Problems in Ontology

PHI 531 Graduate Seminar: Problems in Ontology

Crosslisted with PHI 358 Problems in Ontology

Up to 4 Credit Hours

Principal faculty: Barry Smith

Mondays, 4-6pm, Fall 2012, Jacobs 106, UB North Campus

All sessions will be accessible both for face-to-face participants and on-line via webex.

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Content

This class will consist of a mixture of:

• presentations by ontologists from UB and elsewhere;
• ontology development and planning sessions;
• teaching on specific ontology topics (for examples see here);
• video presentations (for example from here).

We will cover a variety of topics in theoretical and applied ontology, paying special attention to applications in the areas of biology and medicine on the one hand, and defense and security on the other.

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Outcomes

By the end of the class students will be able to:

• understand the nature, utility and scope of contemporary applied ontology
• understand methods and rules for ontology development, evaluation, planning and organization
• contribute to ontological development initiatives
• engage in discussion of major issues in theoretical and applied ontology

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Schedule

August 27: Introduction to Ontology

• Slides | Raw Webex Video | Streaming Video

We will begin with a basic introduction to ontology by addressing questions such as: What is an ontology? What are the differences and interrelations between ontology (philosophy), ontology (science), and ontology (engineering)? How are ontologies used? We will also provide an introduction to Basic Formal Ontology (BFO), focusing on a discussion of the question: What is a musical score?

September 10: Presentation by Werner Ceusters (Bioinformatics/Psychiatry): Referent Tracking: Particulars in Focus

• Slides | Raw Webex Video | Streaming Video

Referent Tracking (RT) is a methodology to create digital copies of the parts of the world we are interested in. It is based on Basic Formal Ontology, but focuses on particulars rather than universals. The goal is to create information systems in such a way that (1) the information they contain mimics the structure of the corresponding portions of reality and (2) they can make optimal use of ontologies and terminologies.

September 24: Mental Functioning Ontology

• Raw Webex Video | Streaming Video

4:00pm Janna Hastings (Swiss Center for Affective Sciences and European Bioinformatics Institute): Representing Mental Functioning Slides

Mental functioning includes all the faculties of the mind, e.g., perception, planning, language, memory, emotion, and self-representation. The study of these processes cuts across disciplines such as psychology, psychiatry, neuroscience, and biomedicine. The Mental Functioning Ontology (MFO) is designed to provide a means for the common description of data in all of these disciplines, in order to support data aggregation and comparison. For background material see here (slides) and here (papers).

4:45pm Barry Smith: Mental Functioning and the Ontology of Language Slides

In this section we will address those kinds of mental functioning which involve overt or covert use of language. We will focus especially on the issue of the directedness of thought and language to extra-mental objects.

September 27: How To Do Things With Diagrams

• Slides | Raw Webex Video | Streaming Video

The talk will explore some of the ways in which the theory of speech acts can throw light on the role of diagrams and of diagrammatic symbologies in areas such as chess, music, chemistry and military planning. The ontology of processes and process representations will play a central role.

October 1: Mental Functioning and the Ontology of Language

• Slides | Raw Webex Video1 | Raw Webex Video2 | Streaming Video

We will continue the discussions initiated on September 24 of how mental processes are interrelated in different ways with linguistic processes (for example of speaking, reading, and silent siloloquy) and linguistic artifacts (for example scientific and literary texts, instruction manuals, contracts). This session will include a survey of the WHO's Internal Classification of Functioning.

• October 8: Special session on research collaborations in military, healthcare and other fields of information-driven science

Further details are available here.

• October 15: Social Ontology

Webex

We will address the foundations of social ontology, considering questions such as:

What is an organization?

What is an obligation?

What is a credential?

What is authority?

What is a population?

What role do documents play in the construction of social reality?

• 4:00-5:00pm The Ontology of Social Reality: Barry Smith

focusing on debts, obligations, prices, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, and the views of John Searle

• 5:00-6:00pm The Ontology of Medically Related Social Entities (OMRSE): Mathias Brochhausen and William Hogan (University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences)

Background reading:

• On document ontology: [1], [2]
• On OMRSE: [3]

• October 22: Information on this session provided only to students registered for credit
• October 29: Alexander Diehl (Neurology): From the Gene Ontology to the Neurological Disease Ontology
• November 5: Albert Goldfain (Blue Highway): The Infectious Disease Ontology
• November 12: Symposium on the Information Artifact Ontology with Ron Rudnicki (CUBRC) and Werner Ceusters
• November 19: Symposium on the Information Artifact Ontology (Part 2)
• November 26: TBD
• December 3: TBD

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Grading Requirements for this class will depend on the selected number of credit hours, but will include active class participation and completion of some written work or ontology project.

All students taking the class for credit should make an appointment with Dr Smith to discuss further details.

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Literature

Introductory readings are provided here.

See also the Buffalo Ontology Site.