In knowledge, terminology is the study of the meaning of terms and words, those including prefixes, suffixes, conjunctions, portmanteaus, coinings, etymologies, anagrams, compound words, context of words, e.g. scientific (hard or soft), metaphorical, or analogy, among other aspects.
Overview
In hmolscience, a significant number of two cultures and or two natures (vs one nature), dualism, and or unbridgeable gap conceptualized collisional-like terminology issues exist. While some of these, e.g. "sun rise" (technically the earth rotates toward the sun at start of lightness) and "sun set" (technically the earth rotates away from the sun at start of darkness), these examples being a heliocentric mindset ingraining, are relatively innocuous, others, e.g. "life" (technically there is no such thing) or "death" (technically there is no such thing), these being Heliopolis creation myth (Anunian theology) mindset ingrainings, are not so innocuous, requiring considerable reconceptualization. To give an example of successful upgrade, in the mid 19th century the questionable 18th century terms "living force" (or vis viva) and "dead force" (vis mortua) easily dropped out of circulation, particularly going into the early 20th century, with the acceptance and adopted usage of the terminologically neutral terms: kinetic energy (coined by William Thomson and Peter Tait in 1862) and potential energy (coined by William Rankine in 1853), respectively; terms that cogently scale up and down the so-called great chain of being, molecular evolution table, or molecular evolution timeline, without any sort of anthropocentric or religio-mythology bias or underpinning.
Darwin | Terminology reflections
See main: Darwin on higher and lower
Darwin thought a great deal about terminology, particularly in regards to the terms "higher" and "lower", some communications of which are as follows:
“Never use the words higher or lower.”
— Charles Darwin (c.1845), note written on the margin of his copy of Robert Chambers’ 1844 Vestiges of The Natural History of Creation [3]
Life terminology | Reform
See main: Life terminology upgrades
In 1925, Alfred Lotka, in his Elements of Physical Biology, spends his entire first chapter "Regarding Definitions" on the issue of the definition of "life" form a physical + chemical point of view; about which he says is but a "hunt for the jabberwock", but does not see the remedy.
Terms in the physicochemical sciences have slowly been "upgraded" in the two centuries, according to which formerly anthropocentric or religio-mythology centric terms are or become divested of any terms that are non-physicochemically neutral, i.e. ones that do not extend up or down, unbiasedly, the so-called great chain of being, molecular evolution table, or molecular evolution timeline. To speak of a "living atom" (or living molecule), e.g., is a defunct neoplasm, not recognized by physics and chemistry (Charles Sherrington, 1938), and hence one either to be abandoned (Francis Crick, 1966) or upgraded.
Sociology terminology | Reform
See main: Sociology terminology upgrades
The following, to exemplify, is a description humans in aggregate groups using a chemical thermodynamically neutral (or physical science neutral) one nature terminology, albeit with the exception of the term "society", which is a term not found in the test tube, periodic table and or the chemistry textbooks:
“In the inorganic world we find the power of combination growing with the increase of differences. Place a thousand atoms of oxygen in a receiver, and they will remain motionless; but introduce a single atom of carbon, and excite their affinities for each other, and at once motion will be produced. Such being the case in regard to all other matter, it must be so in regard to those combinations in which man is concerned, indicated by the term society.”
— George Carey (1858), Principles of Social Science (§8: On The Formation of Society)
Likewise, to give a simpler example, the premise of “sociology” defined as the subject of study when people act "social"— from Latin socius “companion” — together is in need of a bit of terminology deanthropomorphization, in respect to one nature cleansing, e.g. in the physical sciences, one does not say that water and wine mix, whereas oil and water do not mix, because the former are “companions” to each other, whereas the latter are non-companions, but rather that wine is hydrophilic, whereas oil is hydrophobic; and if further term clarification is needed, one can interject into physical chemical descriptions and quantifications of each scenario, etc.
Love terminology | Reform
See main: Love terminology upgrades
The subject of love terminology reform is a newer subject; David Bossens (2013) gives a queried example of how love terminology reform is a precipitate of life terminology reform.
