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1. ONTOLOGY
Ontology is the philosophical study of the
nature of being, becoming, existence, or
reality, as well as the basic categories of
being and their relations. Traditionally listed
as a part of the major branch of philosophy
known as metaphysics, ontology deals with
questions concerning what entities exist or
can be said to exist, and how such entities
can be grouped, related within a hierarchy,
and subdivided according to similarities and
differences.
In the broadest sense, ontologists investigate
what makes a human human, relying on
institutional, social, and technical
conventions representing a nexus of
intellectual activities.
[1]

2. •Etymology[edit]
•The word ontology is a compound word,
composed of onto-, from the Greek ὤν, on
(gen. ὄντος, ontos), i.e. "being; that which is",
which is the present participle of the verb εἰμί,
eimi, i.e. "to be, I am", and -λογία, -logia, i.e.
"science, study, theory".
[5][6]
•While the etymology is Greek, the oldest
extant record of the word itself is the New
Latin form ontologia, which appeared in 1606,
in the work Ogdoas Scholastica by Jacob
Lorhard (Lorhardus) and in 1613 in the
Lexicon philosophicum by Rudolf Göckel
(Goclenius); see classical compounds for this
type of word formation.
[citation needed]

3. •Origins[edit]
•Parmenides and monism[edit]
•Parmenides was among the first to propose an
ontological characterization of the fundamental
nature of existence. In his prologue or proem he
describes two views of existence; initially that
nothing comes from nothing, and therefore
existence is eternal. Consequently, our opinions
about truth must often be false and deceitful.
Most of western philosophy, and science —
including the fundamental concepts of
falsifiability and the conservation of energy —
have emerged from this view. This posits that
existence is what can be conceived of by
thought, created, or possessed. Hence, there
can be neither void nor vacuum; and true reality
can neither come into being nor vanish from
existence

4. •The first occurrence in English of
"ontology" as recorded by the OED
(Oxford English Dictionary, online edition,
2008) was a work by Gideon Harvey
(1636/7-1702): Archelogia philosophica
nova; or, New principles of Philosophy.
•Containing Philosophy in general,
Metaphysicks or Ontology, Dynamilogy or
a Discourse of Power, Religio Philosophi
or Natural Theology, Physicks or
Natural philosophy, London, Thomson,
1663.
[citation needed]
• It is likely the word was first used in its
Latin form by philosophers based on the
Latin roots, which themselves are based
on the Greek.
[citation needed]

5. •. Rather, the entirety of creation is eternal,
uniform, and immutable, though not infinite
(he characterized its shape as that of a
perfect sphere).
•Parmenides thus posits that change, as
perceived in everyday experience, is
illusory. Everything that can be
apprehended is but one part of a single
entity. This idea somewhat anticipates
the modern concept of an ultimate
grand unification theory that finally
describes all of existence in terms of
one inter-related sub-atomic reality
which applies to everything.
[citation needed]

6. •Overview[edit]
•Ontology, in analytic philosophy, concerns
the determination whether some
categories of being are fundamental and
asks in what sense can the items in those
categories be said to "be".
•It is the inquiry into being in so much as it
is being ("being qua being"), or into beings
insofar as they exist—and not insofar as
(for instance) particular facts can be
obtained about them or particular
properties belong to them.
[citation needed]
•Some philosophers, notably of the
Platonic school, contend that all nouns
(including abstract nouns) refer to existent
entities.

7. • Other philosophers contend that
nouns do not always name entities, but
that some provide a kind of shorthand
for reference to a collection of either
objects or events
•. In this latter view, mind, instead of
referring to an entity, refers to a
collection of mental events experienced
by a person; society refers to a
collection of persons with some shared
characteristics, and geometry refers to
a collection of a specific kind of
intellectual activity.
[2]
•Between these poles of realism and
nominalism, stand a variety of other
positions; but any ontology must give
an account of which words refer to
entities, which do not, why, and what
categories result.
•

8. •When one applies this process to nouns
such as electrons, energy, contract,
happiness, space, time, truth, causality,
and God, ontology becomes fundamental
to many branches of philosophy.
[
•Some fundamental questions[edit]
•Principal questions of ontology
include:
•"What can be said to exist?"
•"Into what categories, if any, can we
sort existing things?"
•"What are the meanings of being?"
•"What are the various modes of being
of entities?"
•Various philosophers have provided
different answers to these questions

