The quality or state of being other or different; otherness, especially in philosophy.
From Latin alteritas, derived from alter (other). This philosophical term was revived in 20th-century Continental philosophy, particularly by thinkers like Levinas exploring the concept of radical 'otherness' and difference.
Philosophers obsess over 'alterity' because it's the flip side of identity—you can't know yourself without acknowledging something radically OTHER. Emmanuel Levinas argued that ethics begins with encountering the alterity of another person's face!
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