subjectivity

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“
No material law or principle invokes subjectivity, yet subjectivity is the hallmark of the mind.

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Definitions (4)

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  1. The absence of objective reality: illusiveness; the character of arising within the mind, as, for example, the sensation of a color does. We must, in the first place, remember that analysis and subjectivity on the one hand, and synthesis and objectivity on the other hand, go together in Kant's mind. E. Caird, Philos. of Kant, p. 413. Belief in the subjectivity of time, space, and other forms of thought inevitably involves Agnosticism. J. Martineau, Mind, XIII. 596.
  2. The private, arbitrary, and limited element of self; that which is peculiar to an individual mind: as, the subjectivity of Byron or Shelley. There are two ways of looking at subjectivity. We may understand by it, in the first place, only the natural and finite subjectivity, with its contingent and arbitrary content of particular interests and inclinations. … In this sense of subjectivity, we cannot help admiring the tranquil resignation of the ancients to destiny, and feeling that it is a much higher and worthier mood than that of the moderns, who obstinately pursue their subjective aims, and when they find themselves constrained to give up the hope of reaching them, console themselves with the prospect of a reward in some shape or other. But the term subjectivity is not to be confined merely to the bad and finite kind of it which is contradistinguished from the fact. In its truth subjectivity is immanent in the fact, and as a subjectivity thus infinite is the very truth of the fact. … Christianity, we know, teaches that God wishes all men to be saved. That teaching declares that subjectivity has an infinite value. Hegel, Henning's notes of his lectures, tr. in Wallace's [Logic of Hegel, § 147. It is surely subjectivity and interiority which are the notions latest acquired by the human mind. W. James, Prin. of Psychology, II. 43.

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Examples (50)

  • We are still Cartesians -- the children of Descartes -- who believe that subjectivity, consciousness, sets us apart. —  Michael Pollan gives a plant's-eye view
  • But he would not suffer their "subjectivity" - to adopt modern terms - to destroy their "objectivity." —  The Life of John Bunyan
  • The result is that the person undergoing the life of Andrew Steele both lives through significant moments in Steele's subjectivity, and is drawn out of the stream of sensory and emotional reaction to contemplate the significance of that experience from the point of view of a wise commentator. —  Asimov'sSF,February2008
  • To get outside of your own subjectivity, and to see the world from a completely different and equally valid perspective, to come fully to understand them. —  Asimov'sSF,February2008
  • Yet this subjectivity could be just what TV news needs to restore its reputation. —  Entertainment Weekly's PopWatch
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Etymologies (1)

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  1. = French subjectivité = German subjektivität, from New Latin subjectivita(t-)s, from Latin subjectivus, subjective: see subjective.
 

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