Any doctrine emphasizing the priority of a whole over its parts. In the philosophy of language, this becomes the claim that the meaning of an individual word or sentence can only be understood in terms of its relations to an indefinitely larger body of language, such as a whole theory, or even a whole language or form of life. In the philosophy of mind, a mental state similarly may be identified only in terms of its relations with others. Moderate holism may allow that other things besides these relationships also count; extreme holism would hold that the network of relationships is all that we have. A holistic view of science holds that experience only confirms or disconfirms large bodies of doctrine, impinging at the edges, and leaving some leeway over the adjustments that it requires (see Duhem thesis).