What does the word idea mean

In common usage and in philosophy, ideas are the results of thought.^[1] Also in philosophy, ideas can also be mental representational images of some object. Many philosophers have considered ideas to be a fundamental ontological category of being. The capacity to create and understand the meaning of ideas is considered to be an essential and defining feature of human beings. In a popular sense, an idea arises in a reflexive, spontaneous manner, even without thinking or serious reflection, for example, when we talk about the idea of a person or a place. A new or an original idea can often lead to innovation.

Etymology[edit]

The word idea comes from Greek ἰδέα idea «form, pattern,» from the root of ἰδεῖν idein, «to see.»^[2]

History[edit]

The argument over the underlying nature of ideas is opened by Plato, whose exposition of his theory of forms—which recurs and accumulates over the course of his many dialogs—appropriates and adds a new sense to the Greek word for things that are «seen» (re. εἶδος) that highlights those elements of perception which are encountered without material or objective reference available to the eyes (re. ἰδέα). As this argument is disseminated the word «idea» begins to take on connotations that would be more familiarly associated with the term today. In the fifth book of his Republic, Plato defines philosophy as the love of this formal (as opposed to visual) way of seeing.

Plato advances the theory that perceived but immaterial objects of awareness constituted a realm of deathless forms or ideas from which the material world emanated. Aristotle challenges Plato in this area, positing that the phenomenal world of ideas arises as mental composites of remembered observations. Though it is anachronistic to apply these terms to thinkers from antiquity, it clarifies the argument between Plato and Aristotle if we call Plato an idealist thinker and Aristotle an empiricist thinker.

This antagonism between empiricism and idealism generally characterizes the dynamism of the argument over the theory of ideas up to the present. This schism in theory has never been resolved to the satisfaction of thinkers from both sides of the disagreement and is represented today in the split between analytic and continental schools of philosophy. Persistent contradictions between classical physics and quantum mechanics may be pointed to as a rough analogy for the gap between the two schools of thought.

Philosophy[edit]

Plato[edit]

Plato in Ancient Greece was one of the earliest philosophers to provide a detailed discussion of ideas and of the thinking process (in Plato’s Greek the word idea carries a rather different sense of our modern English term). Plato argued in dialogues such as the Phaedo, Symposium, Republic, and Timaeus that there is a realm of ideas or forms (eidei), which exist independently of anyone who may have thoughts on these ideas, and it is the ideas which distinguish mere opinion from knowledge, for unlike material things which are transient and liable to contrary properties, ideas are unchanging and nothing but just what they are. Consequently, Plato seems to assert forcefully that material things can only be the objects of opinion; real knowledge can only be had of unchanging ideas. Furthermore, ideas for Plato appear to serve as universals; consider the following passage from the Republic:

«We both assert that there are,» I said, «and distinguish in speech, many fair things, many good things, and so on for each kind of thing.»

«Yes, so we do.»

«And we also assert that there is a fair itself, a good itself, and so on for all things that we set down as many. Now, again, we refer to them as one idea of each as though the idea were one; and we address it as that which really is.»

«That’s so.»

«And, moreover, we say that the former are seen, but not intellected, while the ideas are intellected but not seen.»

— Plato, Bk. VI 507b-c

René Descartes[edit]

Descartes often wrote of the meaning of the idea as an image or representation, often but not necessarily «in the mind», which was well known in the vernacular. Despite Descartes’ invention of the non-Platonic use of the term, he at first followed this vernacular use.^b In his Meditations on First Philosophy he says, «Some of my thoughts are like images of things, and it is to these alone that the name ‘idea’ properly belongs.» He sometimes maintained that ideas were innate^[3] and uses of the term idea diverge from the original primary scholastic use. He provides multiple non-equivalent definitions of the term, uses it to refer to as many as six distinct kinds of entities, and divides ideas inconsistently into various genetic categories.^[4] For him knowledge took the form of ideas and philosophical investigation is devoted to the consideration of these entities.

John Locke[edit]

John Locke’s use of idea stands in striking contrast to Plato’s.^[5] In his Introduction to An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke defines idea as «that term which, I think, serves best to stand for whatsoever is the object of the understanding when a man thinks, I have used it to express whatever is meant by phantasm, notion, species, or whatever it is which the mind can be employed about in thinking; And I could not avoid frequently using it.»^[6] He said he regarded the contribution offered in his essay as necessary to examine our own abilities and discern what objects our understandings were, or were not, fitted to deal with. In this style of ideal conception other outstanding figures followed in his footsteps — Hume and Kant in the 18th century, Arthur Schopenhauer in the 19th century, and Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Karl Popper in the 20th century. Locke always believed in the good sense — not pushing things to extremes and while taking fully into account the plain facts of the matter. He prioritized common-sense ideas that struck him as «good-tempered, moderate, and down-to-earth.»

As John Locke studied humans in his work “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding” he continually referenced Descartes for ideas as he asked this fundamental question: “When we are concerned with something about which we have no certain knowledge, what rules or standards should guide how confident we allow ourselves to be that our opinions are right?” ^[7] Put in another way, he inquired into how humans might verify their ideas, and considered the distinctions between different types of ideas. Locke found that an idea “can simply mean some sort of brute experience.”^[8] He shows that there are “No innate principles in the mind.”^[9] Thus, he concludes that “our ideas are all experienced in nature.”^[10] An experience can either be a sensation or a reflection: “consider whether there are any innate ideas in the mind before any are brought in by the impression from sensation or reflection.” ^[7] Therefore, an idea was an experience in which the human mind apprehended something.

In a Lockean view, there are really two types of ideas: complex and simple. Simple ideas are the building blocks for more complex ideas, and “While the mind is wholly passive in the reception of simple ideas, it is very active in the building of complex ideas…”^[11] Complex ideas, therefore, can either be modes, substances, or relations.

Modes combine simpler ideas in order to convey new information. For instance, David Banach ^[12] gives the example of beauty as a mode. He points to combinations of color and form as qualities constitutive of this mode. Substances, however, are distinct from modes. Substances convey the underlying formal unity of certain objects, such as dogs, cats, or tables. Relations represent the relationship between two or more ideas that contain analogous elements to one another without the implication of underlying formal unity. A painting or a piece of music, for example, can both be called ‘art’ without belonging to the same substance. They are related as forms of art (the term ‘art’ in this illustration would be a ‘mode of relations’). In this way, Locke concluded that the formal ambiguity around ideas he initially sought to clarify had been resolved.

David Hume[edit]

Hume differs from Locke by limiting idea to the more or less vague mental reconstructions of perceptions, the perceptual process being described as an «impression.»^[13][14] Hume shared with Locke the basic empiricist premise that it is only from life experiences (whether their own or others’) that humans’ knowledge of the existence of anything outside of themselves can be ultimately derived, that they shall carry on doing what they are prompted to do by their emotional drives of varying kinds. In choosing the means to those ends, they shall follow their accustomed associations of ideas.^d Hume has contended and defended the notion that «reason alone is merely the ‘slave of the passions’.»^[15][16]

Immanuel Kant[edit]

Immanuel Kant defines ideas by distinguishing them from concepts. Concepts arise by the compositing of experience into abstract categorial representations of presumed or encountered empirical objects whereas the origin of ideas, for Kant, is a priori to experience. Regulative ideas, for example, are ideals that one must tend towards, but by definition may not be completely realized as objects of empirical experience. Liberty, according to Kant, is an idea whereas «tree» (as an abstraction covering all species of trees) is a concept. The autonomy of the rational and universal subject is opposed to the determinism of the empirical subject.^[17] Kant felt that it is precisely in knowing its limits that philosophy exists. The business of philosophy he thought was not to give rules, but to analyze the private judgement of good common sense.^e

Rudolf Steiner[edit]

Whereas Kant declares limits to knowledge («we can never know the thing in itself»), in his epistemological work, Rudolf Steiner sees ideas as «objects of experience» which the mind apprehends, much as the eye apprehends light. In Goethean Science (1883), he declares, «Thinking … is no more and no less an organ of perception than the eye or ear. Just as the eye perceives colors and the ear sounds, so thinking perceives ideas.» He holds this to be the premise upon which Goethe made his natural-scientific observations.

