thesis

Senses relating to logic, rhetoric, etc.

Noun

  1. Senses relating to logic, rhetoric, etc.
    • I submit these nine theses to Wikipedia’s community and to the world. I do this, as Martin Luther said when he posted his famous 95 theses, “Out of love for the truth and the desire to elucidate it.” […] I am confident...

    1. (rhetoric) A proposition or statement supported by arguments.

    2. (by extension) A lengthy essay written to establish the validity of a thesis (sense 1.1), especially one submitted in order to complete the requirements for a non-doctoral degree in the US and a doctoral degree in the UK; a dissertation.

      • I told them of the grave, becoming, and ſublime deportment they ſhould aſſume upon this myſtical occaſion, and read them two homilies and a theſis of my own compoſing, in order to prepare them. - 1766, [Oliver...

    3. (mathematics, computer science) A conjecture, especially one too vague to be formally stated or verified but useful as a working convention.

    4. (logic) An affirmation, or distinction from a supposition or hypothesis.

    5. (philosophy) In the dialectical method of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel: the initial stage of reasoning where a formal statement of a point is developed; this is followed by antithesis and synthesis.

  2. Senses relating to music and prosody.

    Antonyms: arsis

    1. (music, prosody, originally) The action of lowering the hand or bringing down the foot when indicating a rhythm; hence, an accented part of a measure of music or verse indicated by this action; an ictus, a stress.

    2. (music, prosody, with a reversal of meaning) A depression of the voice when pronouncing a syllables of a word; hence, the unstressed part of the metrical foot of a verse upon which such a depression falls, or an unaccented musical note.

Origin

From Late Middle English thesis (“lowering of the voice”) and also borrowed directly from its etymon Latin thesis (“proposition, thesis; lowering of the voice”), from Ancient Greek θέσῐς (thésĭs, “arrangement, placement, setting; conclusion, position, thesis; lowering of the voice”), from τῐ́θημῐ (tĭ́thēmĭ, “to place, put, set; to put down in writing; to consider as, regard”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁- (“to do; to place, put”)) + -σῐς (-sĭs, suffix forming abstract nouns or nouns of action, process, or result). The English word is a doublet of deed. Sense 1.1 (“proposition or statement supported by arguments”) is adopted from antithesis. Sense 1.4 (“initial stage of reasoning”) was first used by the German philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814), and later applied to the dialectical method of his countryman, the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel...

Forms

theses

Related

antithesis apothesis enthesis hypothesis nonthetic prosthesis prothesis synthesis thetic thetically

Derived

all but thesis bachelor's thesis blue water thesis bowling alone thesis Church-Turing thesis conflict thesis counterthesis doctoral thesis e-thesis graduate thesis Habakkuk thesis master's thesis Merton thesis nonthesis private language thesis Rothbarth-Habakkuk thesis thesis defense thesis statement