Canadian Medical Guide > Humanities > Humanities > Philosophy Terms and Definitions

Philosophy

Medical Definition:	A love or pursuit of wisdom. A search for the underlying causes and principles of reality. (Webster, 3d ed)
Also Called:	Hedonism,Philosophical Overview,Stoicism

Philosophy Categories.

	Life - The state that distinguishes organisms from inorganic matter, manifested by growth, metabolism, reproduction, and adaptation. It includes the course of existence, the sum of experiences, the mode of existing, or the fact of being. Over the centuries inquiries into the nature of life have crossed the boundaries from philosophy to biology, forensic medicine, anthropology, etc., in creative as well as scientific literature. (Random House Unabridged Dictionary, 2d ed; Dr. James H. Cassedy, NLM History of Medicine Division)
	Logic - The science that investigates the principles governing correct or reliable inference and deals with the canons and criteria of validity in thought and demonstration. This system of reasoning is applicable to any branch of knowledge or study. (Random House Unabridged Dictionary, 2d ed & Sippl, Computer Dictionary, 4th ed)
	Metaphysics - The branch of philosophy that treats of first principles, including ontology (the nature of existence or being) and cosmology (the origin and structure of the universe). (From Random House Unabridged Dictionary, 2d ed)
	Philosophy, Dental
	Philosophy, Medical
	Philosophy, Nursing
	Postmodernism - A late 20th-century philosophical approach or style of cultural analysis that seeks to reveal the cultural or social construction of concepts conventionally assumed to be natural or universal. (from E.R. DuBose, The Illusion of Trust: Toward a Medical Theological Ethics in the Postmodern Age, Kluwer, 1995)
	Thanatology - The study of the theory, philosophy, and doctrine of death.
	Utopias
	Vitalism - The metaphysical doctrine that the functions and processes of life are due to a vital principle distinct from physicochemical forces and that the laws of physics and chemistry alone cannot explain life functions and processes. Vitalism is opposed to mechanistic materialism. The belief was that matter was divided into two classes based on behavior with respect to heat: organic and inorganic. Inorganic material could be melted but could always be recovered by removing the heat source. Organic compounds changed form upon heating and could not be recovered by removing the heat source. The proposed explanation for the difference between organic and inorganic compounds was the Vitalism Theory, which stated that inorganic materials did not contain the "vital force" of life.

Philosophy Medical Definitions and Terms

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