Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 4.3bsd-beta 6/6/85; site dg_rtp.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!bellcore!decvax!mcnc!rti-sel!dg_rtp!throopw
From: throopw@dg_rtp.UUCP (Wayne Throop)
Newsgroups: net.sci,net.philosophy,net.nlang
Subject: Re: Metaphysicians
Message-ID: <212@dg_rtp.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 9-Mar-86 00:04:21 EST
Article-I.D.: dg_rtp.212
Posted: Sun Mar  9 00:04:21 1986
Date-Received: Tue, 11-Mar-86 01:40:23 EST
References: <899@decwrl.DEC.COM> <402@aoa.UUCP> <192@ulowell.UUCP>
Lines: 46
Xref: watmath net.sci:570 net.philosophy:4394 net.nlang:4268

[   I've broadened the newsgroups to include net.nlang, and pose the
    question as a word-derivation question to the nlinguists at large.
    (You know... as opposed to the captive ones you normally see... :-)

        When did "metaphysics" aquire the meaning "occultism" (rather
        than the more proper meaning of "the study of the nature of
        being and reality").

    History of the query and my speculation below. ]

> In the Short Story *Elsewhen* [...] there is this passage:
>
>       I've been gathering data on all sorts of phenomena that run
>       contrary to orthadox psychological theory -- all the junk that
>       goes under the general name of metaphysics -- telepathy, [etc etc]
>
> Later on the same page there is a switch.  Metaphysics is called
> metapsychics.  [...]
> I wonder if it is a typo.  My copy is a first edition -- i will have
> to check later ones.

Hmmm.  I don't have my copy to hand, it seems to be out on my
"lent/lost" program.  But it sounds a lot like a typeo.

> If it is a typo, then the confusion may have
> started with Heinlein.  On the other hand, if metapsychics'' was
> commonly used at that time, it is probably a common mistake which
> has occurred more than once.

I suspect that Heinlein coined the term "metapsychics" himself, and I'd
be surprised if it made its way into common use.

But... I looked up metaphysics in the some dictionaries.  I find that
"metaphysical" can mean "supernatural" in all of them.  And in one, an
archaic meaning of "metaphysics" meaning "occultism" was listed.

I wonder if what happened was that the wave of occultism in England in
the late 1800s and early 1900s appropriated the word.  The dictionary
that lists the archaic meaning is the oldest one (published in the 40s,
I think).  The newer ones don't mention it, so this meaning may have
been going out about then.

> Laura Creighton  hoptoad!laura  toad@lll-crg.arpa
-- 
Wayne Throop at Data General, RTP, NC
<the-known-world>!mcnc!rti-sel!dg_rtp!throopw