The Vital Center
E110650
The Vital Center is a 1949 political treatise by historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. that defends liberal democracy against both totalitarian communism and right-wing authoritarianism.
All labels observed (2)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| The Vital Center canonical | 1 |
| vital center | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T941158 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Vital Center Context triple: [Arthur Schlesinger Jr., notableWork, The Vital Center]
-
A.
The Man with Two Brains
The Man with Two Brains is a 1983 sci-fi comedy film starring Steve Martin as a brilliant but eccentric brain surgeon who falls in love with a disembodied brain.
-
B.
The Human Brain
The Human Brain is a popular science book by Isaac Asimov that explains the structure, function, and mysteries of the human brain for a general audience.
-
C.
The Study of Man
The Study of Man is a foundational 1936 anthropology book by Ralph Linton that systematically introduces and explains the nature of culture and human societies.
-
D.
The Connection of the Senses
The Connection of the Senses is a philosophical work by P. F. Strawson that explores how different sensory modalities contribute to our unified experience of the world.
-
E.
Broca's Brain
Broca's Brain is a popular science book by Carl Sagan that explores the nature of scientific thought, the brain, and the cosmos through essays on astronomy, philosophy, and skepticism.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Vital Center Target entity description: The Vital Center is a 1949 political treatise by historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. that defends liberal democracy against both totalitarian communism and right-wing authoritarianism.
-
A.
The Man with Two Brains
The Man with Two Brains is a 1983 sci-fi comedy film starring Steve Martin as a brilliant but eccentric brain surgeon who falls in love with a disembodied brain.
-
B.
The Human Brain
The Human Brain is a popular science book by Isaac Asimov that explains the structure, function, and mysteries of the human brain for a general audience.
-
C.
The Study of Man
The Study of Man is a foundational 1936 anthropology book by Ralph Linton that systematically introduces and explains the nature of culture and human societies.
-
D.
The Connection of the Senses
The Connection of the Senses is a philosophical work by P. F. Strawson that explores how different sensory modalities contribute to our unified experience of the world.
-
E.
Broca's Brain
Broca's Brain is a popular science book by Carl Sagan that explores the nature of scientific thought, the brain, and the cosmos through essays on astronomy, philosophy, and skepticism.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (45)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf |
book
ⓘ
political treatise ⓘ |
| author |
Arthur Schlesinger Jr.
ⓘ
surface form:
Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.
|
| countryOfOrigin |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| firstEditionFormat | hardcover ⓘ |
| genre |
nonfiction
ⓘ
political philosophy ⓘ political theory ⓘ |
| hasAuthorOccupation |
historian
ⓘ
political commentator ⓘ |
| hasPart |
analysis of totalitarianism
ⓘ
critique of Marxism ⓘ critique of laissez-faire conservatism ⓘ defense of New Deal liberalism ⓘ |
| hasTheme |
balance between freedom and security
ⓘ
critique of political extremes ⓘ defense of the political center ⓘ relationship between capitalism and democracy ⓘ responsibility of intellectuals in politics ⓘ role of the state in democracy ⓘ |
| influenced |
Cold War liberal thought
ⓘ
postwar American liberalism ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| literaryForm | prose ⓘ |
| mainSubject |
American liberalism
ⓘ
Cold War liberalism ⓘ anti-communism ⓘ anti-totalitarianism ⓘ democratic socialism ⓘ liberal democracy ⓘ |
| notableIdea |
The Vital Center
self-linksurface differs
ⓘ
surface form:
vital center
|
| opposes |
fascism
ⓘ
right-wing authoritarianism ⓘ totalitarian communism ⓘ |
| publicationDate | 1949 ⓘ |
| publisher | Houghton Mifflin ⓘ |
| setInPeriod |
World War II
ⓘ
early Cold War United States ⓘ interwar period ⓘ |
| supports |
civil liberties
ⓘ
liberal democracy ⓘ mixed economy ⓘ political pluralism ⓘ welfare state ⓘ |
| timePeriodAddressed | early Cold War ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: The Vital Center Description of subject: The Vital Center is a 1949 political treatise by historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. that defends liberal democracy against both totalitarian communism and right-wing authoritarianism.
Referenced by (2)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.
this entity surface form:
vital center