Talk:Ontology/Archive 3

Eleatic principle, contingency and ontological dependence

I see some problems with the following sentences in the overview section:

This answer assigns fully real, concrete, or factual existence to actual singular particular processes, events, or natural objects, in the ordinary world, as distinct from abstractions, generalities, and fictions, which it regards as conceptually or perceptually contingent, imagined or derived from reality.[9][10] Such contingency on or derivation from ordinary concrete reality is an example of the philosophical concept of 'ontological dependence'.

problems:

1. The 1st sentences refers to the eleatic principle from previous sentence. But its connection to "fully real, concrete, or factual existence" is not clear, especially when contrasted with contingency. I doubt that such a connection can be drawn here. This sentence has two sources. The first one doesn't mention the eleatic principle, it only talks about powers in relation to Locke's distinction between primary & secondary qualities, as far as I can tell. The second source is to a full book without reference to pages or sections, so it's not very helpful for checking the claim.
2. The 2nd sentence claims that contingent things are examples of ontological dependence. I think this is wrong. It may be right if you assume that only necessary entities have fundamental existence, but I don't think that this assumption is generally accepted. This sentence lacks a source. Phlsph7 (talk) 05:34, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

One way to rescue some of the ideas here would be the following: The eleatic principle says that only things with powers exist. Powers are usually connected to causation. Causation is usually restricted to concrete objects. So we could deduce that according to the eleatic principle, only concrete objects exist but not abstract objects. But abstract objects are not the same as intentional objects, like the imagined things mentioned. So we can't deny their existence on the basis of the eleatic principle. And we have to do something about the claims of contingency, since concrete objects are usually seen as contingent.

But ideas I sketched here to connect the eleatic principle to concrete objects is original research unless we can find a source for it. Phlsph7 (talk) 06:01, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

It is not too clear that the term 'Eleatic Principle' is widely used, and not too clear that it is necessary here.

The sentences in question are:

Ontology is closely associated with Aristotle's question of 'being qua being': the question of what all entities in the widest sense have in common. The Eleatic principle is one answer to this question: it states that being is inextricably tied to causation, that "Power is the mark of Being". This answer assigns fully real, concrete, or factual existence to actual singular particular processes, events, or natural objects, in the ordinary world, as distinct from abstractions, generalities, and fictions, which it regards as conceptually or perceptually contingent, imagined or derived from reality. Such contingency on or derivation from ordinary concrete reality is an example of the philosophical concept of 'ontological dependence'. A little accepted concept of fundamental concrete real being can be found in Berkeley's slogan that "to be is to be perceived".

Here is my proposal:

Ontology is closely associated with Aristotle's question of 'being qua being': the question of what all entities in the widest sense have in common. One approach asks what is fully real, concrete, or factual existence? It assigns it to actual singular particular processes, events, or natural objects, in the ordinary world, as distinct from fictions, which it regards as imagined, and from abstractions or generalities, which it regards as conceptually or perceptually contingent on, dependent on, or derived from, reality. It regards 'powers', participating in causality, as marks of reality. A little accepted concept of fundamental concrete real being can be found in Berkeley's slogan that "to be is to be perceived".

Chjoaygame (talk) 08:21, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

I don't agree with your assessment of the eleatic principle. This is what the source "Borchert2" has to say:

In The Sophist, Plato’s Eleatic Stranger proposes that a role in the world’s causal network is the necessary and sufficient condition for existence, that “Power is the mark of Being.” This idea has had some currency in the twentieth century, particularly in the work of David Lewis (1986) and D. M. Armstrong (1978, 1989, 1997). This Eleatic principle is an attractive test for reality in the natural world, for whatever is real in nature should be able to make a difference...

