The ancient Greeks believed air, as opposed to solid earth, to be incorporeal, in so far as it is less resistant to movement; and the ancient Persians believed fire to be incorporeal in that every soul was said to be produced from it.[5] In modern philosophy, a distinction between the incorporeal and immaterial is not necessarily maintained: a body is described as incorporeal if it is not made out of matter.
In the problem of universals, universals are separable from any particular embodiment in one sense, while in another, they seem inherent nonetheless. Aristotle offered a hylomorphic account of abstraction in contrast to Plato's world of Forms. Aristotle used the Greek terms soma (body) and hyle (matter, literally "wood").
The notion that a causally effective incorporeal body is even coherent requires the belief that something can affect what's material, without physically existing at the point of effect. A ball can directly affect another ball by coming in direct contact with it, and is visible because it reflects the light that directly reaches it. An incorporeal field of influence, or immaterial body could not perform these functions because they have no physical construction with which to perform these functions. Following Newton, it became customary to accept action at a distance as brute fact, and to overlook the philosophical problems involved in so doing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incorporeality
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abstract_and_concrete
In ontology and the philosophy of mind, a non-physical entity is an object that exists outside physical reality. The philosophical schools of idealism and dualism assert that such entities exist, while physicalism asserts that they do not. Positing the existence of non-physical entities leads to further questions concerning their inherent nature and their relation to physical entities.[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Non-physical_entity
n).
In the field of optics, transparency (also called pellucidity or diaphaneity) is the physical property of allowing light to pass through the material without appreciable scattering of light. On a macroscopic scale (one in which the dimensions are much larger than the wavelengths of the photons in question), the photons can be said to follow Snell's law. Translucency (also called translucence or translucidity) allows light to pass through, but does not necessarily (again, on the macroscopic scale) follow Snell's law; the photons can be scattered at either of the two interfaces, or internally, where there is a change in index of refraction. In other words, a translucent material is made up of components with different indices of refraction. A transparent material is made up of components with a uniform index of refraction.[1] Transparent materials appear clear, with the overall appearance of one color, or any combination leading up to a brilliant spectrum of every color. The opposite property of translucency is opacity.
When light encounters a material, it can interact with it in several different ways. These interactions depend on the wavelength of the light and the nature of the material. Photons interact with an object by some combination of reflection, absorption and transmission. Some materials, such as plate glass and clean water, transmit much of the light that falls on them and reflect little of it; such materials are called optically transparent. Many liquids and aqueous solutions are highly transparent. Absence of structural defects (voids, cracks, etc.) and molecular structure of most liquids are mostly responsible for excellent optical transmission.
Materials which do not transmit light are called opaque. Many such substances have a chemical composition which includes what are referred to as absorption centers. Many substances are selective in their absorption of white light frequencies. They absorb certain portions of the visible spectrum while reflecting others. The frequencies of the spectrum which are not absorbed are either reflected or transmitted for our physical observation. This is what gives rise to color. The attenuation of light of all frequencies and wavelengths is due to the combined mechanisms of absorption and scattering.[2]
Transparency can provide almost perfect camouflage for animals able to achieve it. This is easier in dimly-lit or turbid seawater than in good illumination. Many marine animals such as jellyfish are highly transparent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transparency_and_translucency
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloaking_device
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloak
Hoodening (/ʊd.ɛnɪŋ/), also spelled hodening and oodening, is a folk custom found in Kent, a county in south-eastern England. The tradition entails the use of a wooden hobby horse known as a hooden horse that is mounted on a pole and carried by an individual hidden under a sackcloth. Originally, the tradition was restricted to the area of East Kent, although in the twentieth century it spread into neighbouring West Kent. It represents a regional variation of a "hooded animal" tradition that appears in various forms throughout the British Isles.
As recorded from the eighteenth to the early twentieth centuries, hoodening was a tradition performed at Christmas time by groups of farm labourers. They would form into teams to accompany the hooden horse on its travels around the local area, and although the makeup of such groups varied, they typically included an individual to carry the horse, a leader, a man in female clothing known as a "Mollie", and several musicians. The team would then carry the hooden horse to local houses and shops, where they would expect payment for their appearance. Although this practice is extinct, in the present the hooden horse is incorporated into various Kentish Mummers plays and Morris dances that take place at different times of the year.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoodening
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