different between positivism vs materialism

English

Etymology

From French positivisme, from positif (“positive”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?p?z?t?v??zm/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?p?z?t?v??zm/

Noun

positivism (countable and uncountable, plural positivisms)

1. (philosophy) A doctrine that states that the only authentic knowledge is scientific knowledge, and that such knowledge can only come from positive affirmation of theories through strict scientific method, refusing every form of metaphysics.
2. (law) A school of thought in jurisprudence in which the law is seen as separated from moral values; i.e. the law is posited by lawmakers (humans); legal positivism.

Antonyms

• (in philosophy): antipositivism

Derived terms

• logical positivism
• legal positivism
• neopositivism

Translations

English

Etymology

From French matérialisme; surface etymology is material +? -ism.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /m??t??i?l?z?m/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /m??t???i?l?z?m/
• Hyphenation: ma?te?ri?al?ism

Noun

materialism (countable and uncountable, plural materialisms)

1. Constant concern over material possessions and wealth; a great or excessive regard for worldly concerns.
   • 2010, Nuala O'Faolain, A More Complex Truth, "An Ugly Little War":

     We accept that a third of the population live on the poverty line. We accept that only a handful of the most exceptional of the children of the poor will make it through to a third-level education. We accept massive examples of greed and dishonesty in public life. We except the values of materialism. What do we expect then—to be left un-harassed, we who have all the privileges?

2. (philosophy) The philosophical belief that nothing exists beyond what is physical.
   • 1814, Joseph S. Buckminster, The Sermons by the Late Rev. Joseph S. Buckminster, Sermon I:

     The result of the labours of philosophy appeared to be a total scepticism on the most important subjects of hu man duty and expectation. The irregular fears of a future state had been supplanted by the materialism of Epicurus; and this system—if system it may be called, which left them without a God, a providence, a morality, or a retribution—was the fashionable philosophy of the more cultivated classes.

   • 1902, William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience, Lecture I:

     Medical materialism seems indeed a good appellation for the too simple-minded system of thought which we are considering. ... All such mental over-tensions, it says, are, when you come to the bottom of the matter, mere affairs of diathesis (auto-intoxications most probably), due to the perverted action of various glands which physiology will yet discover.
3. (obsolete, rare) Material substances in the aggregate; matter.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of A. Chalmers to this entry?)

Synonyms

• (philosophy): physicalism
• (philosophy): philosophical materialism

Antonyms

• (philosophy): idealism

Derived terms

• new materialism
• philosophical materialism
• scientific materialism
• speculative materialism
• transcendental materialism

Related terms

• materialistic
• materialist

Translations

See also

• idealism
• physicalism

Further reading

• materialism in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• materialism in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• "materialism" in Raymond Williams, Keywords (revised), 1983, Fontana Press, page 197.

Romanian

Etymology

From French matérialisme

Noun

materialism n (uncountable)

1. materialism

Declension

Swedish

Etymology

materiell +? -ism

Noun

materialism c

1. materialism

Declension

Related terms

• materialist
• materialistisk