This article has more to say on its relation to ontology. I think it's good to keep it here since it's a easy example of the question of being qua being, I think more accessible than the new version, which would still need a sources that ties this new approach to the question of being qua being. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:51, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

The view you propose seems to be rather complex, involving many elements that are not necessarily connected to each other. I don't think that this is a good introductory example. If this is specifically Whitehead's view then it might be better to explain it in the history section. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:58, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

I'm not against using Whitehead's view here in general, but we would need to distill it into something a little bit more managable. Maybe something in the sense of process ontology, that for something to be is to be a process and nothing exists outside time. The source "Borchert2" mentions a similar view:

For Samuel Alexander (1920), to be is to be the exclusive occupant of a volume of space-time. This rules out not only abstract entities, but even a field theory of the natural world, for force fields occupy regions of space-time, yet do not exclude one another

We could keep both the reference to eleatic principle and this example. Phlsph7 (talk) 09:18, 17 February 2021 (UTC)

I went through through the old revisions and found a version that avoids the problems mentioned so far:

Ontology is closely associated with Aristotle's question of 'being qua being': the question of what all entities in the widest sense have in common. The Eleatic principle is one answer to this question: it states that being is inextricably tied to causation, that "Power is the mark of Being". One problem with this answer is that it excludes abstract objects. Another explicit but little accepted answer can be found in Berkeley's slogan that "to be is to be perceived".

I suggest we use this version until we come up with alternative introductory examples for the question of the being qua being. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:25, 18 February 2021 (UTC)

being qua being

The section 'Overview' writes "Ontology is closely associated with Aristotle's question of 'being qua being': the question of what all entities in the widest sense have in common."

I have found only one use of the technical term 'being qua being' in Bochert2, where it was not associated with Aristotle, and I failed to find it in Sandkühler2. I would like to see this often-enough-encountered term given some attention. I don't know exactly how it should be attended to. I have yet to be persuaded that the just-above-quoted sentence is a good introductory one. Thoughts?Chjoaygame (talk) 12:15, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

On page 527 of Bochert2, I find "Aristotle made three crucial points about the study of Being as Being." Yes, that is close to 'being qua being'.Chjoaygame (talk) 12:26, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

I've fixed the Sandkühler-reference for being qua being: it's found in the beginning of section 2.1, not in section 4. Phlsph7 (talk) 14:02, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

My mistake, I have now found 'being qua being' in Borchert2, on page 22 of volume 7, though it is scarcely tied to Aristotle.Chjoaygame (talk) 16:46, 25 April 2021 (UTC)

Possible typo

The sentence "Categories are usually seen as the highest kinds or genera" sounds as if "or" should be "of" but I am unclear on the etiquette for researching and/or changing it.

If someone has the time could they look into it?

Thank you.

Thanks for bringing it up. I think "or" is correct here: seen as the highest kinds or (seen as the highest) genera.--Phlsph7 (talk) 04:49, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Reism

Phlsph7 WAS indeed referencing "Reism" when I corrected it to "Realism". However the attribution "from continental philosophy" was confusing because there is a sub-domain under the continental philosophy called "continental realism". There is not even one mention of "reism" on that page. So I added the reference to "reism" next to the first use of the term for clarity and took out the misleading link to continental philosophy. I think, if desired, it could make sense to re-add it but NOT as an explanation for "reism." Thanks for the clarifications Phlsph7. Alex Jackl (talk) 17:13, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing out the possible confusion with "continental realism". I think the mention of "continental philosophy" here is not very important. Phlsph7 (talk) 17:20, 28 July 2021 (UTC)

request for detail

This edit removes what seems like notable information, with just the explanation WP:COPYPASTE. It would be good to have further information about why this was done. Is the claim wrong or unverifiable?Chjoaygame (talk) 03:01, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

The text was just copied from the cited sources (page 197) with minimal changes.Phlsph7 (talk) 04:34, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Yes, that is said by WP:COPYPASTE. I am wondering whether the claim might be wrong or unverifiable? If it is substantially true, it seems verified by the source that was given. A paraphrase of that source would be acceptable, I guess?Chjoaygame (talk) 10:52, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

A paraphrase would avoid the copyright problem. Another problem is that Leibniz was not the only philosopher in the 17th century to have used the term: the source lists others as well. Instead, he was the only "great philosopher" in the 17th century to have used the term. I haven't checked how "great philosopher" is defined in the source, but I think our etymology-section is not the right place for such details. Phlsph7 (talk) 18:51, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

