occasionalism

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   philosophy: the doctrine that created things do not directly cause events but merely provide occasions on which God produces the corresponding effects

   Occasionalism explains the apparent interaction of mind and body as a sequence of divine interventions.

2. 2
   noun

   linguistics: the formation or use of a word created for a particular occasion

   The novelist's one-off compound is an example of occasionalism rather than an established lexical item.

From occasional + -ism. The metaphysical label refers to an event as the occasion, not the efficient cause, of divine action. Linguistics later used the same formation for a word coined for one occasion.

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