Wilhelm Wundt[edit]

Wundt widens the term from Kant’s usage to include conscious representation of some object or process of the external world. In so doing, he includes not only ideas of memory and imagination, but also perceptual processes, whereas other psychologists confine the term to the first two groups.^[13] One of Wundt’s main concerns was to investigate conscious processes in their own context by experiment and introspection. He regarded both of these as exact methods, interrelated in that experimentation created optimal conditions for introspection. Where the experimental method failed, he turned to other objectively valuable aids, specifically to those products of cultural communal life which lead one to infer particular mental motives. Outstanding among these are speech, myth, and social custom. Wundt designed the basic mental activity apperception — a unifying function which should be understood as an activity of the will. Many aspects of his empirical physiological psychology are used today. One is his principles of mutually enhanced contrasts and of assimilation and dissimilation (i.e. in color and form perception and his advocacy of objective methods of expression and of recording results, especially in language. Another is the principle of heterogony of ends — that multiply motivated acts lead to unintended side effects which in turn become motives for new actions.^[18]

Charles Sanders Peirce[edit]

C. S. Peirce published the first full statement of pragmatism in his important works «How to Make Our Ideas Clear» (1878) and «The Fixation of Belief» (1877).^[19] In «How to Make Our Ideas Clear» he proposed that a clear idea (in his study he uses concept and idea as synonymic) is defined as one, when it is apprehended such as it will be recognized wherever it is met, and no other will be mistaken for it. If it fails of this clearness, it is said to be obscure. He argued that to understand an idea clearly we should ask ourselves what difference its application would make to our evaluation of a proposed solution to the problem at hand. Pragmatism (a term he appropriated for use in this context), he defended, was a method for ascertaining the meaning of terms (as a theory of meaning). The originality of his ideas is in their rejection of what was accepted as a view and understanding of knowledge as impersonal facts which had been accepted by scientists for some 250 years. Peirce contended that we acquire knowledge as participants, not as spectators. He felt «the real», sooner or later, is composed of information that has been acquired through ideas and knowledge and ordered by the application of logical reasoning. The rational distinction of the empirical object is not prior to its perception by a knowledgable subject, in other words. He also published many papers on logic in relation to ideas.

G. F. Stout and J. M. Baldwin[edit]

G. F. Stout and J. M. Baldwin, in the Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology, define the idea as «the reproduction with a more or less adequate image, of an object not actually present to the senses.» ^[20] They point out that an idea and a perception are by various authorities contrasted in various ways. «Difference in degree of intensity», «comparative absence of bodily movement on the part of the subject», «comparative dependence on mental activity», are suggested by psychologists as characteristic of an idea as compared with a perception.^[13]

It should be observed that an idea, in the narrower and generally accepted sense of a mental reproduction, is frequently composite. That is, as in the example given above of the idea of a chair, a great many objects, differing materially in detail, all call a single idea. When a man, for example, has obtained an idea of chairs in general by comparison with which he can say «This is a chair, that is a stool», he has what is known as an «abstract idea» distinct from the reproduction in his mind of any particular chair (see abstraction). Furthermore, a complex idea may not have any corresponding physical object, though its particular constituent elements may severally be the reproductions of actual perceptions. Thus the idea of a centaur is a complex mental picture composed of the ideas of man and horse, that of a mermaid of a woman and a fish.^[13]

Walter Benjamin[edit]

«Ideas are to objects [of perception] as constellations are to stars,»^[21] writes Walter Benjamin in the introduction to his The Origin of German Tragic Drama. «The set of concepts which assist in the representation of an idea lend it actuality as such a configuration. For phenomena are not incorporated into ideas. They are not contained in them. Ideas are, rather, their objective virtual arrangement, their objective interpretation.»

Benjamin advances, «That an idea is that moment in the substance and being of a word in which this word has become, and performs, as a symbol.» as George Steiner summarizes.^[21] In this way techne—art and technology—may be represented, ideally, as «discrete, fully autonomous objects…[thus entering] into fusion without losing their identity.»^[21]

In anthropology and the social sciences[edit]

Diffusion studies explore the spread of ideas from culture to culture. Some anthropological theories hold that all cultures imitate ideas from one or a few original cultures, the Adam of the Bible, or several cultural circles that overlap. Evolutionary diffusion theory holds that cultures are influenced by one another but that similar ideas can be developed in isolation.

In the mid-20th century, social scientists began to study how and why ideas spread from one person or culture to another. Everett Rogers pioneered diffusion of innovations studies, using research to prove factors in adoption and profiles of adopters of ideas. In 1976, in his book The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins suggested applying biological evolutionary theories to the spread of ideas. He coined the term meme to describe an abstract unit of selection, equivalent to the gene in evolutionary biology.

Ideas & Intellectual Property[edit]

Relationship between ideas and patents[edit]

On susceptibility to exclusive property[edit]

It has been pretended by some, (and in England especially,) that inventors have a natural and exclusive right to their inventions, and not merely for their own lives, but inheritable to their heirs. But while it is a moot question whether the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all, it would be singular to admit a natural and even an hereditary right to inventors. It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject, that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre of land, for instance.

By a universal law, indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men equally and in common, is the property for the moment of him who occupies it, but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society. It would be curious then, if an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain, could, of natural right, be claimed in exclusive and stable property.

If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.

That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property.

Society may give an exclusive right to the profits arising from them, as an encouragement to men to pursue ideas which may produce utility, but this may or may not be done, according to the will and convenience of the society, without claim or complaint from anybody. Accordingly, it is a fact, as far as I am informed, that England was, until we copied her, the only country on earth which ever, by a general law, gave a legal right to the exclusive use of an idea. In some other countries it is sometimes done, in a great case, and by a special and personal act but, generally speaking, other nations have thought that these monopolies produce more embarrassment than advantage to society.^[22]

Patent law regulates various aspects related to the functional manifestation of inventions based on new ideas or incremental improvements to existing ones. Thus, patents have a direct relationship to ideas.

Relationship between ideas and copyrights[edit]

In some cases, authors can be granted limited legal monopolies on the manner in which certain works are expressed. This is known colloquially as copyright, although the term intellectual property is used mistakenly in place of copyright. Copyright law regulating the aforementioned monopolies generally does not cover the actual ideas. The law does not bestow the legal status of property upon ideas per se. Instead, laws purport to regulate events related to the usage, copying, production, sale and other forms of exploitation of the fundamental expression of a work, that may or may not carry ideas. Copyright law is fundamentally different from patent law in this respect: patents do grant monopolies on ideas (more on this below).

A copyright is meant to regulate some aspects of the usage of expressions of a work, not an idea. Thus, copyrights have a negative relationship to ideas.

