externalism

[ik-stur-nl-iz-uhm]

noun

1. attention to externals, especially excessive attention to externals, as in religion.

externalism

/ ɪkˈstɜːnəˌlɪzəm /

noun

1. exaggerated emphasis on outward form, esp in religious worship

2. a philosophical doctrine holding that only objects that can be perceived by the senses are real; phenomenalism

Other Word Forms

• externalist noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of externalism¹

First recorded in 1855–60; external + -ism

Example Sentences

According to Manzotti’s version of externalism, spread-mind theory, which Parks is rather taken with, consciousness resides in the interaction between the body of the perceiver and what that perceiver is perceiving: when we look at an apple, we do not merely experience a representation of the apple inside our mind; we are, in some sense, identical with the apple.

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Manzotti’s brand of externalism is still a minority position in the world of consciousness studies.

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But despite Khomeini’s interest in iman, Turner argues that neither he nor Ali Shariati, the sociologist who shaped Iranian revolutionaries’ thinking in the years up to the 1979 Revolution, really broke with Safavid externalism.

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For Turner, this Safavid ‘externalism’ gave the Iranian state a deep-seated character that has persisted ever since:

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According to Turner, “it was under Majlisi that Twelver Shi’ite externalism became truly orthodox, while all other views were rejected and often forcibly repressed”:

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