bicameralism

plural bicameralisms

1. uncountableusuallygovernmentThe practice of dividing legislative bodies into two chambers with complementary powers and limitations designed to provide checks and balances against one another.
2. uncountableusuallyhuman sciencesAmbiguous misnomer for Julian Jaynes's theory of bicamerality, probably never used by Jaynes, rarely used in academic literature based on his work, but often found informally (compare bicameral mind and bicameral mentality)

   1978, Edward Proffitt, "Romanticism, Bicamerality, and the Evolution of the Brain", The Wordsworth Circle, Vol. 9, No.1, reprinted with permission in Kuijsten, 2016, page 134. Coleridge...could not revert to bicameralism either.

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   As a result of this bicameralism, they were not conscious as we are today, and had no unified sense of self.

   2016, Susan G. Josephson, From Idolatry to Advertising: Visual Art and Contemporary Culture, →ISBN

   "...the evidence for bicameralism in early China." p. 2 "...to elucidate the evidence for bicameralism and the transition to consciousness..." p. 3 "...presents detailed evidence for bicameralism and the development of consciousness..." p. 14

   2016, Marcel Kuijsten, Gods, Voices, Julian Jaynes and the Bicameral Mind: The Theories of Julian Jaynes, (Introduction)