Work means a tangible medium of expression. It may be an original or derivative work of art, be it literary, dramatic, musical recitation, artistic, related to sound recording, etc. In (at least) countries adhering to the Berne Convention, copyright automatically starts covering the work upon the original creation and fixation thereof, without any extra steps. While creation usually involves an idea, the idea in itself does not suffice for the purposes of claiming copyright.^{[23][24][25][26]
[27]}

Relationship of ideas to confidentiality agreements[edit]

Confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements are legal instruments that assist corporations and individuals in keeping ideas from escaping to the general public. Generally, these instruments are covered by contract law.^{[citation needed]}

See also[edit]

• Idealism
• Brainstorming
• Creativity techniques
• Diffusion of innovations
• Form
• Ideology
• List of perception-related topics
• Notion (philosophy)
• Object of the mind
• Think tank
• Thought experiment
• History of ideas
• Intellectual history
• Concept
• Philosophical analysis

Notes[edit]

References[edit]

• The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Macmillan Publishing Company, New York, 1973 ISBN 0-02-894950-1 ISBN 978-0-02-894950-5
• Dictionary of the History of Ideas Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York 1973–74, LCCN 72-7943 ISBN 0-684-16425-6

— Nous

¹ Volume IV 1a, 3a

² Volume IV 4a, 5a

³ Volume IV 32 — 37

Ideas

Ideology

Authority

Education

Liberalism

Idea of God

Pragmatism

Chain of Being

• The Story of Thought, DK Publishing, Bryan Magee, London, 1998, ISBN 0-7894-4455-0

a.k.a. The Story of Philosophy, Dorling Kindersley Publishing, 2001, ISBN 0-7894-7994-X

(subtitled on cover: The Essential Guide to the History of Western Philosophy)

^a Plato, pages 11 — 17, 24 — 31, 42, 50, 59, 77, 142, 144, 150

^b Descartes, pages 78, 84 — 89, 91, 95, 102, 136 — 137, 190, 191

^c Locke, pages 59 — 61, 102 — 109, 122 — 124, 142, 185

^d Hume, pages 61, 103, 112 — 117, 142 — 143, 155, 185

^e Kant, pages 9, 38, 57, 87, 103, 119, 131 — 137, 149, 182

^f Peirce, pages 61, How to Make Our Ideas Clear 186 — 187 and 189

^g Saint Augustine, pages 30, 144; City of God 51, 52, 53 and The Confessions 50, 51, 52

— additional in the Dictionary of the History of Ideas for Saint Augustine and Neo-Platonism

^h Stoics, pages 22, 40, 44; The governing philosophy of the Roman Empire on pages 46 — 47.

— additional in Dictionary of the History of Ideas for Stoics, also here [1], and here [2], and here [3].

• The Reader’s Encyclopedia, 2nd Edition 1965, Thomas Y. Crowell Company, LCCN 65-12510

An Encyclopedia of World Literature

^¹apage 774 Plato (c.427–348 BC)

^²apage 779 Francesco Petrarca

^³apage 770 Charles Sanders Peirce

^¹bpage 849 the Renaissance

• This article incorporates text from the Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, a publication now in the public domain.

Further reading[edit]

• A. G. Balz, Idea and Essence in the Philosophy of Hobbes and Spinoza (New York 1918)
• Gregory T. Doolan, Aquinas on the divine ideas as exemplar causes (Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 2008)
• Patricia A. Easton (ed.), Logic and the Workings of the Mind. The Logic of Ideas and Faculty Psychology in Early Modern Philosophy (Atascadero, Calif.: Ridgeview 1997)
• Pierre Garin, La Théorie de l’idée suivant l’école thomiste (Paris 1932)
• Marc A. High, Idea and Ontology. An Essay in Early Modern Metaphysics of Ideas ( Pennsylvania State University Press, 2008)
• Lawrence Lessig, The Future of Ideas (New York 2001)
• Paul Natorp, Platons Ideenlehre (Leipzig 1930)
• Melchert, Norman (2002). The Great Conversation: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy. McGraw Hill. ISBN 0-19-517510-7.
• W. D. Ross, Plato’s Theory of Ideas (Oxford 1951)
• Peter Watson, Ideas: A History from Fire to Freud, Weidenfeld & Nicolson (London 2005)
• J. W. Yolton, John Locke and the Way of Ideas (Oxford 1956)

Scratch that «great idea,» bit, here’s a *stupid idea*: only Internet Explorer…. ❋ Glyn Moody (2008)

Or rather it might be said that an idea, the _big idea_, danced unceremoniously into his brain, and, beginning to take definite and concrete form, chased a score of other smaller ideas through all the thought-channels of his handsome, boyish, well-rounded head. ❋ James R. [pseud.] Driscoll (N/A)

The modern idea lays stress first of all on the _idea_ in music. ❋ Frederick Herman Martens (1903)

It can be got only by a constant obtrusion of a mere idea, the _idea of self_, and of such unsatisfactory ideas as one’s right, for instance, to exclude others. ❋ Vernon Lee (1895)

We cannot live intellectually and morally in presence of the idea, say, of a jockey of Degas or one of his ballet girls in contemplation of her shoe, as long as we can live æsthetically in the arrangement of lines and masses and dabs of colour and interlacings of light and shade which translate themselves into this _idea_ of jockey or ballet girl; we are therefore bored, ruffled, or, what is worse, we learn to live on insufficient spiritual rations, and grow anæmic. ❋ Vernon Lee (1895)

Whether then the man and beast be in actual labor or not, the dominant idea in the artist’s mind is that they are or have been laboring; that that is what they stand for, _that idea_ to be presented in the strongest possible way. ❋ Henry Rankin Poore (1899)

«I hadn’t the least idea it was so wicked — not the least _idea_. ❋ Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (1877)

The main idea is that god is rational and, as such, good. ❋ Unknown (2010)

The main idea is to support the way in which scientists search/browse for resources (e.g. published papers on a particular topic), and to allow them to recall their exploration path to remember the context in which they obtained these resources. ❋ Unknown (2009)

Her main idea is to reinforce tax cuts for Coporations and cut spending/services for the middle class while implementing decreasing revenues as their incomes continue to dwindle. ❋ Unknown (2010)

The main idea is to find a way to make the incentives run towards providing more insurance and more care, and let the market work from there. ❋ Unknown (2008)

The main idea is that the shot-glass will track the amount of liquor in it and report it to other users. ❋ Unknown (2007)

The main idea is that we keep hunting a good buck near his core area without bumping him out. ❋ Unknown (2007)

«This curtain idea is just one of those dreams in the back of my noodle,» he explained at the time. ❋ Unknown (2005)

To me it seems that ideas, spirits, and relations are all in their respective kinds the object of human knowledge and subject of discourse; and that the term idea would be improperly extended to signify everything we know or have any notion of. ❋ Unknown (2006)

The main idea is that America is inhospitable to gods. ❋ Unknown (2004)

The main idea is that scientists can abuse their prestige by propounding unscientific banalities outside their field (a point also made by Orwell in a 1945 essay, entitled ‘What is Science?’). ❋ Unknown (1994)

With the advance of Philosophy we must revert to that more ancient use of the term idea which confines its extension into the realm of the perceptual to those elements of the sensible presentation which can be reproduced by the conceptual activity of the subject, and which in asserting, for instance, the ideality of ❋ Alexander Philip (N/A)

[dad]: whose stupid fucking idea was this?
[son]: [fuck if I know] ❋ OG (2004)

when you get an idea the [lightbulb] [over your head] turns on and [glows] a pretty yellow ❋ Etchasketch (2004)

a. ‘That’s [a good] idea, [Prime] Minister’.
b. ‘You [swine]!’. ❋ Hedley Clubnobber (2006)

[I have no idea] what to put here, and I [feel good] [about it]. ❋ Yaweh (2005)

«[Girl], why you dressin like an idea?» ❋ Sparrs46 (2019)

[Hey jeremy] look at that idea[Woah] [chad] thats a big idea, man ❋ Jeremiah DeWink (2018)

I just had an idea, [or what] [alcoholics] refer to as [a moment of clarity]. ❋ The IRan (2009)

It’s [not a] [band it’s] an [idea]. ❋ D1nuslamb2.o (2017)

[I have no idea] why [I can’t believe it’s not butter]! ❋ The Cynical One (2009)

[Jeff] had an imaginational thought and told [Anna] and it [spread] to others so now it is called an idea. ❋ Urbandiesalpotion (2014)

An idea (Greek: ἰδέα) as a philosophical term generally refers to an image in the mind. Concepts basically refer to generalized ideas, and categories are the most fundamental concepts.

