History of Ontology

<table style="float:right;"><td> id=Ontology/

#MAGIC SubpageIndex id=Ontology/

</td></table>

~~Imported from [Wikipedia:Ontology Wikipedia] on 2005-03-14~~

'''Find:Ontology is a study of conceptions of reality and the nature of being.''' In philosophy, ''ontology'' (from the Greek ὤν: ''being,'' and

-λογία: ''study)'' forms the basic subject matter of metaphysics. It studies being or existence and their most basic categories

--trying to find out what entities and what types of entities exist.

Ontology has strong implications for our conceptions of [Meme:Reality_Tunnel reality].

In philosophy, 'ontology' (from the Greek ων = being and

λόγος = word/speech) is the most fundamental branch of

metaphysics. It studies being or existence as well as the basic categories

thereof -- trying to find out what entities and what types of entities exist.

Ontology has strong implications for the conceptions of reality.

Some philosophers, notably of the Platonic school, contend that all nouns refer

to entities. Other philosophers contend that some nouns do not name entities but

provide a kind of shorthand way of referring to a collection (of either objects

or events). In this latter view, mind, instead of referring to an entity,

instead refers to a collection of mental events experienced by a person;

society, instead of referring to an entity, refers to a collection of persons

with some shared characteristics; and geometry, instead of referring to an

entity, refers to a collection of a specific kind of intellectual activity. Any

ontology then must give an account of which words refer to entities, which do

not, why, and what categories result. When one applies this process to nouns

such as electrons, energy, promise, happiness, time, truth, causality, and god,

ontology becomes fundamental to many branches of philosophy.

As a philosophical subject, ontology chiefly deals with the precise utilization of words as descriptors of entities or realities. Any ontology must give an account of which words refer to entities, which do not, why, and what categories result. When one applies this process to nouns such as electrons, energy, promise, happiness, time, truth, causality, and god, ontology becomes fundamental to many branches of philosophy.

== Some basic questions ==

Ontology has as one of its basic question: "What exists?" Different philosophers provide different answers to this question. One common approach is to divide the extant entities into groups called "categories." However, these lists of categories are also quite different from one another.

"What are the fundamental categories of being?"

Different philosophers make different lists of such

fundamental categories of being.

This highlights one of the problems of the philosophical approach--it — it

relies on continued investigation of categories, and has no clear way to stop

asking. Whereas, in theology and library science and artificial intelligence,

one typically adopts a relatively stable foundation ontology. This reflects a

larger cosmology, and probably morals, aesthetic, examples or stories; all of

which can set foundational priorities. In theology this derives from a religion

and its (relatively) stable doctrines.

'''Further examples of ontological questions include:'''

*What is existence?

*What are physical objects?

*What are the essential as opposed to merely accidental, attributes of a given object?

*What constitutes the Identity of an object?

*Can one give an account of what it means to say that a physical object exists?

*What are an object's properties or relations and how are they related to the object itself?

*Is existence a property?

*When does an object go out of existence? as opposed to merely changing?

*'''[Deoxy:koan/82 Why does something exist rather than nothing?]'''