Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Properly, a perfect demonstration.
  • noun Hence A theorem; a philosophical truth.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun rare A philosophical proposition, doctrine, or principle of reasoning.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun philosophy A philosophical statement, theorem or axiom.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Borrowed from the Ancient Greek φιλοσόφημα (philosophēma, "syllogism") via Latin philosophema ("syllogism"). The Greek was formed from φιλοσοφέω (philosopheō, "to philosophize or pursue knowledge") and the nominalizing suffix -μα (-ma).

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Examples

  • A philosopheme is a demonstrative inference: an epichireme is a dialectical inference: a sophism is a contentious inference: an aporeme is an inference that reasons dialectically to

    Topics 2002

  • The first to dissent was, most unbelievably, Plotinus, one of the most nonrealistic of philosophers, and he turned his dissent into a major philosopheme about symmetry, which he presented in his renowned essay

    SYMMETRY AND ASYMMETRY SALOMON BOCHNER 1968

  • The composition shows the characteristics of a philosopheme or a myth,

    The Destiny of the Soul A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life William Rounseville Alger 1863

  • And so far the Greek philosopheme does not differ essentially from the cosmotheism, or identification of God with the universe, in which consisted the first apostacy of mankind after the flood, when they combined to raise a temple to the heavens, and which is still the favored religion of the Chinese.

    Literary Remains, Volume 2 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1803

  • Now according to the Greek philosopheme or 'mythus', in these, or in this identity, there arose a war, schism, or division, that is, a polarization into thesis and antithesis.

    Literary Remains, Volume 2 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1803

  • The Greek philosopheme, preserved for us in the Æschylean Prometheus, stands midway betwixt both, yet is distinct in kind from either.

    Literary Remains, Volume 2 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1803

  • And this 'not' must be heedfully borne in mind through the whole interpretation of this most profound and pregnant philosopheme.

    Literary Remains, Volume 2 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1803

  • As such it is next to be seen what the several significances of each must or may be according to the philosophic conception; and of which significances, therefore, should we find in the philosopheme a correspondent to each, we shall be entitled to assert that such are the meanings of the fable.

    Literary Remains, Volume 2 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 1803

  • For the quintessence of that which constitutes the basis of the Christian religion -- namely, the leading back of mankind to communion with God by means of salvation -- is not only a philosopheme, a theoretical or mystic doctrine, but a _fact_: it comes into the world as a series of divine _facts_; it is interwoven by innumerable threads into creation and the course of nature and history; and, as to this whole aspect of its appearance in the world of phenomena, it falls under the cognition of the exact sciences.

    The Theories of Darwin and Their Relation to Philosophy, Religion, and Morality Rudolf Schmid

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  • It starts as a commonplace meme,

    Repeated, becomes a grand theme.

    Its freshness once past

    It settles at last

    Retired as a philosopheme.

    January 18, 2018