9. cont
•One common approach is to divide the
extant subjects and predicates into
groups called categories.
•Such lists of categories differ widely
from one another, and it is through the
co-ordination of different categorical
schemes that ontology relates to such
fields as library science and artificial
intelligence.
•Such an understanding of ontological
categories, however, is merely
taxonomic, classificatory.
•The categories are, properly
speaking,
[3] the ways in which a being
can be addressed simply as a being,
such as what it is (its 'whatness',
quidditas or essence), how it is (its
'howness' or qualitativeness), how
much it is (quantitativeness), where it is,
its relatedness to other beings, etc.
[citati

10. continue
•Further ontological questions
include:
[citation needed]
•What is existence, i.e. what does it
mean for a being to be?
•Is existence a property?
•Is existence a genus or general class
that is simply divided up by specific
differences?
•Which entities, if any, are fundamental?
•Are all entities objects?
•How do the properties of an object
relate to the object itself?
•What features are the essential, as
opposed to merely accidental attributes
of a given object?
•How many levels of existence or
ontological levels are there? And what
constitutes a 'level'?
•What is a physical object?

11. •Can one give an account of what it
means to say that a physical object
exists? (hyungsang)
•Can one give an account of what it
means to say that a non-physical entity
exists? (sungsang)
•What constitutes the identity of an
object?
•When does an object go out of
existence, as opposed to merely
changing?
•Do beings exist other than in the
modes of objectivity and subjectivity,
i.e. is the subject/object split of modern
philosophy inevitable?

12. •Concepts[edit]
•Essential ontological dichotomies include:
•universals and particulars
•substance and accident
•abstract and concrete objects
•essence and existence
•determinism and indeterminism

13. •Types
•Philosophers can classify ontologies in
various ways using criteria such as the
degree of abstraction and field of
application:
[4]
•Upper ontology: concepts supporting
development of an ontology, meta-
ontology
•Domain ontology: concepts relevant to
a particular topic or area of interest, for
example, information technology or
computer languages, or particular
branches of science
•Interface ontology: concepts relevant
to the juncture of two disciplines
•Process ontology: inputs, outputs,
constraints, sequencing information,
involved in business or engineering
processes

14. •Etymology
•The word ontology is a compound word,
composed of onto-, from the Greek ὤν, on
(gen. ὄντος, ontos), i.e. "being; that which
is", which is the present participle of the
verb εἰμί, eimi, i.e. "to be, I am", and -λογία,
-logia, i.e. "science, study, theory".
[5][6]
•While the etymology is Greek, the oldest
extant record of the word itself is the New
Latin form ontologia, which appeared in
1606, in the work Ogdoas Scholastica by
Jacob Lorhard (Lorhardus) and in 1613 in
the Lexicon philosophicum by Rudolf
Göckel (Goclenius); see classical
compounds for this type of word
formation.
[citation needed]

15. •The first occurrence in English of
"ontology" as recorded by the OED
(Oxford English Dictionary, online edition,
2008) was a work by Gideon Harvey
(1636/7-1702): Archelogia philosophica
nova; or, New principles of Philosophy.
Containing Philosophy in general,
Metaphysicks or Ontology, Dynamilogy or
a Discourse of Power, Religio Philosophi
or Natural Theology, Physicks or Natural
philosophy, London, Thomson, 1663.
[citation
needed]]

16. •It is likely the word was first used in its
Latin form by philosophers based on the
Latin roots, which themselves are based
on the Greek.
[citation needed

17. •Origins[edit]
•Parmenides and monism[edit]
•Parmenides was among the first to
propose an ontological characterization of
the fundamental nature of existence. In his
prologue or proem he describes two views
of existence; initially that nothing comes
from nothing, and therefore existence is
eternal. Consequently, our opinions about
truth must often be false and deceitful.
Most of western philosophy, and
science — including the fundamental
concepts of falsifiability and the
conservation of energy — have emerged
from this view. This posits that existence is
what can be conceived of by thought,
created, or possessed. Hence, there can
be neither void nor vacuum; and true
reality can neither come into being nor
vanish from existence

18. •Particulars and universals[edit]
•Particulars or individuals are usually
contrasted with universals.
[11][12]
•Universals concern features that can be
exemplified by various different
particulars.
[13] For example, a tomato
and a strawberry are two particulars
that exemplify the universal redness.
Universals can be present at various
distinct locations in space at the same
time while particulars are restricted to
one location at a time.
• Universals can be fully present at
different times, which is why they are
sometimes referred to as repeatables in
contrast to non-repeatable
particulars.
[10]
• The so-called problem of universals is
the problem to explain how different
things can agree in their features, e.g.
how a tomato and a strawberry can
both be red.
[6][13] Realists about
universals believe that there are
universals

