Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun The belief that the human condition can be improved through concerted effort.
- noun The belief that there is an inherent tendency toward progress or improvement in the human condition.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun The improvement of society by regulated practical means: opposed to the passive principle of both pessimism and optimism.
- noun The doctrine that the world is neither the worst nor the best possible, but that it is capable of improvement: a mean between theoretical pessimism and optimism.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun The doctrine that there is a tendency throughout nature toward improvement.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun the belief that the world can be made better by human effort
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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The term optimism as thus extended would also include "meliorism", a word first used in print by Sully to designate the theory of those who hold that things are, indeed, bad, but that they can be better, and that it is in our power to increase the happiness and welfare of mankind.
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 11: New Mexico-Philip 1840-1916 1913
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But given how messianic aspects of neoconservatism would subsequently become it's interesting to note that Kristol also (and in my view correctly) quipped that "meliorism" was all that could be hoped for even though: "Unsurprisingly, "coping" rather than "solving" lacks dramatic appeal for journalists as for politicians."
John Terry’s sacking as England captain tells us something interesting... 2009
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Those opponents of Fabianism who desire something more revolutionary than its political 'meliorism' and 'palliatives' accuse it of alliance with bureaucracy.
The History of the Fabian Society Edward R. Pease 1906
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It is, however, fair to state that the term “meliorism,” coined by William James, describes far more accurately than “optimism” the view of the process philosophers mentioned.
TIME MILI�� ��APEK 1968
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The antonym to meliorism is apologism, which condemns attempts to alter earthly conditions; in this essay apologism stands for the idea that prolongevity is neither possible nor desirable.
LONGEVITY GERALD J. GRUMAN 1968
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Although Descartes differs from Bacon on method - ology, he holds similar views in favor of meliorism, including prolongevity.
LONGEVITY GERALD J. GRUMAN 1968
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What is not meaningful is incremental meliorism in the face of a coming catastrophe and against the opposition of a overwhelming oligarchic hegemony.
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It is important to study the Weimar history, another time when centrists tried accomodation, comity, incrementalism, and meliorism enabled and abetted the murder of millions.
Matthew Yglesias » The Real German Resistance to Hitler: The Social Democrats 2009
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What is not meaningful is incremental meliorism in the face of a coming catastrophe and against the opposition of a overwhelming oligarchic hegemony.
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And it is just such meliorism that numbers among the many emotions Cleopatra feels when she talks about an “armour of gold” for Antony.
BREAKFAST WITH SOCRATES ROBERT ROWLAND SMITH 2010
nuxiy commented on the word meliorism
What is the opposite of meliorism?
March 18, 2009
qroqqa commented on the word meliorism
pejorism
March 18, 2009