Morality terminology | Reform
See main: Morality terminology reform
The roots of the terms "moral" and "vitalism" trace to the mythological characters Mor aka "death goddess" and Vita aka life goddess, in the sense that something considered, deemed, or seen as amoral is considered to bring about the arrival of Mor, whereas something deemed moral acts to bring about the arrival of Vita; the following is an example quote of where using mythological-based terminology issues arise:
“We shall use the terms morality, behavior, conduct, or constructive action in the same broad way. It may sound strange to speak of the morals of an atom, or of the way in which a molecule conducts itself. But in the last analysis, science can draw no fundamental distinction between the conduct of an animal, a bullet, or a freshman, although there may be more unknown factors involved in one case than in the other.”
— William Patten (1920), The Grand Strategy of Evolution: the Social Philosophy of a Biologist
Here, in short, we see a "terminology reform" issue: it is indeed strange to speak of the "morals" of an atom. To reform the term "moral", into a chemical thermodynamically neutral language, however, is a large subject, to say the least — much of which involves a good deal of deanthropomorphization of belief system.
See also
● Self terminology reform
● Soul terminology upgrades (see: Epicurus)
● Spirit terminology upgrades | Spirit → Curious manifestations of material energy (Jevons, 1874) (Ѻ)
Quotes
The following are related quotes:
“The first thing needed is the rectification of names.”
— Confucius (c.470BC), Analects 13:3
“Power, truth, justice: they are words that denote something great, but that something we are quite unable to see and conceive.”
— Michel Montaigne (1580), Essays [2]
“I am always very chary about using such expressions as ‘spiritual phenomena’, because the word spiritual has almost become a synonym of supernatural. Yet the word is a perfectly proper one and ought to be redeemed and freely used, more nearly as a synonym of psychic in its widest sense, and I shall not hesitate so to use it. The last three chapters have been devoted to showing that spiritual phenomena are as much natural phenomena as physical phenomena, that spiritual forces are true natural forces, and that there is a spiritual energy, i.e., a psychic and social energy, that is as capable of doing work as any other form of kinetic energy. In fact it is the highest and most effective form of energy or vis viva.”
— Lester Ward (1907), Pure Sociology [4]
“Historians will have to learn to be as precise in the employment of their terms as is the mathematician and the physicist.”
— Morris Zucker (1945), commentary on terms such as ‘free’ vs. ‘slave’ labor power [1]
“While it was long possible and sometimes tempting for physicists to deny the usefulness of the molecular hypothesis, we economists have the good luck of being some of the ‘molecules’ of economic life ourselves, and of having the possibility through human contacts to study the behavior of other ‘molecules’ (see: human molecular hypothesis)…. If we will be more forthcoming with explanations of our cherished terms, our science colleagues may be more inclined to help us with ‘entropy’, which to me is a more difficult concept than anything economics has to offer.”
— Tjalling Koopmans (1947/79), collected work (aggregate quote)
References
1. Zucker, Morris. (1945). The Philosophy of American History: The Historical Field Theory (pg. 310). Arnold-Howard Publishing Co.
2. (a) Montaigne, Michel. (1580). The Essays of Montaigne (translator: E.J. Trechmann) (Book 2, Ch. 12, pg. 494). Publisher, 1927.
(b) Henderson, Lawrence J. (1935). Pareto’s General Sociology: A Physiologists Interpretation (pg. 33). Harvard University Press.
3. (a) Chambers, Robert. (1844). Vestiges of The Natural History of Creation (higher, 34+ pgs; lower, 28+ pgs). W&R Chambers.
(b) Mayr, Ernst. (1988). Toward a New Philosophy of Biology (pg. 251). Harvard University Press.
(c) Klyce, Brig. (2013). “The Second Law of Thermodynamics” (Ѻ), Panspermia.org.
4. Ward, Lester F. (1907). Pure Sociology: a Treatise on the Origin and Spontaneous Development of Society (thermodynamics, pgs. 97, 168; spiritual energy, pgs. 167-68, etc.). MacMillan.
5. Bossens, David. (2013). Debates of the Hmolpedians (Amz) (Ѻ). Lulu.
External links
● Terminology – Wikipedia.