Whether ideas exist in the mind alone or as an extra-mental objective existence, whether ideas are generated or exist innately in the mind, whether some types of ideas (such as God, soul, and world: See Kant) should be considered special or basically the same, and other questions concerning ideas have been central issues in the history of philosophy. Questions regarding the nature, essence, origin, and types of ideas have been integrated and contextualized into each philosophical thought, both in ontology and epistemology, and the meaning of idea has thus been configured accordingly.

Plato asserted, for example, that ideas or forms («eidos») are not simply images that exist in the mind, but they are permanent extra-mental forms with which Demiurge, the divine crafter, created the cosmos. Those ideas or forms are, according to Plato, also inscribed in the soul prior to experience. Medieval scholastics understood those ideas as the forms within God’s mind by which the Creator created the universe. Modern philosophers since Descartes, however, interpreted ideas as mental images that exist within the mind of a cognitive subject.^[1] Ideas were often understood as representations of objects outside of mind. This concept of idea as a mental image is still held today.

Etymology

The word «Idea» originates from the Greek, and it is the feminine form of, the word εἶδος (Greek eidos: something seen; form, shape; related to idein «to see,» eidenai «to know» ^[2]). «Idea» meant at first a form, shape, or appearance and implied the «visual aspect» of things in classical Greek.^[3] Accordingly, ideas and forms are used interchangeably for Greek authors.

With Plato, idea and/or form became essential concepts in philosophy. The ontological status of idea or form, epistemological roles of ideas or forms, and their ethical implications became central issues in philosophy. In this article, Plato’s concept and the modern understanding of ideas are introduced to illustrate two different approaches to ideas.

Plato’s Theory of Forms or Ideas («eidos»)

Plato concept of ideas or forms are often capitalized as «Ideas» or «Forms» to distinguish his distinct notion from the modern conception of ideas as mental images. In this section, the term Form is used. But Form and Idea both refer to the same Greek term «eidos.» Plato’s Theory of Forms^[4] asserts that Forms or Ideas, and not the material world of change known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind of reality.^[5] Plato spoke of Forms^[6] in formulating his solution to the problem of universals.

Terminology: The Forms and the forms

The English word «form» may be used to translate two distinct concepts with which Plato was concerned—the outward «form» or appearance of something (Greek eidos and idea in their conventional, nontechnical senses, or other terms such as morphē), and «Form» in a new, technical sense, apparently invented by Plato (esp. eidos, idea). These are often distinguished by the use of uncapitalized «form» and capitalized «Form,» respectively. In the following summary passage, the two concepts are related to each other:^[7]

Suppose a person were to make all kinds of figures (schēmata) of gold… —somebody points to one of them and asks what it is (ti pot’esti). By far the safest and truest answer is [to say] that it is gold; and not to call the triangle or any other figures which are formed in the gold «these» (tauta) as though they had existence (hōs onta)… And the same argument applies to the universal nature (phusis) which receives all bodies (sōmata)—that must always be called the same; for, while receiving all things, she never departs at all from her own nature, and never… assumes a form (morphē) like that of any of the things which enter into her; … But the forms which enter into and go out of her are the likenesses (mimēmata) of real existences (tōn ontōn aei) modelled after their patterns (tupōthenta) in a wonderful and inexplicable manner…

The forms that we see, according to Plato, are not real, but literally mimic the real Forms. In the Allegory of the cave expressed in Republic they are called the shadows of real things. That which the observer understands when he views the mimics are the archetypes of the many types and properties (that is, of universals) of things we see all around us. They are not located in the object, which as far as Plato is concerned, is mere smoke and mirrors situated in space (which also is real).

Forms or Ideas («eidos»)

The Greek concept of form precedes the attested language and is represented by a number of words mainly having to do with vision: the sight or appearance of a thing. The main words, εἶδος (eidos) and ἰδέα (idea)^[8] come from the Indo-European root *weid-, «see.»^[9] Both words are in the works of Homer, the earliest Greek literature.

These meanings remained the same over the centuries until the beginning of philosophy, when they became equivocal, acquiring additional specialized philosophic meanings. The pre-Socratic philosophers, starting with Thales, noted that appearances change quite a bit and began to inquire into the essential existence of things, leading some to conclude that things were made of substances, which comprise the actually existing thing being seen. They began to question the relationship between the appearance and the essential existence of things, between the substance and the form; thus, the theory of matter and form (today’s hylomorphism) was born. Starting with at least Plato, and possibly germinal in some of the presocratics, the forms were considered «in» something else, which Plato called nature (phusis). The latter seemed as a «mother» (matter from mater)^[10] of substances.

For Plato, as well as in general speech, there is a form for every object or quality in reality: forms of dogs, human beings, mountains, colors, courage, love, and goodness. While the notion of form served to identify objects, Plato went further and inquired into the Form itself. He supposed that the object is essentially or «really» the Form and that phenomena are mere shadows that mimic the Form; that is, momentary portrayals of the Form under different circumstances. The problem of the universals — how can one thing in general be many things in particular — was solved by presuming that Form was a distinct singular thing but caused plural representations of itself in particular objects.^[11] Matter was considered particular in itself.

These Forms are the essences of various objects: they are that without which a thing would not be the kind of thing it is. For example, there are countless tables in the world but the Form of table-ness is at the core; it is the essence of all tables.^[12] Plato held that the world of Forms is separate from our own world (the world of substances) and also is the true basis of reality. Removed from matter, Forms are the most pure of all things. Furthermore, Plato believed that true knowledge/intelligence is the ability to grasp the world of Forms with one’s mind.^[13]

A Form is aspatial (outside the world) and atemporal (outside time). ^[14] Forms are aspatial in that they have no spatial dimensions, and thus no orientation in space, nor do they even (like the point) have a location.^[15] They are non-physical, but they are not in the mind, and are extra-mental.^[16]

A Form is an objective «blueprint» of perfection.^[17] The Forms are perfect themselves because they are unchanging. For example, say we have a triangle drawn on a blackboard. A triangle is a polygon with 3 sides. The triangle as it is on the blackboard is far from perfect. However, it is only the intelligibility of the Form «triangle» that allows us to know the drawing on the chalkboard is a triangle, and the Form «triangle» is perfect and unchanging. It is exactly the same whenever anyone chooses to consider it; however, the time is that of the observer and not of the triangle.

The pure land

The Forms exist in a rarefied sector of the universe. For everything on Earth there is a formal counterpart:^[18]

But the true earth is pure (katharan) and situated in the pure heaven (en katharōi ouranōi) … and it is the heaven which is commonly spoken by us as the ether (aithera) … for if any man could arrive at the extreme limit … he would acknowledge that this other world was the place of the true heaven (ho alethōs ouranos) and the true light (to alethinon phōs) and the true earth (hē hōs alēthōs gē).