"I think our etymology-section is not the right place for such details." That's a good reason.Chjoaygame (talk) 22:22, 28 June 2021 (UTC)

Agreed Alex Jackl (talk) 14:57, 12 August 2021 (UTC)

Ontology

Surely there ought to be a criticism section, bearing in mind that some philosophers consider "ontology" to be a spurious or bogus concept? Esedowns (talk) 13:19, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

There is a lot of criticism of metaphysics. There is also criticism of specific ontological theories. But not much of ontology as a discipline. I wouldn't be opposed to such a section if there are good sources. Phlsph7 (talk) 14:01, 26 August 2022 (UTC)

Relational ontologies

Hello Larataguera and thanks for adding the subsection "Relational ontologies". The current article already talks about relational ontologies in a slightly different sense in the section "Constituent ontologies vs blob theories". In this section, blob theories or relational ontologies are characterized as theories that deny that objects have an internal structure. In you addition, they are characterized as "worlds without objects" and as the claim that relationships are prior to things. Your first characterization seems problematic to me, especially since the cited source for it does not mention relational ontologies explicitly. One way to deal with this would be to merge your section into this one and clarify that the term "relational ontologies" can be used in these different ways. However, Carchasm is also right to point out that some of the characterizations are too specific to include in the type section since they concern quite specific issues in anthropology. I'm not sure how to best proceed here. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:12, 22 September 2022 (UTC)

Hi Phlsph7, and thanks for bringing this up here. I actually didn't notice the inclusion of relational ontologies (as 'blob theories') until after I made my edit. Apologies for that oversight. What I'm describing is something different (concretely relational and not theoretically so), and might be better phrased as 'Indigenous ontologies'. So I'm reviewing the literature and will propose a new edit later today.

Nearly all of this article speaks from a Western philosophical tradition, and I hope to help wp:globalize the perspective with this addition. Your and Carchasm's concerns are reasonable, so I'll make another edit soon. Thanks Larataguera (talk) 11:23, 22 September 2022 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea. In this case, the subsection could stay in the section "Other ontological topics" but focus not on relational ontologies in general but on a more specific theory that just happens to be a relational ontology. Phlsph7 (talk) 11:34, 22 September 2022 (UTC)

I think there will need to be an addition to the 'types of ontologies' section, because Indigenous relational ontologies are not 'blob theories'; and use of the descriptor 'relational' is not similar to its use in contrast to 'constituent'. Indigenous relational ontologies are not concerned with the "internal structure of objects", but rather with relational ways of being[1] in the world. Indigenous ontologies are distinct from and frequently incommensurable with Western ontologies, and certainly represent a different 'type'. I haven't quite sorted out the best way to present this yet, but I hope to have something soon. Thanks for your patience. I have linked a couple of sources here (in addition to Escobar) in case it's helpful to review them ahead of my edit. Larataguera (talk) 17:46, 22 September 2022 (UTC)

Part of my rationale for moving it is that it seems like this is a pretty new area of academic research, and that the research is mostly in the field of anthropology, not philosophy. This certainly doesn't mean it shouldn't be on the article, but I want to be cautious about including it in a more abstract section of the page without support from high-quality secondary sources in Philosophy. A lot of interdisciplinary ideas in fields that are close to philosophy also frequently claim to have distinct concepts that don't necessarily end up being very distinct upon further examination. Relational "ways of being" or something that looks like them are certainly present in Western and other non-indigenous traditions, for example. But we also can't synthesize how they relate to Western philosophy ourselves per WP:NOR, so we often need to wait for more thorough coverage before we can expand upon an emerging field in detail. Especially if it seems very distinct or incommensurable, it might make more sense practically to have a brief mention of a paragraph or two in the "other ontological topics" and then develop the specific ideas further in a dedicated article on indigenous ontologies.

