fatalism
Fatalism is the belief that events are fixed in advance and human effort cannot change them; in everyday use, a resigned acceptance of whatever happens.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Definitions
- The belief that everything that happens is decided in advance by fate or necessity, so that people cannot change the outcome of events.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - An attitude of passive acceptance: the habit of giving up on effort because a result is assumed to be settled already.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - In philosophy: the thesis that whatever will happen will happen no matter what anyone does, often discussed alongside determinism and the problem of free will.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
Examples
- His fatalism kept him from even trying to appeal the decision.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - There is a quiet fatalism in the way the villagers talk about the floods.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - Experts warn that climate fatalism can be as harmful as denial.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - The heroes of Greek tragedy struggle against a fatalism they cannot escape.
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Usage
In everyday English fatalism usually describes an attitude rather than a theory. People are said to give in to fatalism or to be overcome by it when they stop acting because they believe the outcome is already decided. The word tends to carry criticism: it suggests that someone has handed over control of a situation they could still influence. Common phrases include a sense of fatalism, grim fatalism and a mood of fatalism, and the adjective fatalistic describes a person, a remark, an outlook or a prediction.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Fatalism is easy to confuse with pessimism, but the two are different. A pessimist expects a bad result, while a fatalist believes the result, good or bad, is fixed and does not depend on us. A fatalist can therefore wait calmly for a happy ending, provided they believe it is meant to be. The opposite of fatalism is a belief in free will and human agency, and in the everyday sense also optimism, resourcefulness and initiative.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)In philosophy and theology fatalism is distinguished from determinism, although the two ideas are often linked. Determinism says that every event has causes that make it happen, whereas fatalism stresses that certain outcomes will come about whatever we do. The theme of inescapable fate runs through literature from ancient tragedy onwards. Recent writing about public problems such as climate change or political decline also uses the word for the feeling that nothing can be done.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Webster's dictionary of 1913 gives a single sense: the doctrine that all things are subject to fate, or that they take place by inevitable necessity. It defines a fatalist as one who maintains that all things happen by inevitable necessity, and fatalistic as implying or partaking of the nature of fatalism. That old entry does not mention the looser everyday sense of passive resignation, which is now the most familiar use.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Word forms
Regular forms according to English morphology (editorial description); the noun is mostly used without a plural.
word forms
| przypadek | forma |
|---|---|
| singular | fatalism |
| plural | fatalisms |
Word forms: Editorial team
Collocations
- a sense of fatalism
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - grim fatalism
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - climate fatalism
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - historical fatalism
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - give in to fatalism
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Synonyms · Antonyms
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)source
Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Etymology
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W. W. Skeat, An Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed., Oxford 1910, open sourcealso
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, 1913, open sourceRelated words
- fate , base word
- fatal , adjective
- fatalist , agent noun
- fatalistic , adjective
- fatality , related word
Related entries
Questions and answers
What does fatalism mean?
It is the conviction that the future is already settled, so nothing people do can alter it. In everyday use it also means a resigned attitude of accepting whatever happens without trying to change it.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)How does fatalism differ from determinism?
Determinism says every event follows from earlier causes. Fatalism says certain outcomes will happen no matter what anyone does, so human choices make no difference to them.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Is fatalism the same as pessimism?
No. A pessimist expects things to go badly, while a fatalist believes the outcome is fixed, whether it turns out good or bad. A fatalist may even expect a happy ending, as long as it seems meant to be.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)What is a fatalist?
A fatalist is a person who believes that events are decided in advance and that effort cannot change them. The related adjective is fatalistic, as in a fatalistic outlook or a fatalistic remark.