In comparison to it our Earth is «spoilt and corroded as in the sea all things are corroded by the brine.»^[19] There the colors are «brighter far and clearer than ours; there is a purple of wonderful lustre, also the radiance of gold and the white which is in the earth is whiter than any chalk or snow.»^[19] Moreover the plants are better: «and in this far region everything that grows — trees and flowers and fruits — are in a like degree fairer than any here.»^[19] Gems lie about like ordinary stones: «and there are hills, having stones … more transparent, and fairer in color than our highly-valued emeralds and sardonyxes ….»^[19] And for the humans, «… they have no disease, and live much longer than we do, and have sight, and hearing and smell … in far greater perfection. They converse with the gods and see the sun, moon and stars as they truly are ….»^[19] Indeed, for Plato, «god» is identical to the Form of the Good.

Evidence of Forms

Plato’s main evidence for the existence of Forms is intuitive only and is as follows.

The argument from human perception

To understand Plato’s argument from human perception, it is helpful to use the example of the color blue. We call both the sky and blue jeans by the same color: blue. However, clearly a pair of jeans and the sky are not the same color; moreover, the wavelengths of light reflected by the sky at every location and all the millions of blue jeans in every state of fading constantly change, and yet we somehow have an idea of the basic form Blueness as it applies to them. Says Plato:^[20][21]

But if the very nature of knowledge changes, at the time when the change occurs there will be no knowledge, and, according to this view, there will be no one to know and nothing to be known: but if that which knows and that which is known exist ever, and the beautiful and the good and every other thing also exist, then I do not think that they can resemble a process of flux, as we were just now supposing.

The argument from perfection

No one has ever seen a perfect circle, nor a perfectly straight line, yet everyone knows what a circle and a straight line are. Plato utilizes the tool-maker’s blueprint as evidence that Forms are real:^[22]

… when a man has discovered the instrument which is naturally adapted to each work, he must expess this natural form, and not others which he fancies, in the material ….

Given that perceived circles or lines are not exactly circular or straight, and yet idea of a perfect circle or line directs the manufacturer, then it follows that there must exist the idea or Form of a perfect circle or line.

Criticisms of Platonic Forms

Self-criticism

Plato was well aware of the limitations of his theory, as he offered his own criticisms of it in his dialogue Parmenides, in which Socrates is portrayed as a young philosopher acting as junior counterfoil to aged Parmenides.

The dialogue does present a very real difficulty with the Theory of Forms, which was overcome later by Aristotle (but not without rejecting the independently existing world of Forms). It is debated whether Plato viewed these criticisms as conclusively disproving the Theory of Forms. It is worth noting that Aristotle was a student and then a junior colleague of Plato; it is entirely possible that the presentation of Parmenides «sets up» for Aristotle; that is, they agreed to disagree.

The difficulty lies in the conceptualization of the «participation» of an object in a form (or Form). The young Socrates conceives of his solution to the problem of the universals in another metaphor, which though wonderfully apt, remains to be elucidated:^[23]

Nay, but the idea may be like the day which is one and the same in many places at once, and yet continuous with itself; in this way each idea may be one and the same in all at the same time.

But exactly how is a Form like the day in being everywhere at once? The solution calls for a distinct form, in which the particular instances that are not identical to the form participate; i.e., the form is shared like the day in many places. The concept of «participate,» represented in Greek by more than one word, is as obscure in Greek as it is in English. Plato hypothesized that distinctness meant existence as an independent being, thus opening himself up to the famous Third Man Argument of Parmenides,^[24] which proves that forms cannot independently exist and be participated.^[25] and ^[26]

If universal and particulars — say man or greatness — all exist and are the same, then the Form is not one but is multiple. If they are only like each other then they contain a form that is the same and others that are different. Thus if the Form and a particular are alike then there must be another, or third, man or greatness by possession of which they are alike. An infinite regression must result (consequently the mathematicians often call the argument the Third Man Regression); that is, an endless series of third men. The ultimate participant, greatness, rendering the entire series great, is missing. Moreover, any Form is not unitary but is composed of infinite parts, none of which is the proper Form.

The young Socrates (some may say the young Plato) did not give up the Theory of Forms over the Third Man but took another tack, that the particulars do not exist as such. Whatever they are, they «mime» the Forms, appearing to be particulars. This is a clear dip into representationalism, that we cannot observe the objects as they are in themselves but only their representations. That view has the weakness that if only the mimes can be observed then the real Forms cannot be known at all and the observer can have no idea of what the representations are supposed to represent or that they are representations.

Plato’s later answer would be that men already know the Forms because they were in the world of Forms before birth. The mimes only recall these Forms to memory.^[27] Unfortunately the hidden world can in no way be verified in this lifetime and its otherworldness can only be a matter of speculation (in those times before the knowledge of revelation and faith).^[28]

Aristotelian criticism

The topic of Aristotelian criticism of Plato’s Theory of Forms is quite extensive and continues to expand, for many reasons. First, Aristotle did not just criticize Plato but Platonism typically without distinguishing individuals. Moreover, rather than quote Plato directly he chose to summarize him often in one-liners that are not comprehensible without considerable exegesis, and sometimes not then. As a historian of prior thought, Aristotle often uses the prior arguments as a foil to present his own ideas. Consequently, in presenting the Aristotelian criticisms it is necessary to distinguish what Aristotle wrote, what he meant, what Plato meant, the validity of Aristotle’s understanding of Plato’s thoughts, and the relationship between Plato’s thought and Aristotle’s concepts: a formidable task extending over centuries of scholarship. This article presents a few sample arguments addressed by a few sample scholars. Readers may pursue the topic more fully through the citations and bibliography.

In the summary passage quoted above^[7] Plato distinguishes between real and non-real «existing things,» where the latter term is used of substance. The figures, which the artificer places in the gold, are not substance, but gold is. Aristotle, after stating that according to Plato all things studied by the sciences have Form, asserts that Plato considered only substance to have Form giving rise to the contradiction of Forms existing as the objects of the sciences but not existing as non-substance.^[29]

Despite Ross’s objection that Aristotle is wrong in his assumption, that Plato considers many non-substances to be Forms, such as Sameness, Difference, Rest, Motion, the criticism remains and is major, for it seems that Plato did not know where to draw the line between Form and non-Form. As Cornford points out,^[30] things about which the young Socrates (and Plato) asserted «I have often been puzzled about these things»^[31] referring to Man, Fire and Water, appear as Forms in his later works, but others do not, such as Hair, Mud, Dirt, about which Socrates is made to assert: «it would be too absurd to suppose that they have a Form.»

Another argument of Aristotle attacked by Ross^[29] is that Socrates posits a Form, Otherness, to account for the differences between Forms. Apparently Otherness is existing non-existence: the Not-tall, the Not-beautiful, etc., so that every particular object participates in a Form causing it not to be one essence; that is, a Form to exclude the essence but allow all others. According to Ross, however, Plato never made the leap from «A is not B» to «A is Not-B.» Otherness only applies to its own particulars and not to the other Forms; for example, there is no Form, Non-Greek, only particulars of Otherness that suppress Greek.

However, this objection does not evade the question. Whether or not Socrates meant that the particulars of Otherness are Not-Greek, Not-tall, Not-beautiful, etc., such a particular still operates only on specific essences. If it were a general exclusiveness every Form would be excluded and nothing be anything in particular. If the exclusion excludes one essence then either Otherness is not unitary or multiple Othernesses exist, each one excluding one essence. It is something and it is not something; it allows and does not allow, which are contradictory properties of the one Form.