19. •Particulars and
universals[edit]
•Particulars or individuals are usually
contrasted with universals.
[11][12
•
] Universals concern features that can
be exemplified by various different
particulars.
[13] For example, a tomato
and a strawberry are two particulars
that exemplify the universal redness.
• Universals can be present at various
distinct locations in space at the same
time while particulars are restricted to
one location at a time.
•Universals can be fully present at
different times, which is why they are
sometimes referred to as repeatables in
contrast to non-repeatable
particulars.
[10]
•The so-called problem of universals is
the problem to explain how different
things can agree in their features, e.g.
how a tomato and a strawberry can
both be red.
[6][13] Realists about
universals believe that there are
universals

20. •They can solve the problem of
universals by explaining the
commonality through a universal
shared by both entities.
[10]
• Realists are divided among themselves
as to whether universals can exist
independently of being exemplified by
something ("ante res") or not ("in
rebus").
[14]
•Nominalists, on the other hand, deny
that there are universals. They have to
resort to other notions to explain how a
feature can be common to several
entities, for example, by positing either
fundamental resemblance-relations
between the entities (resemblance
nominalism) or a shared membership
to a common natural class (class
nominalism).
[10]

21. •Abstract and concrete[edit]
•Many philosophers agree that there is
an exclusive and exhaustive distinction
between concrete objects (hyungsang)
and abstract objects (sungsang).
[10]
•Some philosophers consider this to be
the most general division of being.
[15]
Examples of concrete objects include
plants, human beings and planets while
things like numbers, sets and
propositions are abstract objects.
[16]
•Tte the general agreement concerning
the paradigm cases, there is less
consensus as to what the charac-
teristic marks of concreteness and
abstractness are.
•Popular suggestions include defining
the distinction in terms of the
difference between (1) existence inside
or outside space-time, (2) having
causes and effects or not and (3)
having contingent or necessary
existence.
[17][18]

22. •They can solve the problem of universals
by explaining the commonality through a
universal shared by both entities.
[10]
Realists are divided among themselves as
to whether universals can exist
independently of being exemplified by
something ("ante res") or not ("in
rebus").
[14] Nominalists, on the other hand,
deny that there are universals. They have
to resort to other notions to explain how a
feature can be common to several entities,
for example, by positing either
fundamental resemblance-relations
between the entities (resemblance
nominalism) or a shared membership to a
common natural class (class
nominalism).
[10]

23. •Ontological dependence[edit]
•An entity ontologically depends on
another entity if the first entity cannot
exist without the second entity.
Ontologically independent entities, on
the other hand, can exist all by
themselves.
[19] For example, the surface
of an apple cannot exist without the
apple and so depends on it
ontologically.
[20]
• Entities often characterized as
ontologically dependent include
properties, which depend on their
bearers, and boundaries, which depend
on the entity they demarcate from its
surroundings.
[21]
•Ontological dependence is to be
distinguished from causal dependence,
in which an effect depends for its
existence on a cause. It is often
important to draw a distinction between
two types of ontological dependence:
rigid and generic

24. •Rigid dependence concerns the
dependence on one specific entity, as
the surface of an apple depends on its
specific apple.
[22]
• Generic dependence, on the other
hand, involves a weaker form of
dependence, on merely a certain type
of entity. For example, electricity
generically depends on there being
charged particles, but it does not
depend on any specific charged
particle.
[21]
• Dependence-relations are relevant to
ontology since it is often held that
ontologically dependent entities have a
less robust form of being.
•This way a hierarchy is introduced into
the world that brings with it the
distinction between more and less
fundamental entities.
[21]

25. •Identity
•Identity is a basic ontological concept
that is often expressed by the word
"same".
[10][23]
• It is distinguished between qualitative
identity and numerical identity. For
example, consider two children with
identical bicycles engaged in a race
while their mother is watching. The two
children have the same bicycle in one
sense (qualitative identity) and the
same mother in another sense
(numerical identity).
[10]
• Two qualitatively identical things are
often said to be indiscernible. The two
senses of sameness are linked by two
principles: the principle of
indiscernibility of identicals and the
principle of identity of indiscernibles.
The principle of indiscernibility of
identicals is uncontroversial and states
that if two entities are numerically
identical with each other then they
exactly resemble each other.
[23

26. •The principle of identity of
indiscernibles, on the other hand, is
more controversial in making the
converse claim that if two entities
exactly resemble each other then they
must be numerically identical.
[23] This
entails that "no two distinct things
exactly resemble each other".
[24]
• A well-known counterexample comes
from Max Black, who describes a
symmetrical universe consisting of
only two spheres with the same
features.
[25] Black argues that the two
spheres are indiscernible but not
identical, thereby constituting a
violation of the principle of identity of
indiscernibles.
[26]

