Concept
World
Overview
The world is the totality of entities, the whole of reality, or everything that exists. The nature of the world has been conceptualized differently in different fields. Some conceptions see the world as unique, while others talk of a "plurality of worlds". Some treat the world as one simple object, while others analyze the world as a complex made up of parts.
In scientific cosmology, the world or universe is commonly defined as "the totality of all space and time; all that is, has been, and will be". Theories of modality talk of possible worlds as complete and consistent ways how things could have been. Phenomenology, starting from the horizon of co-given objects present in the periphery of every experience, defines the world as the biggest horizon, or the "horizon of all horizons". In philosophy of mind, the world is contrasted with the mind as that which is represented by the mind.
Theology conceptualizes the world in relation to God, for example, as God's creation, as identical to God, or as the two being interdependent. In religions, there is a tendency to downgrade the material or sensory world in favor of a spiritual world to be sought through religious practice. A comprehensive representation of the world and our place in it, as is found in religions, is known as a worldview. Cosmogony is the field that studies the origin or creation of the world, while eschatology refers to the science or doctrine of the last things or of the end of the world.
In various contexts, the term "world" takes a more restricted meaning associated, for example, with the Earth and all life on it, with humanity as a whole, or with an international or intercontinental scope. In this sense, world history refers to the history of humanity as a whole, and world politics is the discipline of political science studying issues that transcend nations and continents. Other examples include terms such as "world religion", "world language", "world government", "world war", "world population", "world economy", or "world championship".
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where World is discussed.
We might indeed say that every one knows what the world is without help, for he is himself that subject of knowledge of which the world is the idea; and so far this would be true. But that knowledge is empirical, is in the concrete; the task of philosophy is to reproduce this in the abstract to raise to permanent rational knowledge the successive changing perceptions, and in general, all that is…
Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Idea
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; the book is about it; opens on it
Empedocles, that the circle which the sun makes in its motion circumscribes the world, and that circle is the utmost bound of the world. Seleucus, that the world knows no limits. Diogenes, that the universe is infinite, but this world is finite. The Stoics make a difference between that which is called the universe, and that which is called the whole world;--the universe is the infinite space considered with the…
Plutarch, Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; opens on it
Besides, our world is an image of the intelligible world. Now as our world is a composite of matter (and form), there must be matter also on high (that is, in the intelligible world). Otherwise, how could we call the intelligible world "kosmos" (that is, either world, or adornment), unless we see matter (receiving) form therein? How could we find form there, without (a residence) that should receive it? That world…
Plotinus, Plotinos
names the idea; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
When we regard the two propositions—“The world is infinite in quantity,” and, “The world is finite in quantity,” as contradictory opposites, we are assuming that the world—the complete series of phenomena—is a thing in itself. For it remains as a permanent quantity, whether I deny the infinite or the finite regress in the series of its phenomena.
Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Pure Reason
names the idea; states what it is; author linked in the graph; opens on it
The house, the cathedral, the judge's robe, the general's uniform, are ultimate facts for the child or the savage; but for the civilized man they are symbols of domestic life, of the Church, and of the State. Even where the supra-sensuous world has its purest expression, in the knowledge and will of intelligent beings, it presupposes a sensuous world as the material of ideas and of actions. "This" world and the…
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Introduction to Hegel's Philosophy of Fine Arts Translated from the German with Notes and Prefatory Essay
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is
Philosophers who discussed World
Related ideas
- Ātman (Hinduism)
- Nelson Goodman
- General relativity
- Western philosophy
- Heaven
- Abrahamic religions
- Immanuel Kant
- Industrial Revolution
- Ludwig Wittgenstein
- Mass
- Monism
- Aether (classical element)
- Brahman
- Ontology
- Vedanta
- Old English
- Plato
- Philosophical pluralism
- Pantheism
- Panentheism
- Heliocentrism
- Quantum mechanics
- Theory of forms
- Solar System
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Absurdism.