Philosophy Midterm Vocabulary

• Vocabulary list: 1 to 20

Platitude (platitudinous, platitudinously)

Platitude (platitudinous, platitudinously)

a remark or statement, especially one with a moral content, that has been used too often to be interesting or thoughtful.

• i.e., Prime Minister saying “We need to help our country”

To falsify (falsification)

1. alter (information or evidence) so as to mislead.

   • i.e., “a laboratory which was alleged to have __________ test results"

2. prove (a statement or theory) to be false

   • less common definition

   • i.e., “the hypothesis is falsified by the evidence”

Plausible (plausibility, plausibly)

(of an argument or statement) seeming reasonable or probably

• i.e., a plausible explanation

Implicit (implicitly)

implied though not plainly expressed

• i.e., “comments seen as implicit criticism of policies”

Explicit (explicitly)

stated clearly and in detail, leaving no room for confusion or doubt

• “the speaker’s intentions were not made explicit”

Defensible (defensibly)

actions, ideas, thesis capable of being justified by argument (i.e., relativism is not ______________)

To venerate (veneration, venerable, venerably)

to regard with great respect; revere (i.e., they ___________ Mother Theresa as a saint)

Coherent (coherence, to cohere, coherently)

• (of an argument, theory, or policy) logical and consistent.

• doesn’t make an argument true but gives reliability

• i.e., "they failed to develop a coherent economic strategy"

To corroborate (corroboration)

• to understand a subject by picking out its most obvious cases i.e., examining a mother-daughter relationship when examining the topic of love)

Superficial (superficiality)

existing or occurring at the surface

Profound (profundity)

very great or intense

i.e.,

id est; that is

e.g.,

exempli gratia; for example

ibid

ibidem; in the same place

Ubiquitous (ubiquity)

present in all places at once (it’s everywhere— can’t escape it)

Precise (precision, precisely)

accurate

Concise (concision, concisely)

given a lot of information clearly and in a few words

To inculcate (inculcation)

to impress upon something or to refer to a person/teacher— they’re inculcating values/habits into anther set of people

Qua

isolating something and looking at it from one area

Phenomenon

what we observe/encounter— to show/reveal itself

To impugn

dispute the truth, validity, or honesty (of a statement or motive)

Ambiguous

unclear, multiple meanings/interpretations

Unambiguous

clear; opposite of ambiguous

Equivocal

without proper clarity; the same word is used but with a different meaning each time (i.e., the ____________ nature of her remarks)

Unequivocal

with proper clarity; in a way that leaves no doubt

To explicate

to analyze/develop something; to explain something (i.e., attempting to explicate the relationship between crime and economic forces)

To entail

implication; what follows; to involve (something) as a necessary or inevitable part or consequence (i.e., a situation that entails considerable risks)