fallibilism
/ˈfælɪbɪlɪzəm/noun
fallibilism is a noun meaning “The doctrine that knowledge is never certain, but always hypothetical and susceptible to correction” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-A-L-L-I-B-I-L-I-S-M, and it appears about once in every 87 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of fallibilism is fallibilisms.
What does fallibilism mean?
noun
- 1
The doctrine that knowledge is never certain, but always hypothetical and susceptible to correction.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce fallibilism?
- /ˈfælɪbɪlɪzəm/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Forms of fallibilism
- fallibilisms plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is fallibilism?
Fallibilism appears about once in every 87 million words in written English, the 297,763rd most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Fallibilism in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense doctrine that knowledge is never certain:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | faillibilisme |
| German | Fallibilismus |
| Portuguese | falibilismo |
| Spanish | falibilismo |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does fallibilism come from?
From fallible + -ism.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).