Word.ws English Dictionary

dataism

dataism noun: the belief that all knowledge consists of data and that scientific theories should only be the simplest systematizations of that data.

Noun (1)

dataism (uncountable)

  1. The belief that all knowledge consists of data and that scientific theories should only be the simplest systematizations of that data.
    • Dataism and dadaism are the hard core of strict empiricism, a philosophy incongruously held by many theoreticians and underlying much research planning. It encourages the blind accumulation of superficial information that leads nowhere because it comes from nowhere and takes place in a vacuum of...1998, Mario Bunge -, Philosophy of Science: From Explanation to Justification, →ISBN, page 211
    • Dataism is becoming 'a belief in a new gold standard of knowledge about human behavior', van Dijck writes, and argues that it is crucial to be aware of the different reasons for and contexts within which data is gathered. We also need to realise that data is interpreted by analysts.2014, Jill W. Rettberg, Seeing Ourselves Through Technology, →ISBN

Noun (2) capitalized: Dataism

Dataism (uncountable)

  1. (alternative) Alternative form of dataism.
    • The dichotomy between Dataism and Interpretationism in China is quite reminiscent of this German scene.1981, Centre for Translation Projects, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Renditions - Issues 15-18, page 17
    • In place of the founding tenets of modernity – liberalism, democracy and personal autonomy – there is a new religion: Dataism. Its followers – many of whom reside in the Bay Area of California – put their faith in information by encouraging us to see it as the only true source of value.2016 August 24, David Runciman, “Homo Deus by Yuval Noah Harari review – how data will destroy human freedom”, in The Guardian
  2. A movement that emphasizes traditional aesthetics and formal practices.
    • He regards it above all as 'Dataism' - a term and an art opposed to the iconoclasm of Modernism in general and Dadaism in particular. Dataism restates traditional aesthetics through formal practices.1993, Frank Popper, Art of the electronic age, page 87
    • One of the Cyberart aspects is the "Dataism" This art is opposed to the iconoclast features of Dadai"sm. By his formal practices, the Dataism reaffirms the traditional aesthetic.1999, Jean-Claude Heudin, Virtual Worlds: Synthetic Universes, Digital Life, and Complexity

Forms of dataism

alternative formDataism

Origin of dataism

From data + -ism.

Questions about dataism

What does dataism mean?
Dataism means the belief that all knowledge consists of data and that scientific theories should only be the simplest systematizations of that data.
What part of speech is dataism?
Dataism is a noun.

Words near dataism in the dictionary

  1. datagrammes
  2. datagramming
  3. datagrams
  4. datahub
  5. datahubs
  6. dataism
  7. dataist
  8. dataists
  9. Datakan
  10. datal
  11. dataler

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dataism (page history and authors); Dataism (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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