In the realm of philosophy, the concept of telos is utilized to denote the inherent purpose of an individual or object. This idea is known as teleology, with its realization referred to as entelechy. The term itself originates from Ancient Greek, where it meant “end” or “result”, and has had a significant impact on the English language. For instance, in biology, the “end phase” of mitosis is termed telophase, and the “end part” of a chromosome is known as a telomere. In linguistics, a homoioteleuton represents a repetition of the end sounds of words. Additionally, the noun talisman was borrowed into English in the 1630s from French and Arabic, ultimately stemming from Byzantine Greek telesma, which means “religious rite” or, more literally, “something done to completion”. Ultimately, telos is derived from a suffixed form of the Proto-Indo-European term kwel, meaning “to revolve”.