27. •Modality
•Modality concerns the concepts of
possibility, actuality and necessity.
• In contemporary discourse, these
concepts are often defined in terms of
possible worlds.
[10] A possible world is
a complete way how things could have
been.
[30] The actual world is one
possible world among others: things
could have been different than they
actually are.
• A proposition is possibly true if there
is at least one possible world in which
it is true; it is necessarily true if it is
true in all possible worlds.
[31
•
] Actualists and possibilists disagree
on the ontological status of possible
worlds.
[10] Actualists hold that reality is
at its core actual and that possible
worlds should be understood in terms
of actual entities, for example, as
fictions or as sets of sentences.
[32

28. •Substances
•The category of substances has played
a central role in many ontological
theories throughout the history of
philosophy.
[36][37]
•"Substance" is a technical term within
philosophy not to be confused with the
more common usage in the sense of
chemical substances like gold or sulfur.
•The most common features ascribed to
substances in the philosophical sense
is that they are particulars that are
ontologically independent: they are
able to exist all by themselves.
[36][6]
•Being ontologically independent,
substances can play the role of
fundamental entities in the ontological
hierarchy.
[21][37] If 'ontological
independence' is defined as including
causal independence then only self-
caused entities, like Spinoza's God, can
be substances. With a specifically
ontological definition of 'independence',
many everyday objects like books or
cats may qualify as substances.
[6][36]
Another defining feature often
attributed to substances is their ability
to undergo changes.

29. •Properties and relations
•The category of properties consists of
entities that can be exemplified by
other entities, e.g. by substances.
[39]
Properties characterize their bearers,
they express what their bearer is like.
[6]
For example, the red color and the
round shape of an apple are properties
of this apple.
•Various ways have been suggested
concerning how to conceive properties
themselves and their relation to
substances.
[10]
•The traditionally dominant view is that
properties are universals that inhere in
their bearers.
[6] As universals, they can
be shared by different substances.
• Nominalists, on the other hand, deny
that universals exist.
[13] Some
nominalists try to account for
properties in terms of resemblance
relations or class membership.
[10]
Another alternative for nominalists is to
conceptualize properties as simple
particulars, so-called tropes.
[

30. •This position entails that both the apple
and its redness are particulars. Different
apples may still exactly resemble each
other concerning their color, but they do
not share the same particular property on
this view: the two color-tropes are
numerically distinct.
[13]
• Another important question for any theory
of properties is how to conceive the
relation between a bearer and its
properties.
[10]
•Substratum theorists hold that there is
some kind of substance, substratum or
bare particular that acts as bearer.
[40]
Bundle theory is an alternative view that
does away with a substratum altogether:
objects are taken to be just a bundle of
properties.
[37][41]
• They are held together not by a
substratum but by the so-called
compresence-relation responsible for the
bundling. Both substratum theory and
bundle theory can be combined with
conceptualizing properties as universals or
as particulars.
[40]

31. •States of affairs and events[edit]
•States of affairs are complex entities, in
contrast to substances and properties,
which are usually conceived as
simple.
[6][50]
• Complex entities are built up from or
constituted by other entities. Atomic
states of affairs are constituted by one
particular and one property exemplified
by this particular.
[10][51]
•For example, the state of affairs that
Socrates is wise is constituted by the
particular "Socrates" and the property
"wise

32. •". Relational states of affairs involve
several particulars and a relation
connecting them. States of affairs that
obtain are also referred to as facts.
[51]
• It is controversial which ontological
status should be ascribed to states of
affairs that do not obtain.
[10] States of
affairs have been prominent in 20th-
century ontology as various theories
were proposed to describe the world as
composed of states of affairs.
[6][52][53]
•It is often held that states of affairs play
the role of truthmakers:
• judgments or assertions are true
because the corresponding state of
affairs obtains

33. •Ontological theories can be divided
into various types according to their
theoretical commitments.
•Types of ontologies[edit]
• Particular ontological theories or types
of theories are often referred to as
"ontologies" (singular or plural). This
usage contrasts with the meaning of
"ontology" (only singular) as a branch
of philosophy: the science of being in
general.
[

34. •Ontological theories can be divided
into various types according to their
theoretical commitments.
•Types of ontologies[edit]
• Particular ontological theories or types
of theories are often referred to as
"ontologies" (singular or plural). This
usage contrasts with the meaning of
"ontology" (only singular) as a branch
of philosophy: the science of being in
general.
[

38. • L