This is a recurring challenge with our coverage of philosophical topics though - if no reliable secondary source synthesis exists between similar ideas in two or more of Western/Eastern/African/Indigenous philosophy, we can't (or, shouldn't!) perform the synthesis ourselves in the article, or put claims that essentially appear to contradict each other and confuse the reader right next to each other. But we also need some sort of link between related topics, it just ends up looking a bit more siloed, and there's a limit to how much we can combat that with newer topics. - car chasm (talk) 20:30, 22 September 2022 (UTC)

here is a good piece from Philosophy Compass that "synthesizes insights from different fields such as biological taxonomy, cognitive science, cultural anthropology, and political ecology" and brings them together with ontological debates in philosophy. I wouldn't say this field is all that new, as there has been an interdisciplinary turn toward ontology for about two decades. (Not ancient—but plenty of time for synthesis/integration). This article characterises Indigenous ontologies as animist.

I do agree that some of the more explicitly anthropological content belongs in the 'other topics' section, and I will attempt to re-write my earlier edit with that in mind (perhaps a section titled 'political ontology' or something similar). I still think we can say that Indigenous (animist) ontologies are substantially different from Western ontologies, for example from the above article ...there are intriguing cross-cultural similarities in animist ontologies. Indigenous communities around the world tend to be much more permissive in their ascription of intentionality [to non-humans] than Western participants. This evidence emphasizes animism as a coherent form of ontological difference that is unevenly distributed. So if we stick to this (and similar) articles, I think this difference makes it reasonable to globalise the article by including Indigenous ontology as an ontological 'type'. Thanks! Larataguera (talk) 01:22, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

If we understand the term "type" in a very wide sense, then, of course, indigenous ontologies are a type of ontology. But this is also true for "German ontologies", "American ontologies", "Indian ontologies", "Ancient Greek ontologies", etc. I don't think we want our types-section populated this way. Further questions for this issue would be: how uniform are indigenous ontologies? Do they really all agree on the same basic outlook? Or are they mainly categorizes as indigenous because of the group of people who formulated them? Do articles on ontology in general discuss indigenous ontologies as one type of ontology? Many of these issues would not be that important if it is included in the section "Other ontological topics". But it's probably easier to make this decision once your rewrite of the section is done. Phlsph7 (talk) 05:07, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

I have made another attempt to include this in the 'type' section supported by four articles in philosophy journals that attempt to synthesise the ontological turn in anthropology with western ontological concepts. This paragraph is mostly to establish animist ontologies as a widespread 'type' distinct from western ontologies (not at all in the ethnic sense suggested by Phlsph7 above). I would probably add another paragraph to more completely describe the salient characteristics of animist ontologies (or give examples if appropriate), but I would like to establish the category first in our 'ontology of ontologies'. There's no point in fleshing it out if the existence of the category is still disputed. Larataguera (talk) 20:01, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

PS. Please don't hesitate to ask for quotes for any of the citations if it's helpful! Larataguera (talk) 20:18, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Honestly it doesn't seem like you're really responding to @Phlsph7:'s concerns here and I have a bit of my own that I was struggling to articulate before that I think are along the same lines. Right now, as written, the section you added seems kind of like an uncharitable stereotype? First of all, there are other points of view on this page other than "western" and "animist" so presenting it as a contrast to "Western" seems to do the opposite of globalize - we have no shortage of articles on other topics that neither Western nor Animist - see for example Hindu philosophy, Buddhist philosophy, Islamic philosophy, etc. And second of all, I'm also extremely uncomfortable with the idea that we're overgeneralizing many diverse groups of people as "indigenous" who are all alike to each other and all distinct from "Western" ontologies. We have pages on, for example, Aztec philosophy or other specific indigenous groups, but a claim that in essence, all of these people on several continents are all alike and all fundamentally different from *Westerners* in an incommensurable way, really seems implausible, unsupported by the linked sources, and also like something inappropriate to have on an encyclopedia.

