| 释义 |
metaphysics, n. pl.|mɛtəˈfɪzɪks|
[pl. of metaphysic n., repr. med.L. metaphysica (neut. pl.), med.Gr. (τὰ) µεταϕυσικά (neut. pl.), an alteration of the older τὰ µετὰ τὰ ϕυσικά, ‘the (works) after the Physics’ (cf. meta- and physics), the title applied, at least from the 1st century a.d., to the 13 books of Aristotle dealing with questions of ‘first philosophy’ or ontology.
This title doubtless originally referred (as some of the early commentators state) to the position which the books so designated occupied in the received arrangement of Aristotle's writings (τὰ ϕυσικά being used to signify, not the particular treatise so called, but the whole collection of treatises relating to matters of natural science). It was, however, from an early period used as a name for the branch of study treated in these books, and hence came to be misinterpreted as meaning ‘the science of things transcending what is physical or natural’. This misinterpretation is found, though rarely, in Greek writers, notwithstanding the fact that µετά does not admit of any such sense as ‘beyond’ or ‘transcending’. In scholastic Latin writers the error was general (being helped, perhaps, by the known equivalence of the prefixes meta- and trans- in various compounds); and in English its influence is seen in the custom, frequent down to the 17th c., of explaining metaphysical by words like ‘supernatural’, ‘transnatural’, etc.]
1. a. That branch of speculative inquiry which treats of the first principles of things, including such concepts as being, substance, essence, time, space, cause, identity, etc.; theoretical philosophy as the ultimate science of Being and Knowing.
Formerly often preceded by the (cf. ‘the mathematics’). Now usually construed as singular.
1569J. Sandford tr. Agrippa's Van. Artes liii. 70 Of the Metaphisickes, that is, thinges supernaturall and the Science of them. 1596Shakes. Tam. Shr. i. i. 37 The Mathematickes, and the Metaphysickes, Fall to them as you finde your stomacke serues you. a1619M. Fotherby Atheom. ii. xiv. §2 (1622) 356 The Metaphysickes, considering the pure essence of things. 1651Hobbes Leviath. iv. xlvi. 376 If such Metaphysiques..be not Vain Philosophy, there was never any. 1677Gale Crt. Gentiles II. iv. 211 May we not take it for granted that nothing properly belongs to Metaphysics but what is Supernatural, as the name importes. 1697J. Sergeant Solid Philos. 459 Hence is demonstrated, that Metaphysicks is absolutely the Highest Science. 1718J. Chamberlayne Relig. Philos. Pref. (1730) 1, I have not made use of the Metaphysicks. 1775Harris Philos. Arrangem. (1841) 368 Metaphysics are properly conversant about primary and internal causes. 1845Maurice Mor. & Met. Philos. in Encycl. Metrop. II. 545/1 It is impossible to follow the track of any great moral question without entering into the region of pure Metaphysics. 1847Tennyson Princess iii. 283 ‘How’, she cried, ‘you love The metaphysics!’ a1862Buckle Misc. Wks. (1872) I. 506 Metaphysics, as it must be the end of all Knowledge, so it was the beginning of all Knowledge. 1951G. J. Warnock in Edwards & Pap Mod. Introd. Philos. (1973) 781, I do not know..how the term ‘metaphysics’ really ought to be defined. I suspect..that it is useless to try to divide philosophy into compartments. 1959P. F. Strawson Individuals viii. 247 If metaphysics is the finding of reasons, good, bad or indifferent, for what we believe on instinct, then this has been metaphysics. 1960C. C. Gillispie Edge of Objectivity xi. 496 Comte had to..repudiate not only metaphysics but also ontology. Thus would he deprive science of any and every claim to deal with objective reality or with any truth deeper than consistency or efficacy. 1967J. W. Yolton Metaphysical Analysis (1968) xi. 189 The typical double level of metaphysics: the level of exposition, which is always external to the system being developed, and the level of participation in the system.
fig.a1658Cleveland Gen. Poems (1677) 13 Call her the Metaphysicks of her Sex, And say she tortures Wits, as Quartans vex Physicians.
b. With of: The theoretical principles or higher philosophical rationale of some particular branch of knowledge. Occas. construed as sing.
1845Craik Hist. Lit. Eng. V. 200 Burke was our first..writer on the philosophy of practical politics. The mere metaphysics of that science..he held..in..contempt. 1859Mill in Fraser's Mag. LIX. 489/2 His [sc. Austin's] book on the Province of Jurisprudence stepped at once into the very highest authority on what may be termed the metaphysics of law. 1872O. W. Holmes Poet Breakf.-t. iv. 125 The metaphysics of attention have hardly been sounded to their depths. 1958W. Stark Sociol. of Knowl. i. iv. 197 A metasociology which would be, not a metaphysics, in so far as metaphysics is divorced from the empirical, but a study of man as he appears in all societies. 1964A. W. Gouldner in I. L. Horowitz New Sociol. 209 This..is a metaphysics of the underworld, in which conventional society is seen from the standpoint of a group outside of its own respectable structures.
c. In various inaccurate or extended uses (partly based on the erroneous etymology mentioned above): see quots. Used by some followers of positivist, linguistic, or logical philosophy: concepts of an abstract or speculative nature which are not verifiable by logical or linguistic methods.
1727–41Chambers Cycl. s.v., Some define metaphysics, that part of science which considers spirits, and immaterial beings. 1776Adam Smith W. N. v. i. (1869) II. 355 What are called metaphysics or pneumatics were set in opposition to physics 1836–7Sir W. Hamilton Metaph. vii. (1859) I. 121 The Philosophy of Mind,—Psychology or Metaphysics, in the widest signification of the terms,—is three⁓fold. 1857Buckle Civiliz. iii. 149, I mean by metaphysics, that vast body of literature which is constructed on the supposition that the laws of the human mind can be generalized solely from the facts of individual consciousness. 1865Mill in Westm. Rev. XXVII. 347 In repudiating metaphysics, M. Comte did not interdict himself from analysing or criticising any of the abstract conceptions of the mind. 1936A. J. Ayer Lang., Truth & Logic 30 Philosophy, as a genuine branch of knowledge, must be distinguished from metaphysics. 1937A. Smeaton tr. Carnap's Logical Syntax of Lang. 8 The sentences of metaphysics are pseudo-sentences which on logical analysis are proved to be either empty phrases or phrases which violate the rules of syntax. 1956J. O. Urmson Philos. Analysis vii. 106 The view of Wittgenstein that metaphysics was not merely outdated as the old positivism had it, but was a logically impossible enterprise, being excluded by the essential nature of language. 1957S. Körner in C. A. Mace Brit. Philos. in Mid-Cent. 126 This principle [of verification]..has dominated European thought for at least three centuries..and its acceptance does not mean, therefore, the end of metaphysics as had been believed by some logical positivists. 1966R. Sternfeld Frege's Logical Theory ii. iii. 55 Thus, the general problem of existence is simply replaced by arithmetical attribution, plus Frege's philosophic superstructure. And this portion of metaphysics is replaced by arithmetic.
†2. Used by Marlowe for: Occult or magical lore. (Cf. metaphysical a. 3 b.) Obs.
c1590Marlowe Faust. i. (1604) A 3 These Metaphysickes of Magicians, And Negromantike bookes are heauenly. |