Philosophy & ThoughtGreek → English
Dichotomy
/daɪˈkɑtəmi/noun
A division into two parts treated as mutually exclusive.
The Greek roots
δίχα
dícha
in two, apart
τέμνειν
témnein
to cut
Literally: “a cutting in two”
The story of the word
Greek astronomers used διχοτομία for the moon at exact half phase, cut down the middle by the terminator. Logicians used it for Plato's method of splitting a class in two and then splitting again until you reach the definition. English kept the logical sense and hardened it, so a dichotomy now implies the two halves exhaust the field, which is precisely the assumption a false dichotomy smuggles in.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → Latin → English
- First recorded
- 17th century
Same family
trichotomyanatomyatomepitome
In a sentence
The nature-versus-nurture dichotomy collapses the moment you look at a real developmental study.
He set up a dichotomy between craft and industry that the workshop itself disproved.