Ontology and Its Applications
The Course
This course will provide an introduction to ontology and its applications at the beginning graduate-student level. We will describe the roots of contemporary ontology in classical metaphysics, explain how ontology now plays a role in data science and information fusion, and outline a series of applications of ontology in the biomedical and social sciences.
Department of Philosophy: Special Topics PHI 598. Registration number: #####
Time: Monday, 1-3:50pm, Fall 2018
Room: 200G Baldy
Instructors: Barry Smith and Werner Ceusters
Office hours: By appointment via email to [1]
Recommended background reading
- R. Arp, B. Smith, A. D. Spear, Building Ontologies with Basic Formal Ontology
Schedule
August 27: Introduction to Ontology
September 10: Ontological Realism and Basic Formal Ontology
- Individuals, Universals and Collections
- Fiat Objects
- Endurantist and Perdurantist Accounts of Persistence
- Slides
- Video
September 17: Functions, Capabilities, Dispositions
September 24: Diseases, Disabilities, Diagnoses
Introduction to the Ontology of Medicine
October 1: Mental Health and Disease
October 8: Introduction to Referent Tracking
October 15: Organisms and Environments
- Biological Environments
- Human Environments
- The Microbiome
- Environments, Settings and Behavior
October 22: The Ontology of Experimentation, Classification and Measurement
October 29: Mind, Language, Intentionality, Emotions, Truth, and Aboutness
November 5: Document Acts
November 12: Ontology of Deontic Entities
- Building Ontologies with Basic Formal Ontology, Chapter 5
- Massively Planned Social Agency
- Document Acts and the Ontology of Social Reality
- John Searle: From Speech Acts to Social Reality
- Slides Contents
- Video
- Massively Planned Social Agency
- Slides
- Video
- See also materials here
== November 19: == The Ontology of Organizations
November 26: Presentations of Student Projects 1
December 3: Presentations of Student Projects 2
Grading and Related Policies and Services
All students will be required to take an active part in class discussions throughout the semester and to prepare a paper on some relevant topic. The paper should be submitted in a draft version on or before March 29, and in final form on or before May 3. A powerpoint version will be presented in class in one or other of the two closing sessions .
Your grade will be determined in three equal portions deriving from:
- 1. class participation (2.5% per class attended)
- 2. paper (3000 words; deadline for draft: March 29; deadline for final version: May 3)
- 3. class presentation (graded according to quality of powerpoint slides, quality of delivery, and quality of response to questions)
For policy regarding incompletes see here
For academic integrity policy see here
For accessibility services see here
