What does appetition mean?
Appetition is a noun denoting a fundamental striving or tendency toward some object — the conative force that moves a being to seek what it lacks or pursue what it desires. Unlike everyday words such as appetite or craving, which describe particular wants, appetition names the underlying drive itself, making it a staple of philosophical and early psychological vocabulary. The term is most closely associated with Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, who held that every monad's perceptions are accompanied by appetition, the inner impetus that carries it from one state to the next. Derived from the Latin appetere, 'to strive after,' it belongs to the same family as appetite and petition. Today the word appears almost exclusively in scholarly discussion of metaphysics, the history of ideas, and theories of motivation, where its precision makes it valuable precisely because more familiar synonyms blur the distinction between wanting, feeling, and striving.
nounAn instinctive striving or tendency toward some object or goal; a fundamental impulse of desire directed at attaining or avoiding something. The term is used chiefly in philosophy and psychology to describe the conative drive underlying appetite and will.
- A striving or conative tendency toward an object, as distinguished from mere cognition or feeling.
- In Leibnizian metaphysics, the internal principle by which a monad passes from one perception to another.
"In Leibniz's philosophy, perception is always accompanied by appetition, the inner drive that moves a monad from one state to the next."
"The philosopher argued that appetition, not reason alone, is what sets organisms in motion toward their ends."
"Early modern psychologists treated appetition as the common root from which both hunger and ambition grow."
The plural is rare and appears mainly in academic prose when comparing distinct strivings or drives.
"The treatise catalogued the various appetitions that govern animal behavior."
Leibniz believed every perception comes bundled with appetition — meaning that, in his view, you can never simply perceive the world without simultaneously reaching toward it.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of appetition
Appetition derives from the Latin verb appetere, meaning 'to strive after' or 'to seek eagerly,' formed from ad- ('toward') plus petere ('to seek, aim at'). It entered English in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth century as a learned borrowing, initially in scholastic and philosophical contexts. Its Latin root also yields appetite, appetency, and petition, all of which preserve the sense of seeking or directing oneself toward something. The word gained its most famous formulation in the philosophy of Leibniz, who made appetition a structural feature of reality itself.
Related word forms
How appetition is actually used
Appetition is a rare, learned word confined almost entirely to philosophy, intellectual history, and older psychological writing. It carries no informal register and would strike most readers as technical or archaic; in ordinary contexts, words like desire or craving are preferred.
Easily confused with appetition
Appetite is the everyday word for a desire, especially for food or pleasure, while appetition is a technical philosophical term for the underlying conative drive itself.
Appetence denotes a settled inclination or fondness toward something, whereas appetition refers to the active striving or tendency toward an object.