I can't really endorse or support bigotry no matter how many sources it's supported by. Am I missing something here? I don't want to be inflammatory here so I apologize for being blunt, I assume this is a concern people have raised with you before and that you may have an answer that addresses these concerns, but frankly: How is this not... extremely racist? - car chasm (talk) 20:46, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

@Larataguera: I'm open to diversifying this article by including a discussion of animist and indigenous ontologies (are these two terms identical?). But the current form seems to be WP:NPOV and contains various wide overgeneralizations. Do all western ontologies affirm the division between nature and culture? For example, is this division already built into Spinoza's, Quine's, or Heidegger's approach to ontology? And the points from my last post still apply: if "Indigenous ontologies cannot be essentialised" and have not much else in common besides that they "frequently ascribe intentionality to a variety of non-human objects such as animals, features of the landscape, and even everyday objects", why claim that this is a non-trivial type of ontology. If it is a trivial type, then the section "Types" is not the best place for it. Carchasm and I have formulated our criticism differently but it seems to me that we roughly agree on the main points.

My suggestions for your contribution would be the following. Your sources seem to contain a lot of material on animist and indigenous ontologies. Focus your section on them: how precisely are they defined, what more is there to say about them, who holds such views, how do these views differ from each other, are they really very similar to each other? You can mention that there is a tendency in the west to see things differently. However, this shouldn't be the main point of the section, as it currently is, but more as a side note to the reader. And you have to be careful here: not everyone in the west sees things differently. And, of course, not every ontology is either indigenous or western. Phlsph7 (talk) 21:25, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

I had written a response here, but lost it due to an edit conflict with Phlsph7. I'll do my best on a second writing: I don't see this as being bigoted, but rather as an attempt to include the entirely valid animist ontologies held by numerous people around the world in this global article about ontology. If we do not include those ontologies in the same article and the same section as ontologies formulated by Western thinkers, then that is a form of erasure. It would not be NPOV to talk about ontologies with roots in Western ideology, but fail to talk about ontologies with roots in Indigenous practice. In answer to Phlsph7, I would say that this is a non-trivial type, because millions of people around the world ascribe to it. More pertinent to Wikipedia policy, because 'Indigenous ontology' yields 126,000 results on Google Scholar ("blob theory ontology" gets 14,000).

You are correct to be concerned about overgeneralisation, which is why I specifically warned against it in the article and provided a reference discussing those concerns—the only reference to a non-philosophy journal since I couldn't find adequate treatment of those concerns in a philosophy journal. Perhaps we could discuss animist ontologies in the abstract (without reference to Indigenous people), but it would just beg the question of why that information is there? It's there because millions of people inhabit these ontologies. Obviously not all animists are Indigenous people; and not all Indigenous people are animists. But it is also true that the relevance of animist ontologies arises from their prevalence among Indigenous cultures.

It might be helpful to read the article Ontological Conflicts and the Stories of Peoples in Spite of Europe, which has a section that specifically addresses some of these concerns. Larataguera (talk) 22:04, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Looking at that article, it seems to me to give the impression that it represents a minority viewpoint? I'm sorry but it's really hard to take assertions like this very seriously: "First, because in order to even consider ontological conflicts as a possibility, one must question some of the most profoundly established assumptions in the social sciences, for instance, the assumptions that we are all modern and that the differences that exist are between cultural perspectives on one single reality “out there.” This rules out the possibility of multiple ontologies and what is properly an ontological conflict (i.e., a conflict between different realities).". I think that the charitable assumption I can make here is that "ontology" and "reality" are being used in a sense that's very different from anything found in this wikipedia article. I think that in general a claim of "multiple different realities" would need quite a lot more support before being included on an encyclopedia.

Also having read the linked paper I now believe this to be a WP:FRINGE topic even within anthropology and would oppose its inclusion in this article altogether, it seems like most of the paper is responding to other scholars who (mostly) disagree with them? And it would seem that the claim that millions of people "inhabit" these ontologies (whatever that means? I'm still unsure) is left to be proved and has not gained acceptance with the wider community even of anthropologists, let alone philosophers, so I don't think the assumption of that claim is enough to merit inclusion here. And it's certainly clear that "ontology" is being used in a highly technical anthropological sense: In the context of a debate (Carrithers et al. 2010) that carried the suggestive title of “Ontology Is Just Another Word for Culture,” Matt Candea has argued that, in anthropology, the turn to ontology “comes from the suspicion that cultural difference is not different enough, or alternatively that cultural difference has been reduced by cultural critics to a mere effect of political instrumentality. By contrast, ontology is an attempt to take others and their real difference seriously” (Carrithers et al. 2010:175). - car chasm (talk) 23:01, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

