How to Buy a Beer: The Invisible Ontology of Social Reality

1. How to Buy a Beer: The Invisible Ontology of Social Reality • Barry Smith

2. An Introduction to Ontology and the Forms of Social Organization

3. Institute for Formal Ontology and Medical Information Science • (IFOMIS)

4. University of Leipzig

5. The New AI • Cristiano Castelfranchi • Computational Law • Computational Economics • … Computational Medical Research • will transform the discipline of medicine

6. Formal Ontology • term coined by Edmund Husserl • = the theory of those ontological structures • such as part-whole, universal-particular • which apply to all domains whatsoever

7. Edmund Husserl

8. Logical Investigations¸1900/01 • Aristotelian theory of universals • the theory of part and whole • the theory of dependence • the theory of boundaries and fusion • -- focused primarily on examples drawn from psychology and language

9. a new methodof constituent ontology • to study a domain ontologically • is to establish the parts of the domain • and the interrelations between them • especially the dependence relations

10. Formal Ontology vs. Formal Logic • Formal ontology deals with the interconnections of things • with objects and properties, parts and wholes, relations and collectives • Formal logic deals with the interconnections of truths • with consistency and validity, or and not

11. Formal Ontology vs. Formal Logic • Formal ontology deals with formal ontological structures • Formal logic deals with formal logical structures • ‘formal’ = obtain in all material spheres of reality • ‘formal’ = symbolic

13. theory of universals and their instances • of types and tokens • generals and particulars

14. substance animal mammal human Irishman this individual token man Accidents: Species and instances types tokens

15. There are universals • both among substances (man, mammal) • and among qualities, powers (red, hard, strong) • and among processes (run, movement) • Qualities, powers and processes depend on substances

16. Processes, qualities and powers, too, instantiate universals • process, quality and power universals form trees of greater and lesser generality

17. quality color red scarlet R232, G54, B24

18. qualities, powers and processes, too, are distinguished as between tokens and types • which is to say: between genera and species on the one hand, • ... and instances on the other

19. Accidents: Species and instances quality color red scarlet R232, G54, B24 this individual accident of redness (this token redness – here, now)

20. Accidents: Species and instances process movement arm movement salute salute according to UMC.army.mil this individual saluting event (this token saluting – here, now)

21. Dependence vs. parthood • a is dependent on b • a is part of b • a wife is dependent on a husband • a king is dependent on his subjects • a color is dependent on an extension

23. Basic Formal Ontology • BFO • The Vampire Slayer

24. Basic Formal Ontology • theory of part and whole • theory of universals and instances • theory of substances, qualities, powers, processes • theory of dependence • theory of boundary, continuity and contact • theory of environments/niches • theory of granularity

25. A Network of Domain Ontologies • Material (Regional) Ontologies Basic Formal Ontology

26. A Network of Domain Ontologies

27. A Network of Domain Ontologies

28. A Network of Domain Ontologies

29. A Network of Domain Ontologies

30. A Network of Domain Ontologies

31. A Network of Domain Ontologies

32. LMo: Terminology-Based Medical Ontology • (www.landc.be) • MilO: Military Ontology (Buffalo) • DisrO: Disaster Relief Ontology (Buffalo) • EcO: Economics Ontology (Koblenz) • PsychO: Psychological Ontology • GuarinO: aka DOLCE

33. Methodology

34. First-Order Logicvs. Description Logic • Ontological Adequacy • vs. Computer Tractability • BFO Methodology: • Get ontology right first (realism; descriptive adequacy); • solve tractability problems later

35. Description Logic • makes horrendous sacrifices in ontological adequacy/accuracy from the very start, for the sake of tractability

36. The Reference Ontology Community • Laboratory for Applied Ontology • Leeds Foundational Ontology Project • OntologyWorks (Baltimore) • Ontek Corporation • IFOMIS • LandC • (CYC?)

38. What are the Sources of Ontological Knowledge? • the study of philosophical texts • the construction and testing of formal theories • the consideration of difficult counterexamples • the results of the natural sciences • experiments in information systems/database management

39. What are the Sources of Ontological Knowledge? • the study of philosophical texts • … especially ancient texts

40. Aristotle Aristotle • the world‘s first ontologist

41. Ontology of Social Reality • Thomas Reid:

42. Speech Acts as Glue of Social Reality • Thomas Reid: • the principles of the art of language are to be found in a just analysis of the various species of sentences. • Aristotle and the logicians have analysed one species – to wit, the proposition. • To enumerate and analyse the other species must, I think, be the foundation of a just theory of language.

43. Reid’s theory of ‘social operations’ • ‘social acts’ vs. ‘solitary acts’ • A social act … must be directed to some other person • ... it constitutes a miniature ‘civil society’

44. Adolf Reinach

45. Adolf Reinach • Reinach’s theory of social acts • 1913: The A Priori Foundations of the Civil Law

46. Adolf Reinach • Reinach’s ontology of the promise • part of a wider ontology of legal phenomena such as contract and legislation, • a ‘contribution to the general ontology of social interaction’ (Lecture 2)

47. Austin

48. Austin • Break from Aristotle/Frege in “Other Minds” 1946

49. Austin • Saying “I know that S is P” • is not saying “I have performed a specially striking feat of cognition ...”. • Rather, • When I say “I know” I give others my word: I give others my authority for saying that “S is P”.

50. Austin • Similarly: • ‘promising is not something superior, in the same scale as hoping and intending’. • Rather, when I say ‘I promise’ • I have not merely announced my intention, but, by using this formula (performing this ritual), I have bound myself to others, and staked my reputation, in a new way.