Geist

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Geist

Geist (German

German phonology

This article is about the phonology of the German language based on the Standard German. It deals with current phonology and phonetics as well as with historical developments thereof, including geographical variants ....
) is a German

German language

German is a West Germanic languages, thus related to and classified alongside English language and Dutch language. It is one of the world's world language and the most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union....
word that does not translate very well into English. It is usually translated as mind

Mind

Mind refers to the aspects of intellect and consciousness manifested as combinations of thought, perception, memory, emotion, free will and imagination, including all of the brain's conscious and unconscious cognitive processes....
, spirit

Spirit

The English word "spirit" comes from the Latin "spiritus" . The term is commonly used to refer to a supernatural being which is transcendence and therefore metaphysical in nature....
, or ghost

Ghost

File:Henry Fuseli- Hamlet and his father's Ghost.JPGA ghost is popularly held to be the disembodied spirit or soul of a death person. Popularly described as insubstantial and partly transparent, ghosts are reported to haunt particular List of reportedly haunted locations that they were associated with in life or at time of death....
but can also be associated with drive or motivation. Some English translators resort to using "spirit-mind" to help convey the meaning of the term. Closer approximations include the Greek word p?e?µa(pneuma), the Latin animus

Animus

Animus may stand for:...
and anima

Anima

Anima may refer to:*the Latin term for the "animating principle", see vital force**the Latin translation of Greek Psyche **in Christian contexts, the soul...
, and the Chinese medical ? shen

Shen

Shen can refer to:*Shen ?, a central word in Chinese philosophy, Chinese religion, Chinese terms for God, and Traditional Chinese Medicine.*Shen ?, a shapeshifting Chinese dragon believed to create mirages...
(all quite similar in meaning).

It is a central concept in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit
Phenomenology of Spirit

Ph?nomenologie des Geistes is one of G.W.F. Hegel's most important philosophical works. It is translated as The Phenomenology of Spirit or The Phenomenology of Mind due to the dual meaning in the German language word Geist....
(Phänomenologie des Geistes). According to Hegel, the Weltgeist ("World Spirit") is not an actual thing one might come upon or a God-like thing beyond, but a means of philosophising about history.

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Geist (German

German phonology

German language

Mind

Spirit

The English word "spirit" comes from the Latin "spiritus" . The term is commonly used to refer to a supernatural being which is transcendence and therefore metaphysical in nature....
, or ghost

Ghost

Animus

Animus may stand for:...
and anima

Anima

Anima may refer to:*the Latin term for the "animating principle", see vital force**the Latin translation of Greek Psyche **in Christian contexts, the soul...
, and the Chinese medical ? shen

Shen

Mediation

Mediation, a form of alternative dispute resolution or "appropriate dispute resolution", aims to assist two disputants in reaching an agreement....
of various Volksgeist ("Folk Spirits"), the great men

Hero

A hero , in Greek mythology and folklore, was originally a demigod, the offspring of a mortal and a deity,their Greek hero cult being one of the most distinctive features of Religion in ancient Greece....
of history, such as Napoleon, are the "concrete universal

Universality (philosophy)

In philosophy, universalism is a doctrine or school claiming universal facts can be discovered and is therefore understood as being in opposition to relativism....
".

This has led some to claim that Hegel favoured the great man theory

Great man theory

The Great man theory is a theory held by some that aims to philosophy of history by the impact of "Great men", or heroes: highly influential individuals who, due to either their personal charisma, intelligence and wisdom or Machiavellianism, used Power in a way that had a decisive historical impact....
, although his philosophy of history

Philosophy of history

Philosophy of history is an area of philosophy concerning the eventual significance, if any, of human history. Furthermore, it speculates as to a possible teleology end to its development?that is, it asks if there is a design, purpose, directive principle, or finality in the processes of human history....
, in particular concerning the role of the "universal

Universality (philosophy)

In philosophy, universalism is a doctrine or school claiming universal facts can be discovered and is therefore understood as being in opposition to relativism....
state

State

A state is a political Social contract with effective sovereignty over a geographic area and representing a population. These may be nation states, State or multinational states....
" (Universal Stand, which means as well "order" or "statute" than "state"), and of an "End of History" is much more complex.

