Vocab 1-A

Some terms defined:

a posteriori -- derived from or requiring evidence for its validation or support; empirical; open to revision a priori –of logic  relating to or involving deductive reasoning from a general principle to the expected acts or effects: logic  known to be true independently of or in advance of experience of the subject  matter; requiring no evidence for its validation or support abstract -- thought of apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances: an abstract idea; expressing a quality or characteristic apart from any specific object or instance, as justice, poverty,  and speed; theoretical; not applied or practical: abstract science; difficult to understand; abstruse: abstract speculations.  absurd -- utterly or obviously senseless, illogical, or untrue; contrary to all reason or common sense; laughably foolish or false: an absurd explanation. ad hoc -- concerned or dealing with a specific subject, purpose, or end: for the special purpose or end presently under consideration. ad hominem -- appealing to one's preju-dices, emotions, or special interests rather than to one's intellect or reason; attacking an opponent's character rather than answering his argument.  ad infinitum -- without end; endlessly; to infinity. agnosticism -- an intellectual doctrine or attitude affirming the uncertainty of all claims to ultimate knowledge.
annihilate - to reduce to utter ruin or nonexistence, destroy utterly: to destroy the collective existence or main body of; wipe out, to annul, make void, to cancel the effect of, nullify; to defeat completely, vanquish apodictic  necessarily true or logically certain, incontestable because of having been demonstrated or proved to be demonstrable apologetics the branch of  theology concerned with the defense or proof of Christianity. argument - a process of reasoning, series of reasons, a statement or or fact for oar against a point, an address or composition intended to convince or persuade.  atheism - the doctrine or belief that there is no God, or disbelief in the existence of a supreme being or beings axiology - the branch of philosophy dealing with values, as those of ethics, aesthetics, or religion.   being  -the fact of existing; existence (as opposed to nonexistence), conscious, moral existence, life, substance or nature, something that exists, sentience may or not be necessary. cosmology  - the branch of philosophy dealing with the origin and general structure of the universe, with its parts, elements, and laws, and especially with such of its characteristics as space, time, causality, and freedom.
cosmological argument -  an argument for the existence of God, asserting that the contingency of each entity, and of the universe composed wholly of such entities, demands the admission of an adequate external cause, which is God deduction - a process of reasoning in which a conclusion follows necessarily from the premises presented, so that the conclusion cannot be false if the premises are true.   de facto - in fact; in reality:  actually existing, especially when without authority   deism - belief in the existence of a God on the evidence of reason and nature only, with rejection of supernatural revelation:  belief in God who created the world but has since remained indifferent to it deontology - ethics, especially that branch dealing with duty, moral obligation, and right action   dialectic - of, pertaining to, or of the nature of logical argumentation dogmatism -  unfounded positiveness in matters of opinion; arrogant assertion of opinions as truths dualism  - the state of being dual or consisting of two parts; division into two, the view that there are just two mutually irreducible substances, contrast to monism and pluralism