Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

When the condyle is not in its natural position.  

A dislocation of the mandibular condyle, typically forward of the articular eminence; it is not self‐correcting or self‐reducing. In the jaw, a displacement of the mandibular condyle in front of the condylar eminence. It is often caused by keeping the mouth wide open for an extended time, as in dental treatment that involves a rubber…

A theoretical line traversing through the center of the mandibular condyles and around which the mandible rotates. A projected line connecting the condyles of the mandible. Movement of the mandible is rotation around this imaginary line.  

A device that replicates the position and movement of the jaws whereby the artificial condyle is represented by a metallic ball that interacts with a plane to represent the articulating surface of the temporomandibular joint. These articulators can be arcon instruments, where the metallic condyle is positioned in a similar manner to a naturally occurring…

A congenital anomaly depicted by the absence of the condyle.  

A learned response to a stimulus. Conditioned response. An automatic reaction by a person to a stimulus, or an expected reaction to a stimulus which comes from past experience. Reflex developed by training with a specific repeated stimulus, as in Pavlov’s experiment, in which a dog salivates at the sound of a bell after a…

The process of using force to ensure continuity of the matrix phase and removal of excess mercury when compacting dental amalgam. A psychological process, often present in dreams, in which two or more concepts are fused so that a single symbol represents the multiple components. The process of anabolism involves the fusion of individual building…

A predominantly inorganic mass in a cavity or in the tissue of an organism. A mass of hard material which forms in the body, e.g. a gallstone or deposits on bone in arthritis. A stony mass formed within such an organ as the kidney, especially by the coating of an internal organ (or a foreign…

When the roots of adjacent teeth are joined via cementum deposits. The union of separate parts; coalescence, especially the attachment of a tooth to an adjacent one by deposition of cementum to the roots.  

A computer program, or network of computers, that attempts to simulate an abstract model of a particular system.