For Hegel, the great hero is unwittingly utilised by Geist or Absolute Spirit, by a "ruse of Reason" as Hegel puts it, and is irrelevant to history once his historic mission is accomplished; he is thus submitted to the teleological

Teleology

Teleology is the philosophy study of design and purpose. A teleological school of thought is one that holds all things to be designed for or directed toward a final result, that there is an inherent purpose or final cause for all that exists....
principle of history, a principle which allows Hegel to re-read all the history of philosophy

History of philosophy

The history of philosophy is the study of philosophical ideas and concepts through time. Issues specifically related to history of philosophy might include : How can changes in philosophy be accounted for historically? What drives the development of thought in its historical context? To what degree can philosophical texts from prior historic...
as culminating in his philosophy of history.

The Weltgeist

Weltgeist, the world

World

World is a common name for the planet Earth seen from a human worldview, as a place inhabited by human beings. It is often used to signify the sum of human experience and history, or the 'human condition' in general....
spirit

Spirit

The English word "spirit" comes from the Latin "spiritus" . The term is commonly used to refer to a supernatural being which is transcendence and therefore metaphysical in nature....
concept designates an idealistic

Idealism

Idealism is the philosophical theory which maintains that the ultimate nature of reality is based on mind or ideas. It holds that the so-called external or "real world" is inseparable from mind, consciousness, or perception....
principle of world explanation, which can be found from the beginnings of philosophy up to more recent time. The concept of world spirit was already accepted by the idealistic schools of ancient Indian philosophy, whereby one explained objective reality as its product. (See metaphysical objectivism) In the early philosophy of Greek antiquity, Socrates

Socrates

Socrates was a Classical Greece Philosophy. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known only through the classical accounts of his students....
, Plato

Plato

Plato , was a Classical Greece Greeks philosopher, mathematician, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Platonic Academy in Ancient Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the western world....
and Aristotle

Aristotle

Aristotle was a Greeks philosopher, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. He wrote on many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, Poetics , theater, music, logic, rhetoric, politics, government, ethics, biology and zoology....
all paid homage, amongst other things, to the concept

Concept

A concept is a cognition unit of meaning— an abstraction idea or a mental symbol sometimes defined as a "unit of knowledge," built from other units which act as a concept's characteristics....
of world spirit. Hegel later based his philosophy of history

Philosophy of history

Others

Geist is a component of several German loanword

Loanword

A loanword is a word directly taken into one language from another with little or no translation. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept whereby it is the Meaning or idiom that is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself....
s such as Zeitgeist
Zeitgeist

Zeitgeist is a German language expression literally translated: Zeit, time; Geist, spirit, meaning "the spirit of the age and its society"....
, the spirit of the time or collective unconscious

Collective unconscious

Collective Unconscious, sometimes known as Collective Subconscious, is a term of analytical psychology, coined by Carl Jung. While Sigmund Freud did not distinguish between an "individual psychology" and a "collective psychology", Jung distinguished the collective unconscious from the Personal unconscious unconscious mind particular to...
, and poltergeist

Poltergeist

denotes an invisible Soul or ghost that manifests itself by moving and influencing objects, generally in a particular locale such as a house or room or place within a house....
, the mischievous ghosts that are believed to make noises.

In German (Roman Catholic) theology

Theology

Theology is the study of the existence or attributes of a deity or gods, or more generally the study of religion or spirituality. It is sometimes contrasted with religious studies: theology is understood as the study of religion from an internal perspective , and religious studies as the study of religion from an external perspective....
, the term Heiliger Geist refers to the Holy Spirit

Holy Spirit

In Christianity, the Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit is the spirit of God. The term Christ , is also used to refer to this presence. That is, the Spirit is considered to act in concert with and share an essential nature with God the Father and God the Son ....
.

Geisteskrank is a German word literally meaning "of an ill mind" and is sometimes used to describe someone suffering from mental illness

Mental illness

A mental disorder or mental illness is a psychological or behavioral pattern that occurs in an individual and is thought to cause distress or disability that is not expected as part of normal development or culture....
. In professional psycho-scientific language, however, the term is obsolete nowadays.

Geistlos refers to being mindless or without spirit.

In Blizzard Entertainment

Blizzard Entertainment

Blizzard Entertainment is an American video game developer and video game publisher headquartered in Irvine, California. It is a division of Activision Blizzard....
's World of Warcraft

World of Warcraft

World of Warcraft, often referred to as WoW, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game . It is Blizzard Entertainment's fourth released game set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first introduced by Warcraft: Orcs & Humans in 1994 in video gaming....
a type of creature is called "Geist". In the German version of the game, the creature's name is "Spuk", which is German for spook and also a synonym for ghost.

Geist

The Weltgeist

Others

See also

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