Meaning (existential)
Meaning in existentialism is ''descriptive'' regarding "the meaning of life"; therefore it is unlike typical, ''prescriptive'' conceptions. Due to the methods of existentialism, prescriptive or declarative statements about meaning are unjustified. The root of the word "meaning" is "mean", which is the way someone or something is conveyed, interpreted, or represented. Each individual has his or her own form of unique perspective; meaning is, therefore, purely subjective. Meaning is the way something is understood by an individual; in turn, this subjective meaning is also how the individual may identify it. Meaning is the personal significance of something physical or abstract. This would include the assigning of value(s) to such significance. Kierkegaard For Kierkegaard, meaning does not equal knowledge, although both are important. Meaning, for Kierkegaard, is a lived experience, a quest to find one's values, beliefs, and purpose in a meaningless world. As a Christian, Kie ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Existentialism
Existentialism is a family of philosophical views and inquiry that explore the human individual's struggle to lead an authentic life despite the apparent absurdity or incomprehensibility of existence. In examining meaning, purpose, and value, existentialist thought often includes concepts such as existential crises, angst, courage, and freedom. Existentialism is associated with several 19th- and 20th-century European philosophers who shared an emphasis on the human subject, despite often profound differences in thought. Among the 19th-century figures now associated with existentialism are philosophers Søren Kierkegaard and Friedrich Nietzsche, as well as novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky, all of whom critiqued rationalism and concerned themselves with the problem of meaning. The word ''existentialism'', however, was not coined until the mid 20th century, during which it became most associated with contemporaneous philosophers Jean-Paul Sartre, Martin Heidegger, Simone de Beau ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Affluence
Wealth is the abundance of Value (economics), valuable financial assets or property, physical possessions which can be converted into a form that can be used for financial transaction, transactions. This includes the core meaning as held in the originating Old English word , which is from an Indo-European languages, Indo-European word stem. The modern concept of wealth is of significance in all areas of economics, and clearly so for economic growth, growth economics and development economics, yet the meaning of wealth is context-dependent. A person possessing a substantial net worth is known as ''wealthy''. Net worth is defined as the current value of one's assets less liabilities (excluding the principal in trust accounts). At the most general level, economists may define wealth as "the total of anything of value" that captures both the subjective nature of the idea and the idea that it is not a fixed or static concept. Various definitions and concepts of wealth have been asser ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Metaphysical Properties
Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that examines the basic structure of reality. It is traditionally seen as the study of mind-independent features of the world, but some theorists view it as an inquiry into the conceptual framework of human understanding. Some philosophers, including Aristotle, designate metaphysics as first philosophy to suggest that it is more fundamental than other forms of philosophical inquiry. Metaphysics encompasses a wide range of general and abstract topics. It investigates the nature of existence, the features all entities have in common, and their division into categories of being. An influential division is between particulars and universals. Particulars are individual unique entities, like a specific apple. Universals are general features that different particulars have in common, like the color . Modal metaphysics examines what it means for something to be possible or necessary. Metaphysicians also explore the concepts of space, time, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Meaning (philosophy)
In philosophymore specifically, in its sub-fields semantics, semiotics, philosophy of language, metaphysics, and metasemanticsmeaning "is a relationship between two sorts of things: signs and the kinds of things they intend, express, or signify". The types of meanings vary according to the types of the thing that is being represented. There are: *the things, which might have meaning; *things that are also signs of other things, and therefore are always meaningful (i.e., natural signs of the physical world and ideas within the mind); *things that are necessarily meaningful, such as words and nonverbal symbols. The major contemporary positions of meaning come under the following partial definitions of meaning: *psychological theories, involving notions of thought, intention, or understanding; *logical theories, involving notions such as intension, cognitive content, or sense, along with extension, reference, or denotation; *message, content, information, or communication; * trut ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Man's Search For Meaning
''Man's Search for Meaning'' () is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, and describing his psychotherapeutic method, which involved identifying a purpose to each person's life through one of three ways: the completion of tasks, caring for another person, or finding meaning by facing suffering with dignity. Frankl observed that among the fellow inmates in the concentration camp, those who survived were able to connect with a purpose in life to feel positive about and who then immersed themselves in imagining that purpose in their own way, such as conversing with an (imagined) loved one. According to Frankl, the way a prisoner imagined the future affected his longevity. The book intends to answer the question "How was everyday life in a concentration camp reflected in the mind of the average prisoner?" Part One constitutes Frankl's analysis of his experiences in the concentration camps, while Part ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Viktor Frankl
