Analytic Metaphysics
The Course
This course consists in an overview of central themes in analytic metaphysics viewed from a broadly realist perspective. We begin with a historical overview of analytic metaphysics and a discussion of general categories such as universals, particulars, processes, dispositions and functions. We then extend these general categories to specific areas such as social reality, documents and document acts, disease, money, and war. The course will be of interest not only to philosophers but also to those interested in ontological applications.
Department of Philosophy: Special Topics PHI 598. Registration number: 24232
Time: Tuesdays, 1-3:50pm, Spring 2016
Room: 141 Park Hall, UB North Campus
Instructor: Barry Smith
Office hours: Tuesdays, 12:15-1pm and by appointment via email to [1]
Recommended background reading
- R. Arp, B. Smith, A. D. Spear, Building Ontologies with Basic Formal Ontology
- John R. Searle, Making the Social World
- E. J. Lowe, The Four Category Ontology
- Roman Ingarden, The Literary Work of Art. An Investigation on the Borderlines of Ontology, Logic, and Theory of Language
Schedule
- February 2: Analytic Metaphysics: Introduction and Historical Background
- Aristotle
- Frege, Russell, Wittgenstein
- Husserl and the Polish School
- Contemporary Analytic Metaphysics
- Universals and Particulars
- February 9: Roles, Dispositions and Social Ontology
- 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
- February 16: Roles, Dispositions and Social Ontology: Part 2
See also materials here
- February 23: Analytic Metaphysics: Introduction (continued)
- Three-Dimensionsalism and Four-Dimensionalism
- Universals and Instances
- Fiat Objects
- Sites and Boundaries
- March 1: Material Entities, Process Profiles and Granular Partitions
- Classifying Processes: An Essay in Applied Ontology
- On Classifying Material Entities in Basic Formal Ontology
- March 8: Mind, Language, Truth, Reference and Aboutness
- March 15: Spring Recess
- March 22: Document Acts
- March 29: Money
- The Construction of Social Reality
- Money and Fictions
- Toward a Science of Emerging Media
- Slides
- Video
- April 5: Partitions and Quantities
Ingvar Johansson, “Functions, Function Concepts, and Scales”, The Monist 87 (2004), 96-114
- April 12: Populations, Communities, Groups, Organizations
On Place and Space: The Ontology of the Eruv
- April 19: Terrorism, Wars and Warfighting
Defining Terrorism An Ontological Framework for Understanding the Terror-Crime Nexus
- April 26: Presentations of Student Projects 1
John Beverley: Basic Formal Ontology
J. Neil Otte: Game Theory Ontology
Kejin Cui: Ontology and Spatial Relations Between Land Types
Brian Donohue: Deontic Ontology
Daniel Shaffer: Law
Alec Sculley: Tolerable Delinquency
- May 3: Presentations of Student Projects 2
Jeon-Young Kang: Infectious Disease
Fumiaki Toyoshima: Schizophrenia
Carter Benson: Terrorism
Francesco Franda: Terrorism
Uriah Burke: Film
Ben Lawrence: Drawing
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
