positivist means related to positivism, positivistic. Lexicurio rates it Rare gem — a strength score of 73 out of 100.
Why this word is great
POSITIVIST — [Adjective] Relating to the philosophical doctrine that authentic knowledge is exclusively derived from sensory experience and empirical verification, emphatically rejecting metaphysical speculation. From French *positiviste*, from *positif* ("positive, formally laid down") + *-iste* ("-ist"), after the term *positivism*. Unlike the broadly observational empiricist or the subjectively interpretive interpretivist, the positivist is a doctrinal systematizer, imposing a severe, almost liturgical order upon the knowable world. It is the clean line of a laboratory bench, the unadorned column of census data, and the quiet, methodological exclusion of every 'why' that cannot be measured—a faith so absolute in the tangible that it becomes its own kind of austere cathedral.
adj
- Related to positivism, positivistic.“The positivist tradition contains some rigorous, well-argued and stimulating methodological discussions; such material should be required reading for qualitative researchers wishing to enhance the quality of their practice.”
noun
- A believer in positivism.“The English mind is prone to positivism and kindred forms of materialistic philosophy, and we must expect the derivative theory to be taken up in that interest. We have no predilection for that school, but the contrary. If we had, we might have looked complacently upon a line of criticism which would indirectly, but effectively, play into the hands of positivists and materialistic atheists general”