telos

[tel-os, tee-los]

noun

plural

teloi 

1. the end term of a goal-directed process; especially, the Aristotelian final cause.

Word History and Origins

Origin of telos¹

1900–05; < Greek télos; tele- ²

Example Sentences

They call their creative process “convoluted” — they get captivated with the seed of an idea, and then hunt around for its telos.

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They kept one foot in Taiwan and raised their son in Chinese-speaking communities, bequeathing to him the “telos of self-improvement baked into the immigrant experience.”

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The manager had to come over, and they were given a new server who didn’t care about the cash value or telos of a comic book.

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“In my experience,” he says, “a telos crisis comes in two forms, walking and sleeping.”

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Diversity for its own sake, without a common telos, is infinitely centrifugal, and leads to social fragmentation.

Read more on Seattle Times