Though familiar with insight, Plato had postulated that we know Forms through remembrance. Aristotle successfully makes epistemological arguments against this view. In Plato the particulars do not really exist. Countering «… for that which is non-existent cannot be known»^[32] Aristotle points out that proof rests on prior knowledge of universals and that if we did not know what universals are we would have no idea of what we were trying to prove and could not be trying to prove it. Knowledge of the universal is given from even one particular; in fact, the inductive method of proof depends on it.^[33]

This epistemology sets up for the main attack on Platonism (though not named) in Metaphysics.^[34] In brief, universal and particulars imply each other; one is logically prior or posterior to the other. If they are to be regarded as distinct, then they cannot be universal and particulars; that is, there is no reason to understand the universal from the objects that are supposed to be particulars. It is not the case that if a universal A might be supposed to have particulars a1, a2, etc., A is missing or a1, a2, etc. are missing. A does not exist at all and a1, a2, etc. are unrelated objects.

Ideas as Representations: Modern Representative Theory of Perception

The concept of ideas as images in mind in modern philosophy appeared within the context of the Representative Theory of Perception, a common framework of thought in modern philosophy.

The Representative Theory of Perception, also known as Indirect realism, «epistemological dualism,» and «The veil of perception,» is a philosophical concept. It states that we do not (and can not) perceive the external world directly; instead we know only our ideas or interpretations of objects in the world. Thus, a barrier or a veil of perception prevents first-hand knowledge of anything beyond it. The «veil» exists between the mind and the existing world.

The debate then occurs about where our ideas come from, and what this place is like. An indirect realist believes our ideas come from sense data of a real, material, external world. The doctrine states that in any act of perception, the immediate (direct) object of perception is only a sense-datum that represents an external object.

Aristotle was the first to provide an in-depth description of Indirect realism. In his work, On the Soul, he describes how the eye must be affected by changes in an intervening medium rather than by objects themselves. He then speculates on how these sense impressions can form our experience of seeing and reasons that an endless regress would occur unless the sense itself were self aware. He concludes by proposing that the mind is the things it thinks. He calls the images in the mind «ideas.»

The way that indirect realism involves intermediate stages between objects and perceptions immediately raises a question: How well do sense-data represent external objects, properties, and events? Indirect realism creates deep epistemological problems, such as solipsism and the problem of the external world. Nonetheless, Indirect realism has been popular in the history of philosophy and has been developed by many philosophers including Bertrand Russell, Spinoza, René Descartes, and John Locke.

John Locke

In striking contrast to Plato’s use of idea ^[35] is that of John Locke in his masterpiece Essay Concerning Human Understanding in the Introduction where he defines idea as «It being that term which, I think, serves best to stand for whatsoever is the object of the understanding when a man thinks, I have used it to express whatever is meant by phantasm, notion, species, or whatever it is which the mind can be employed about in thinking ; and I could not avoid frequently using it.» He said he regarded the book necessary to examine our own abilities and see what objects our understandings were, or were not, fitted to deal with. In his philosophy other outstanding figures followed in his footsteps — Hume and Kant in the eighteenth century, Arthur Schopenhauer in the nineteenth century, and Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and Karl Popper in the twentieth century. Locke always believed in good sense — not pushing things to extremes and taking fully into account the plain facts of the matter. He considered his common sense ideas «good-tempered, moderate, and down-to-earth.» ^c

David Hume

Hume differs from Locke by limiting «idea» to the more or less vague mental reconstructions of perceptions, the perceptual process being described as an «impression.»^[36] Hume shared with Locke the basic empiricist premise that it is only from life experiences (whether our own or other’s) that out knowledge of the existence of anything outside of ourselves can be ultimately derived. We shall carry on doing what we are prompted to do by our emotional drives of all kinds. In choosing the means to those ends we shall follow our accustomed association of ideas.^d Hume is quoted as saying: «Reason is the slave of the passions.»

History of ideas

The history of ideas is a field of research in history that deals with the expression, preservation, and change of human ideas over time. The history of ideas is a sister-discipline to, or a particular approach within, intellectual history. Work in the history of ideas may involve interdisciplinary research in the history of philosophy, the history of science, or the history of literature. In Sweden, the history of ideas has been a distinct university subject since the 1930s, when Johan Nordström, a scholar of literature, was appointed professor of the new discipline at Uppsala University. Today, several universities across the world provide courses in this field, usually as part of a graduate program.

The Lovejoy approach

The historian Arthur O. Lovejoy (1873–1962) coined the phrase history of ideas and initiated its systematic study, in the early decades of the twentieth century. For decades Lovejoy presided over the regular meetings of the History of Ideas Club at Johns Hopkins University, where he worked as a professor of history from 1910 to 1939.

Aside from his students and colleagues engaged in related projects (such as René Wellek and Leo Spitzer, with whom Lovejoy engaged in extended debates), scholars such as Isaiah Berlin, Michel Foucault, Christopher Hill, J. G. A. Pocock and others have continued to work in a spirit close to that with which Lovejoy pursued the history of ideas. The first chapter/lecture of Lovejoy’s book The Great Chain of Being lays out a general overview of what is intended (or at least what he intended) to be the program and scope of the study of the history of ideas.

Unit-ideas

Lovejoy’s history of ideas takes as its basic unit of analysis the unit-idea, or the individual concept. These unit-ideas work as the building-blocks of the history of ideas: though they are relatively unchanged in themselves over the course of time, unit-ideas recombine in new patterns and gain expression in new forms in different historical eras. As Lovejoy saw it, the historian of ideas had the task of identifying such unit-ideas and of describing their historical emergence and recession in new forms and combinations.

Modern work

Quentin Skinner has been influential with his critique of Lovejoy’s «unit-idea» methodology. Instead, he proposes a sensitivity to the cultural context of the texts being analysed and the ideas they contained.

See also

• Form
• Meme
• Opinion
• Ideology
• Think tank
• Mental image
• Brainstorming
• Object of the mind
• Thought experiment
• Introspection and Extrospection

Notes

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Balz, A. G. A. Idea and essence in the philosophies of Hobbes and Spinoza. New York: Columbia University Press, 1918.
• Beck, Martha C. Plato’s Self-Corrective Development of the Concepts of Soul, Form and Immortality in Three Arguments of the Phaedo. Edwin Mellon Press, 1999. ISBN 0773479503
• Berlin, I., and H. Hardy. Against the current essays in the history of ideas. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001. ISBN 0691090262
• Bevir, M. The logic of the history of ideas. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1999. ISBN 0521640342
• Cornford, Francis MacDonald. Plato and Parmenides. New York: The Liberal Arts Press, 1957.
• Durham, Michael. «Two Men and the Third Man.» The Dualist: Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy (Stanford University) (1997): 4
• Fine, Gail. On Ideas: Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato’s Theory of Forms. Oxford University Press, 1992. ISBN 0198235496. Reviewed by Gerson, Lloyd P . Gail Fine, On Ideas. Aristotle’s Criticism of Plato’s Theory of Forms. Bryn Mawr Classical Review 04.05.25 (1993).
• Grote, George, «App I Aristotle’s Objections to Plato’s Theory.» Aristotle, Second Edition with Additions, London: John Murray, 1880.
• Lessig, L. The future of ideas the fate of the commons in a connected world. New York: Random House, 2001. ISBN 0375505784
• Lovejoy, A. O. The Great chain of being a study of the history of an idea. Cambridge: The William James lectures delivered at Harvard University, 1933; MA, Harvard University Press, 1974. ISBN 0674361539
• Lovejoy, A. O. Essays in the history of ideas. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1978. ISBN 0313205043
• Ross, Sir David. Plato’s Theory of Ideas. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1951.
• The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, MacMillian Publishing Company, New York, 1973. ISBN 0028949501
• Watson, Peter. Ideas: a history from fire to Freud. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2005.
• Watt, Stephen. «Introduction: The Theory of Forms (Books 5-7),» Plato: Republic. London: Wordsworth Editions, 1997. ISBN 1853264830
• Wiener, P. P. Dictionary of the history of ideas studies of selected pivotal ideas. New York: Scribner, 1973. ISBN 0684132931
• Yolton, J. W. John Locke and the way of ideas. [London]: Oxford University Press, 1956.

