nominalist
|nom-i-nal-ist|
🇺🇸
/ˈnɑːmɪnəlɪst/
🇬🇧
/ˈnɒmɪnəlɪst/
one who says universals are names
Etymology
'nominalist' originates from English, specifically formed from 'nominal' + the suffix '-ist', where 'nominal' ultimately comes from Latin 'nomen' meaning 'name' and the suffix '-ist' indicates 'one who practices or is concerned with'.
'nominalist' developed through Late Latin/Medieval Latin (Medieval Latin 'nominalista') and the English adjective 'nominal' (from Old/Middle French and Late Latin), and was later formed in English as the noun 'nominalist'.
Initially it related to 'of or pertaining to a name' (from Latin), but over time it came to denote specifically 'a proponent of nominalism' — someone who treats universals as names rather than real entities.
Meanings by Part of Speech
Noun 1
a person who holds the philosophical doctrine of nominalism — the view that universals or abstract entities do not exist independently but are merely names or labels.
The medieval nominalist argued that universals existed only in names and not as independent entities.
Synonyms
Antonyms
Last updated: 2025/11/18 15:39