Dialectic is the study of opposing opinions or contradictions. Bachelard uses the term “dialectics” to refer to the study of dualities of space, such as interior and exterior or large and small.

Epistemology is the theory of knowledge. Before studying philosophy, Bachelard studied science; his scientific study contributed to the field of education, in which he worked as a physics and chemistry teacher. The Poetics of Space rejects utilizing an epistemological lens—one rooted in the study of knowledge—to examine creative consciousness.

Fibonacci’s Spiral, or the Golden Spiral, is so named for following the golden ratio, a mathematical equation first written in Sanskrit poetry. The spiral occurs in numerous natural forms including the shell, the fiddlehead fern, and the organization of seeds in the head of a sunflower.