vitalism

American  

[vahyt-l-iz-uhm] / ˈvaɪt lˌɪz əm /

1. the doctrine that phenomena are only partly controlled by mechanical forces, and are in some measure self-determining.

2. Biology. a doctrine that ascribes the functions of a living organism to a vital principle distinct from chemical and physical forces.

---

vitalism British  

/ ˈvaɪtəˌlɪzəm /

noun

1. the philosophical doctrine that the phenomena of life cannot be explained in purely mechanical terms because there is something immaterial which distinguishes living from inanimate matter Compare dynamism mechanism

---

Other Word Forms

• vitalist
  noun
• vitalistic
  adjective
• vitalistically
  adverb

Etymology

Origin of vitalism

First recorded in 1815–25; vital + -ism

Example Sentences

There was something there, a sort of energy, vitalism and naivety, that was actually quite interesting.

From Los Angeles Times • Sep. 9, 2025

When du Bois-Reymond came to the topic, it was still musty with doctrines of vitalism and mechanism, forces and fluids, irritability and sensibility, and other arcana of biology.

From Scientific American • Nov. 10, 2019

The German chemist Friedrich Wohler was one of the early chemists to refute this aspect of vitalism, when, in 1828, he reported the synthesis of urea, a component of many body fluids, from nonliving materials.

From Textbooks • Feb. 14, 2019

This vitalism fit in well with the world view that Goethe had learned from Spinoza, who held that nature is God and God nature.

From The New Yorker • Feb. 1, 2016

Materialistic methods of interpretation were upheld by perhaps the majority of biologists, but vitalism found powerful support.

From Form and Function A Contribution to the History of Animal Morphology by E. S. (Edward Stuart) Russell