Word.ws English Dictionary

instrumentalism

instrumentalism noun: in the philosophy of science, the view that concepts and theories are merely useful instruments whose worth is measured not by whether the concepts and theories are true or false (or correctly depict reality), but how effective they are in explaining and predicting phenomena.

Noun

instrumentalism (countable and uncountable, plural instrumentalisms)

  1. In the philosophy of science, the view that concepts and theories are merely useful instruments whose worth is measured not by whether the concepts and theories are true or false (or correctly depict reality), but how effective they are in explaining and predicting phenomena.
    • Instrumentalism views truth as simply the value belonging to certain ideas in so far as these ideas are biological functions of our organisms, and psychological functions whereby we direct our choices and attain our successes.1908, Josiah Royce, The Problem of Truth in Light of Recent Discussion

instrumentalism meaning in Thai

instrumentalism in Thai

view in the philosophy of science
อุปกรณ์นิยม

Forms of instrumentalism

pluralinstrumentalisms

Origin of instrumentalism

From instrumental + -ism.

Questions about instrumentalism

What does instrumentalism mean?
Instrumentalism means in the philosophy of science, the view that concepts and theories are merely useful instruments whose worth is measured not by whether the concepts and theories are true or false (or correctly depict reality), but how effective they are in explaining and predicting phenomena.
What is instrumentalism in Thai?
Instrumentalism in Thai is อุปกรณ์นิยม. See Instrumentalism meaning in Thai.
What part of speech is instrumentalism?
Instrumentalism is a noun.
What is the plural of instrumentalism?
The plural of instrumentalism is instrumentalisms.

Words near instrumentalism in the dictionary

  1. instrumentalisations
  2. instrumentalise
  3. instrumentalised
  4. instrumentalises
  5. instrumentalising
  6. instrumentalism
  7. instrumentalisms
  8. instrumentalist
  9. instrumentalists
  10. instrumentalities
  11. instrumentality

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: instrumentalism (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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