I'm not using that paper as a source in this article. I'm using philosophy journals, because that's what you asked me to use. I suggested you review that paper because it directly speaks to the concerns you had about this being "extremely racist" Larataguera (talk) 23:29, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I have to say that unfortunately most of you attempts to allay my concerns have, upon further investigation, only worsened them. The paper you linked cites many other papers that disagree with the fundamental claims you are making about "ontology" and quite frankly, makes little attempt to engage or respond with them. Here's an example:

Still, someone may ask, are you not homogenizing when you say that all Westerners operate according to the nature/ culture divide? Or that indigenous peoples live in a different ontology? Here the cart is put in front of the horse. It is assumed that political ontology attributes a given ontology or set of practices to a given group—Westerners, indigenous peoples, or what have you. In fact, political ontology is concerned with practices, performances, and enactments and not with specific groups. One can speak of a given worlding or ontology as long as one can trace its enactment. Moreover, practices do not need to be entirely self-coherent and consistent, although one may find more or less coherence and consistency in some situations than in others. Yet, the lack of coherence or consistency neither implies that all worldings are modern, nor that the term modern cannot be used to label and single out a particular way of worlding. In short, the attribution of modernness would go hand in hand with specific practices and not with a specific group. For instance, I would feel unwarranted to call modern the practices of middle-class white women involved in Wicca. Likewise, neither indigenous identity automatically translates into an other-than-modern ontology, nor does indigenous involvement make a conflict an ontological one. As indicated in the introduction, if the notion of multiple ontologies appears closely associated with indigenous peoples in this article, it is due to my professional trajectory and experience rather than to an implicit claim that there is an inherent association between them.

It would be hard to miss the point of the criticism, that separating "Westerners" and "indigenous" into two separate groups is inappropriate, and more than has been done by the authors in this example. On wikipedia we would call this WP:IDHT. They (and you) just simply do not seem to "get" that the objection made against them is that they are vastly overgeneralizing two mutually overlapping groups of people, they make absolutely no excuses for it, and then go on to continue to do so! If there is anything of value that will eventually come out of this research, I believe that it will need to wait until after it has received much, much broader recognition within academic philosophy over the next few decades, after the more discriminatory and inflammatory aspects can be trimmed out. If you are struggling to be able to include anything in this article without, or as you put it, Perhaps we could discuss animist ontologies in the abstract (without reference to Indigenous people), but it would just beg the question of why that information is there? ...But it is also true that the relevance of animist ontologies arises from their prevalence among Indigenous cultures, then I believe what that implies is that this is not an appropriate topic for inclusion in this page - it is inappropriate and offensive to continually make reference to a general group like "indigenous" when many people who consider themselves as indigenous would not consider that a representation of their own beliefs. - car chasm (talk) 00:23, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

First, I don't think it's fair to characterise my editing as disruptive. It's reasonable to have a conversation about the inclusion of non-Western ontologies. If you don't like that conversation, we/you can stop any time, but I think it can be productive and needs to be had. Second, regarding your position that separating "Westerners" and "indigenous" into two separate groups is inappropriate: erasure of this difference is also inappropriate. There is quite a large body of Indigenous scholarship advocating for recognition of this difference and centering of Indigenous knowledges (as distinct from Western/modern knowledge). So I don't think you can categorically make this claim. Telling Indigenous people that they are no different from colonisers is definitely problematic. Third, if this is going to go anywhere (and perhaps it won't) I think we should focus on the actual content of the sources and their reflection in my edit. I'm not making these distinctions between animist/modern Indigenous/western. The sources (ie, philosophy journals) are making these distinctions. Larataguera (talk) 01:23, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

I recommend that you have a look at WP:RIGHTGREATWRONGS and WP:NOTHERE - if there really is a large body of "indigenous" scholarship advocating for this recognition, inclusion of this content on Wikipedia will need to wait until after that recognition and not before. We do not "need" to have this conversation, this conversation needs to be had in academia long before it can happen here, and the sources you have linked clearly demonstrate that it hasn't, it is still highly debated and controversial. I would discourage you from editing wikipedia in a way that pushes for a particular point of view in the future. WP:NPOV is not an optional content policy.

