Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. The mind before it receives the impressions gained from experience.
- n. The unformed, featureless mind in the philosophy of John Locke.
- n. A need or an opportunity to start from the beginning.
Wiktionary
- n. The idea that the mind comes into this world as a "blank slate".
- n. Anything which exists in a pristine state.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. a smoothed tablet; hence, figuratively, the mind in its earliest state, before receiving impressions from without; -- a term used by Hobbes, Locke, and others, in maintaining a theory opposed to the doctrine of
innate ideas .
WordNet 3.0
- n. a young mind not yet affected by experience (according to John Locke)
- n. an opportunity to start over without prejudice
Etymologies
- Medieval Latin tabula rāsa : Latin tabula, tablet + Latin rāsa, feminine of rāsus, erased.
Examples
“Joe, now: a creature with a brain of human capacity, but without a mind — a perfect Lockean tabula rasa for Anglesey's psibeam to write on.”
Science Fiction Hall of Fame
“People who believe in some sort of tabula rasa theory – whereby we are all born with a blank sheet for a mind, and fill it in by experience – must be surprised at Sperry’s result.”
“Preconceived notions, blinding prejudices, and shrivelling antipathies must be wiped out, and the cultivable soul made a tabula rasa for whatever lesson great Nature has to teach.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘tabula rasa’.
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Latin
tempus fugit, ad absurdum, ad hominem, ad infinitum, ad nauseam, deus ex machina, in absentia, in loco parentis, in vino veritas, ipso facto, mea culpa, memento mori and 8 more...
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The Latin Doctor is Greek to me
Biology Students, Gladiators, Devil Dogs & Harry Potter
et tu, semper fidelis, carpe diem, cui bono, pons asinorum, limbus, e pluribus unum, sine qua non, quidnunc, lacus oblivionis, quincunx, experimentum crucis and 128 more...
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Recently viewed
A random list of things people are looking up on Wordnik.
craftsperson, bobble-head, kiwi and emu brot..., st. isidore the f..., cloudlessness, sangwidges, omnes Una Manet nox, Chappie, Inca dove, ew, C'mere, skepticism and 966 more...
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January 2012
bloviate, pastiche, apparat, facile, paroxysm, pique, bedfellow, pedigree, tutelage, protege, protégé, retroactive and 196 more...
madmouth I can no longer see this word without being reminded of Tambura Rasa, the excellent gypsy band from Vancity...even though the band name is gimicky and sort of lame Oct 27, 2009
aequoria Also, a need or an opportunity to start from the beginning. Dec 7, 2008
treeseed Tabula rasa (Latin: scraped tablet or clean slate) refers to the epistemological thesis that individual human beings are born with no innate or built-in mental content, in a word, "blank", and that their entire resource of knowledge is built up gradually from their experiences and sensory perceptions of the outside world.
_Wikipedia
Jan 25, 2008