vitalism

From vital +‎ -ism.

vitalism (countable and uncountable, plural vitalisms)

1. The doctrine that life involves some immaterial "vital force", and cannot be explained scientifically.
   • 2023, Cat Moir, “What Is Living and What Is Dead In Political Vitalism?”, in Christopher Donohue, Charles T. Wolfe, editors, Vitalism and Its Legacy in Twentieth Century Life Sciences and Philosophy, Springer Nature, →ISBN, page 258:

     Theories and philosophies of vitalism are concerned with the distinction between life and non-life in some form. Given this emphasis, vitalism always has political stakes: where the boundary between life and non-life is drawn is, as theorists of biopolitics have shown, a supremely political matter […] Historically, vitalism has been associated with conservatism and fascism in ways that are sometimes genealogically defensible, sometimes only with difficulty or not at all.

   • 2025 May 1, Ross Douthat, “The New Culture of the Right: Vital, Masculine and Intentionally Offensive”, in The New York Times‎^[1], →ISSN:

     It seems to me that in vitalism, there are people who are anti-Christian, like Bronze Age Pervert, like the Nazis.

• élan vital

Borrowed from French vitalisme.

vitalism n (uncountable)

1. vitalism

vitalism c

1. vitalism

• vitalist
• vitalistisk

• vital
• vitalisera
• vitalitet

• vitalism in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• vitalism in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• vitalism in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)