• This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
• This article incorporates text from the Old Catholic Encyclopedia of 1914, a publication now in the public domain.
• This article incorporates text from the Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, a publication now in the public domain.

External links

All links retrieved February 24, 2018.

• Catholic Encyclopedia entry «idea».
• Francesco Petrarch and his relationship to Renaissance Humanism.
• Philip P. Wiener (ed.), Dictionary of the History of Ideas: Studies of Selected Pivotal Ideas.
• Marc Cohen. Theory of Forms Philosophy 320: History of Ancient Philosophy, University of Washington Philosophy Department
• Tim Ruggiero, Plato And The Theory of Forms Philosophical Society.com.
• Plato’s Middle Period Metaphysics and Epistemology Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

General Philosophy Sources

• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
• The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
• Paideia Project Online.
• Project Gutenberg.

Last Updated:
10 Apr 2023
— Updated example sentences

1

0   0 Ideas are suggestions posted by the members of an ideas community and are organized by zones. For example, if the focus of a particular zone is “Ideas for car features,” an appropriate idea for that zone might have the title “Insulated cup holders that keep your beverage hot or cold.” Or, if the focus of a particular zone is “Ideas for ou [..]

2	0   0 idea late 14c., «archetype, concept of a thing in the mind of God,» from Latin idea «Platonic idea, archetype,» a word in philosophy, the word (Cicero writes it in Greek) and the idea t [..]

3	0   0 idea /aɪˈdiːjə/ noun plural ideas idea /aɪˈdiːjə/ noun plural ideas Learner's definition of IDEA 1  [count] : a thought, plan, or suggestion about what to do My idea is to study law. Star [..]

4	0   0 idea the content of cognition; the main thing you are thinking about; "it was not a good idea"; "the thought never entered my mind" mind: your intention; [..]

5	0   0 idea a plan which you think of, or a picture in your mind

6	0   0 idea Developed in Switzerland and licensed for non-commercial use in PGP. IDEA uses a 128 bit user supplied key to perform a series of nonlinear mathematical transformations on a 64 bit data block. Compare the length of this key with the 56 bits in DES or the 80 bits in Clipper.

7	0   0 idea idey

8	0   0 idea ideye

9	0   0 idea aynfal

10	0   0 idea , Ideal, Idol

11	0   0 idea A concept. The Ideas of God are the Divine Realizations of His own Being. The real Ideas are eternal.

12	0   0 idea See Institutional Development Awards.

13	0   0 idea Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

14	0   0 idea Idea is a concept or a product of the mind. In the narrow sense, an idea is just whatever is before the mind when one thinks. Often, ideas are construed as representational images. In other contexts, [..]

15	0   0 idea (n) the content of cognition; the main thing you are thinking about(n) your intention; what you intend to do(n) a personal view(n) an approximate calculation of quantity or degree or worth(n) (mu [..]

16	0   0 idea Anything existing in the mind as an object of knowledge or thought; concept refers to a generalized idea of a class of objects, based on knowledge of particular instances of the class; conception, oft [..]

17	0   0 idea A block cipher with 128-bit keys and 64-bit blocks popularly used with PGP. It is currently protected by patents.

18	0   0 idea International Data Encryption Algorythm. An encryption algorythm that uses a 128-bit key. Integrity

19	0   0 idea See Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

20	0   0 idea A law ensuring services to children with disabilities throughout the nation. IDEA governs how states and public agencies provide early intervention, special education and related services to eligible [..]

21	0   0 idea Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the federal special education law, as amended in 1997.

22	0   0 idea Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

23	0   0 idea Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

24	0   0 idea See Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.

25	0   0 idea Please see «Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.»

26	0   0 idea International Data Encryption Algorithm. IDEA is a block encryption algorithm that was first published in 1990.

27	0   0 idea Federal law mandating free and appropriate public education for all students. Included in this law are specific requirements for transition planning

28	0   0 idea idio-

29	0   0 idea lang=en 1800s=1843 * »’1843»’ — . »». *: The two young Cratchits laughed tremendously at the idea of Peter’s being a man of business; and Peter himself looked thoughtfully at the fire from be [..]

30	0   0 idea Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

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Britannica Dictionary definition of IDEA

Princeton’s WordNetRate this definition:2.7 / 3 votes

1. idea, thoughtnoun

   the content of cognition; the main thing you are thinking about

   «it was not a good idea»; «the thought never entered my mind»

2. mind, ideanoun

   your intention; what you intend to do

   «he had in mind to see his old teacher»; «the idea of the game is to capture all the pieces»

3. ideanoun

   a personal view

   «he has an idea that we don’t like him»

4. estimate, estimation, approximation, ideanoun

   an approximate calculation of quantity or degree or worth

   «an estimate of what it would cost»; «a rough idea how long it would take»

5. theme, melodic theme, musical theme, ideanoun

   (music) melodic subject of a musical composition

   «the theme is announced in the first measures»; «the accompanist picked up the idea and elaborated it»

WiktionaryRate this definition:2.4 / 5 votes

1. ideanoun

   An abstract archetype of a given thing, compared to which real-life examples are seen as imperfect approximations; pure essence, as opposed to actual examples.

2. ideanoun

   The conception of someone or something as representing a perfect example; an ideal.

3. ideanoun

   The form or shape of something; a quintessential aspect or characteristic.

4. ideanoun

   An image of an object that is formed in the mind or recalled by the memory.

   The mere idea of you is enough to excite me.

5. ideanoun

   More generally, any result of mental activity; a thought, a notion; a way of thinking.

   Ideas won’t go to jail.A. Whitney Griswold (1952)

6. ideanoun

   A conception in the mind of something to be done; a plan for doing something, an intention.

   I have an idea of how we might escape.

7. ideanoun

   A vague or fanciful notion; a feeling or hunch; an impression.

   He had the wild idea that if he leant forward a little, he might be able to touch the mountain-top.

8. ideanoun

   A musical theme or melodic subject.

9. Etymology: From idea, from ἰδέα, from εἴδω.

Samuel Johnson’s DictionaryRate this definition:0.0 / 0 votes

1. IDEAnoun

   Mental imagination.

   Etymology: ideé, French; ἰδέα.

   Whatsoever the mind perceives in itself, or is the immediate object of perception, thought, or understanding, that I call idea.
   John Locke.

   The form under which these things appear to the mind, or the result of our apprehension, is called an idea.
   Isaac Watts.

   Happy you that may to the saint, your only idea,
   Although simply attir’d, your manly affection utter.
   Philip Sidney.

   Our Saviour himself, being to set down the perfect idea of that which we are to pray and wish for on earth, did not teach to pray or wish for more than only that here it might be with us, as with them it is in heaven.
   Richard Hooker, b. i.

   Her sweet idea wander’d through his thoughts.
   Edward Fairfax.

   I did infer your lineaments,
   Being the right idea of your father,
   Both in your form and nobleness of mind.
   William Shakespeare, R. III.

   How good, how fair,
   Answering his great idea!
   John Milton, Paradise Lost, b. vii.

   If Geoffrey Chaucer by the best idea wrought,
   The fairest nymph before his eyes he set.
   Dryden.

