1. The doctrine that a new soul is created afresh for each person: opposed to traducianism.

2. In the philosophy of biology, the belief that perceived difficulties or gaps in the scientific theory of evolution by natural selection are well filled by positing Divine intervention, to create new species, and certainly to create people. Even when it does not depend upon misunderstanding the theory of evolution, the doctrine is unscientific because it simply postulates a God-sized cause for whatever gap is currently of interest: this leads to no falsifiable predictions or unification of knowledge. See also intelligent design.