Viktor Emil Frankl (; 26 March 1905 – 2 September 1997) was an Austrian neurologist, psychologist, philosopher, and The Holocaust, Holocaust survivor, who founded logotherapy, a school of psychotherapy that describes a search for a life's meaning as the central human motivational force. Logotherapy is part of existential therapy, existential and humanistic psychology theories. Logotherapy was promoted as the third school of Viennese Psychotherapy, after those established by Sigmund Freud and Alfred Adler. Frankl published 39 books. The autobiographical ''Man's Search for Meaning'', a best-selling book, is based on his experiences in various Nazi concentration camps. Early life Frankl was born the middle of three children to Gabriel Frankl, a civil servant in the Ministry of Social Service, and Elsa (née Lion), a Jewish family, in Vienna, in what was then the Austria-Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Empire. His interest in psychology and the role of meaning developed when he began t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Holocaust
The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe, around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population. The murders were carried out primarily through mass shootings and poison gas in extermination camps, chiefly Auschwitz concentration camp#Auschwitz II-Birkenau, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Treblinka extermination camp, Treblinka, Belzec extermination camp, Belzec, Sobibor extermination camp, Sobibor, and Chełmno extermination camp, Chełmno in Occupation of Poland (1939–1945), occupied Poland. Separate Nazi persecutions killed a similar or larger number of non-Jewish civilians and prisoners of war (POWs); the term ''Holocaust'' is sometimes used to include the murder and persecution of Victims of Nazi ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Economic Materialism
Economic materialism can be described as either a personal attitude that attaches importance to acquiring (and often consuming) material goods, or as a logistical analysis of how physical resources are shaped into consumable products. The use of the term "materialistic" to describe a person's personality or a society tends to have a negative or critical connotation. Also called acquisitiveness, it is often associated with a value system that regards social status as being determined by affluence (see conspicuous consumption), as well as the belief that possessions can provide happiness, which has been critiqued as a lie brought about by capitalism. Environmentalism can be considered a competing orientation to materialism. The definition of materialism coincides with how and why resources to extract and create the material object are logistically formed. "Success materialism" can be considered a pragmatic form of enlightened self-interest based on a prudent understanding of t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hedonism
Hedonism is a family of Philosophy, philosophical views that prioritize pleasure. Psychological hedonism is the theory that all human behavior is Motivation, motivated by the desire to maximize pleasure and minimize pain. As a form of Psychological egoism, egoism, it suggests that people only help others if they expect a personal benefit. Axiological hedonism is the view that pleasure is the sole source of Intrinsic value (ethics), intrinsic value. It asserts that other things, like knowledge and money, only have value insofar as they produce pleasure and reduce pain. This view divides into quantitative hedonism, which only considers the intensity and duration of pleasures, and qualitative hedonism, which identifies quality as another relevant factor. The closely related position of prudential hedonism states that pleasure and pain are the only factors of well-being. Ethical hedonism applies axiological hedonism to morality, arguing that people have a moral obligation, moral dut ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pleasure Principle (psychology)
In Freudian psychoanalysis, the pleasure principle () is the instinctive seeking of pleasure and avoiding of pain to satisfy biological and psychological needs. Specifically, the pleasure principle is the animating force behind the id. Precursors Epicurus in the ancient world, and later Jeremy Bentham, laid stress upon the role of pleasure in directing human life, the latter stating: "Nature has placed mankind under the governance of two sovereign masters, ''pain'' and ''pleasure''". Freud's most immediate predecessor and guide however was Gustav Theodor Fechner and his psychophysics. Freudian developments Freud used the idea that the mind seeks pleasure and avoids pain in his ''Project for a Scientific Psychology'' of 1895, as well as in the theoretical portion of '' The Interpretation of Dreams'' of 1900, where he termed it the 'unpleasure principle'.''On Metapsychology'', p. 36. In the ''Two Principles of Mental Functioning'' of 1911, contrasting it with the reality prin ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Meaning Of Life
The meaning of life is the concept of an individual's life, or existence in general, having an intrinsic value (ethics), inherent significance or a Meaning (philosophy), philosophical point. There is no consensus on the specifics of such a concept or whether the concept itself even exists in any Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), objective sense. Thinking and discourse on the topic is sought in the English language through questions such as—but not limited to—"What is the meaning of life?", "What is the purpose of existence?", and "Why are Human, we World, here?". There have been many proposed answers to these questions from many different cultural and ideological backgrounds. The search for life's meaning has produced much philosophical, scientific, theological, and metaphysics, metaphysical speculation throughout history. Different people and cultures believe different things for the answer to this question. Opinions vary on the usefulness of using time and Resource, ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Will To Power
The will to power () is a concept in the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche. The will to power describes what Nietzsche may have believed to be the main driving force in humans. However, the concept was never systematically defined in Nietzsche's work, leaving its interpretation open to debate. Usage of the term by Nietzsche can be summarized as self-determination, the concept of actualizing one's will onto one's self or one's surroundings, and coincides heavily with egoism. ''Kraft'' vs. ''Macht'' Some of the misconceptions of the will to power, including Nazi appropriation of Nietzsche's philosophy, arise from overlooking Nietzsche's distinction between ''Kraft'' ("force" or "strength") and ''Macht'' ("power" or "might"). ''Kraft'' is primordial strength that may be exercised by anything possessing it, while ''Macht'' is, within Nietzsche's philosophy, closely tied to sublimation and "self-overcoming", the conscious channeling of ''Kraft'' for creative purposes. Early infl ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |