empiricism

Definition

A doctrine which holds that the only or, at least, the most reliable source of human knowledge is experience, especially perception by means of the physical senses. (Often contrasted with rationalism.)

Etymology

From empiric + -ism.

Example Sentences

• "Empiricism teaches us that we are unceasingly and intimately in contact with a full, living, breathing Reality, that experience is a constant communion with the real."
• "He agrees with Kant that Hume's empiricism is refuted de facto by the example of mathematics, whose judgments are synthetic a priori."
• "Empiricism is the doctrine that human knowledge is grounded on the kind of experience, mostly achieved through the five senses, whose objects are particular events occurring at particular times and in particular places."

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