Webster DictionaryRate this definition:5.0 / 1 vote

1. Ideanoun

   the transcript, image, or picture of a visible object, that is formed by the mind; also, a similar image of any object whatever, whether sensible or spiritual

2. Ideanoun

   a general notion, or a conception formed by generalization

3. Ideanoun

   hence: Any object apprehended, conceived, or thought of, by the mind; a notion, conception, or thought; the real object that is conceived or thought of

4. Ideanoun

   a belief, option, or doctrine; a characteristic or controlling principle; as, an essential idea; the idea of development

5. Ideanoun

   a plan or purpose of action; intention; design

6. Ideanoun

   a rational conception; the complete conception of an object when thought of in all its essential elements or constituents; the necessary metaphysical or constituent attributes and relations, when conceived in the abstract

7. Ideanoun

   a fiction object or picture created by the imagination; the same when proposed as a pattern to be copied, or a standard to be reached; one of the archetypes or patterns of created things, conceived by the Platonists to have excited objectively from eternity in the mind of the Deity

FreebaseRate this definition:3.5 / 2 votes

1. Idea

   In philosophy, the term idea has been used to cover a range of concepts. Ideas are often construed as mental representational images; i.e., images of some object. In other contexts, ideas are taken to be concepts, although abstract concepts do not necessarily appear as images. Many philosophers have considered ideas to be a fundamental ontological category of being. The capacity to create and understand the meaning of ideas is considered to be an essential and defining feature of human beings. In a popular sense, an idea arises in a reflex, spontaneous manner, even without thinking or serious reflection, for example, when we talk about the idea of a person or a place.

Chambers 20th Century DictionaryRate this definition:4.0 / 2 votes

1. Idea

   ī-dē′a, n. an image of an external object formed by the mind: a notion, thought, any product of intellectual action—of memory and imagination: an archetype of the manifold varieties of existence in the universe, belonging to the supersensible world, where reality is found and where God is (Platonic); one of the three products of the reason (the Soul, the Universe, and God) transcending the conceptions of the understanding—transcendental ideas, in the functions of mind concerned with the unification of existence (Kantian); the ideal realised, the absolute truth of which everything that exists is the expression (Hegelian).—adjs. Idē′aed, Idē′a’d, provided with an idea or ideas; Idē′al, existing in idea: mental: existing in imagination only: the highest and best conceivable, the perfect, as opposed to the real, the imperfect.—n. the highest conception of anything.—adj. Idē′aless.—n. Idealisā′tion, act of forming an idea, or of raising to the highest conception.—v.t. Idē′alise, to form an idea: to raise to the highest conception.—v.i. to form ideas.—ns. Idē′alīser; Idē′alism, the doctrine that in external perceptions the objects immediately known are ideas, that all reality is in its nature psychical: any system that considers thought or the idea as the ground either of knowledge or existence: tendency towards the highest conceivable perfection, love for or search after the best and highest: the imaginative treatment of subjects; Idē′alist, one who holds the doctrine of idealism, one who strives after the ideal: an unpractical person.—adj. Idealist′ic, pertaining to idealists or to idealism.—n. Ideal′ity, ideal state: ability and disposition to form ideals of beauty and perfection.—adv. Idē′ally, in an ideal manner: mentally.—n. Idē′alogue, one given to ideas: a theorist.—v.i. Idē′ate, to form ideas.—adj. produced by an idea.—n. the correlative or object of an idea.—n. Ideā′tion, the power of the mind for forming ideas: the exercise of such power.—adjs. Ideā′tional, Idē′ative. [L.,—Gr. idea—idein, to see.]

Editors ContributionRate this definition:0.0 / 0 votes

1. idea

   A thought or form of inspiration.

   They had an idea to spend time with their daughter as she was living in another country.

   Submitted by MaryC on January 16, 2020  

Matched Categories

1. • Calculation
   • Cognitive Content
   • Melody
   • Music
   • Opinion
   • Purpose

British National Corpus

1. Spoken Corpus Frequency

   Rank popularity for the word ‘IDEA’ in Spoken Corpus Frequency: #445

2. Written Corpus Frequency

   Rank popularity for the word ‘IDEA’ in Written Corpus Frequency: #371

3. Nouns Frequency

   Rank popularity for the word ‘IDEA’ in Nouns Frequency: #66

How to pronounce IDEA?

How to say IDEA in sign language?

Numerology

1. Chaldean Numerology

   The numerical value of IDEA in Chaldean Numerology is: 2

2. Pythagorean Numerology

   The numerical value of IDEA in Pythagorean Numerology is: 1

Examples of IDEA in a Sentence

1. Willians Bonilla:

   She knows hardship, they have no idea what they’re in for.

2. Anthony Fauci:

   The idea of vaccinating teachers is very high up in the priority, as well as doing surveillance in the schools so that you can get a good feel for the penetration of infection.

3. Shelby Steele:

   I think you’re God’s gift right now to black America, to the black community all across America, because we’ve gotten this terrible, terrible idea coming out of the 60s, that our dependency on the larger society is justice. And that what we need to be doing is protesting, and that we need Black Lives Matter, and that we need black anger and we need black identity, no, those things assuage us as we decline. What we need are traditional family values. A mother and a father — no social programs will ever substitute for that. We need that sort of common sense responsibility for our own fate — don’t just keep giving us things, more and more things. Ask more from us and we need to ask more from ourselves.

4. Bill Gross:

   For some reason still unbeknownst to me they didn’t think that was a good idea and they did fire me, in the last few weeks, it blindsided me; I had no idea that an executive committee could fire a founder and the titular leader of the company.

5. John Brown:

   I want you to understand that I respect the rights of the poorest and weakest of colored people, oppressed [to deny others their rights or liberty] by the slave system, just as much as I do those of the most wealthy and powerful. That is the idea that has moved me, and that alone.

Popularity rank by frequency of use

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Translations for IDEA

From our Multilingual Translation Dictionary

• ideeAfrikaans
• فكرةArabic
• төшөнсәBashkir
• ідэ́я, ду́мкаBelarusian
• иде́я, ми́съл, предста́ва, планBulgarian
• ideaCatalan, Valencian
• myšlenka, nápadCzech
• Idee, Ahnung, VorstellungGerman
• susuEwe
• ιδέαGreek
• ideoEsperanto
• ideaSpanish
• aimdus, mõte, arvamus, kavatsusEstonian
• ایدهPersian
• idea, ajatusFinnish
• idée, penséeFrench
• beachd-smaoin, smaoin, beachdScottish Gaelic
• רַעֲיוֹןHebrew
• विचारHindi
• lideHaitian Creole
• ötletHungarian
• գաղափար, միտքArmenian
• ideaInterlingua
• ideIndonesian
• tema, idea, impressione, parereItalian
• רעיוןHebrew
• 考え, ちゃくそう, アイデア, 主意Japanese
• ცნება, იდეაGeorgian
• 아이디어, 생각, 구상Korean
• بیروڕاKurdish
• īnfōrmātiōLatin
• IddiLuxembourgish, Letzeburgesch
• mintis, idėjaLithuanian
• doma, idejaLatvian
• идејаMacedonian
• idee, gedachte, intentie, impressie, ingeving, bedoeling, indruk, bedenking, plan, denkbeeldDutch
• idéNorwegian
• pomysł, ideaPolish
• ideiaPortuguese
• idee, părere, bănuialăRomanian
• мысль, те́ма, план, поня́тие, за́мысел, иде́я, представле́ниеRussian
• misao, zamisao, мисао, замисао, pomisao, идеја, помисао, idejaSerbo-Croatian
• myšlienka, nápadSlovak
• ideja, predstava, zamiselSlovene
• idé, tankeSwedish
• స్వరకల్పన, అభిప్రాయము, వ్యూహము, ఉపాయముTelugu
• düşünce, fikirTurkish
• іде́я, ду́мкаUkrainian
• خیالUrdu
• tư tưởng, ý định, ý niệmVietnamese
• 理念Chinese

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