Glossary

Eternalism is the ontological thesis in the philosophy of time asserting that all points in time—past, present, and future—exist with equal reality, contrasting directly with presentism's claim that only the current moment exists.

Eternalism is the ontological thesis in the philosophy of time asserting that all points in time—past, present, and future—exist with equal reality, contrasting directly with presentism's claim that only the current moment exists.

Passive nihilism is a state of existential exhaustion where the collapse of traditional absolute values leads not to creative rebellion, but to a weary acceptance of meaninglessness, characterized by a retreat into hedonism, comfort, and the systematic avoidance of spiritual or intellectua

Perverse instantiation is a failure mode in AI alignment where an artificial intelligence satisfies the literal wording of a programmed command but executes it in a way that completely violates the programmer's original intent, often with catastrophic consequences.

Presentism is the philosophical position that only the present moment is real, meaning that past events have ceased to exist and future events do not yet possess any ontological reality.

The Face of the Other is Emmanuel Levinas's term for the immediate, non-conceptual presence of another human being which breaks through our cognitive categories, reveals our ethical vulnerability, and places an absolute, asymmetrical demand of responsibility upon us.

In Levinasian philosophy, Totality refers to any conceptual, political, or philosophical system that attempts to reduce the unique, infinite alterity of individuals into a unified, controllable, and predictable whole.

Causal Decision Theory (CDT) is a framework of rational choice which asserts that an agent should choose an action based on its expected causal consequences, rather than its mere evidential value or correlation with desirable states.

Evidential Decision Theory (EDT) is a theory of rational choice which holds that an agent should perform the action that conditionalizes on the best expected outcome, treating actions as evidence for states of the world rather than direct causes.

Psychological egoism is the empirical view in philosophy and psychology that all human actions are ultimately motivated by self-interest, suggesting that even seemingly altruistic or moral deeds are performed to secure personal benefits or avoid discomfort.