I would also, again, discourage you from making broad statements about the philosophical beliefs or viewpoints of large groups of people whom you have no authority to speak for. Bigotry is not tolerated on Wikipedia. - car chasm (talk) 01:37, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

The recognition of that difference has already happened. That's why "Indigenous ontology" gets over 100k hits on Google scholar and why that difference is described in the journals I cited. Erasure of cultural difference is not ok, even if the person doing it accuses other people of bigotry.Larataguera (talk) 01:46, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

The sources you have cited do not support your claims that what you are saying is uncontroversial. I will reiterate: WP:NPOV is not an optional content policy. - car chasm (talk) 01:49, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

From the sources cited by Carchasm, it seems clear that the claims made in the newly added sections are controversial and not properly supported by the sources you cite. So I support the revert. The point is not that animist or indigenous ontologies should be excluded from this article at any cost. But if they are included then this should happen in the right way: by presenting a balanced view. The number of hits on search engines may indicate that the topic is notable but it does not prove that the way you presented it is in tune with Wikipedia guidelines. Various arguments have been made why this is not the case and some suggestions have been made about what changes might ameliorate this. Phlsph7 (talk) 05:40, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

Suggested addition

I think mentioning the influence of ontology in anthropology is, in principle, a good idea. And since the indigenous perspective plays an important role in this field, it can be mentioned in turn. I would suggest to add something like the following to the section "Other ontological topics" under the title "Anthropology":

The topic of ontology has received increased attention in anthropology since the 1990s. This is sometimes termed the "ontological turn". This type of inquiry is focused on how people from different cultures experience and understand the nature of being. Specific interest in this regard has been given to the ontological outlook of indigenous people and how their outlook tends to differ from a more Western perspective. As an example of this contrast, it has been argued that various indigenous communities ascribe intentionality to non-human entities, like plants, forests, or rivers. This outlook is known as animism.

I'm not sure that this suggestion avoids all the objections presented so far, but I think it avoids the most important ones. I'm open to further suggestions or reformulations. Phlsph7 (talk) 08:25, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

I think this a good alternative - it avoids a lot of my concerns by specifying that this is something that has been observed in "various indigenous communities" (which certainly seems to be true) without making broad statements about all of them or insisting on incommensurability. Since this is a very new area of research (90s), and it's interdisciplinary (anthropology), the focus of the paragraph is more on the fact that research is being done and what the motivations are for doing so, rather than making any strong conclusions that aren't supported by scholarly consensus. - car chasm (talk) 13:51, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

Thanks phlsph7 for this suggestion. I think it’s fine, and I’m glad there appears to be some consensus on how to include some of this content. I would only like to close my participation in this discussion with the following points:

• I think the allegations of bigotry and hate speech levelled toward me were entirely unnecessary, and that the content I added only made distinctions established by a “vast corpus of ethnographies from animistic hunter-gatherer societies”[2]. Distinction between Indigenous/western onto-epistemologies is further affirmed by the work of Indigenous scholars demanding recognition for Indigenous worldviews. This, for example. To accuse me of hate speech when I am advocating for recognition of Indigenous worldviews is a form of gaslighting.
• Debate about my contribution continually focused on these allegations of racism and on content from a source I never even cited in the article. My contribution never made broad statements about all Indigenous people nor even mentioned incommensurability (much less "insisted" on it). Why fabricate these issues? How different is my wording: The ontologies of Indigenous peoples frequently ascribe intentionality to a variety of non-human objects from the consensus wording above: it has been argued that various indigenous communities ascribe intentionality to non-human entities. If someone wanted to add the phrase “it has been argued that” in front of my sentence, I don’t think I’d have objected. Ludwig's article says that "animism is a widespread metaphysical view". Why couldn’t we have just had a generative debate on the merits of the sources I included and the statements I selected from them? Personal attacks hurt the encyclopedia by stifling generative discourse that could possibly have yielded an even better solution than that proposed by phlsph7.
• As a result of making distinctions supported by tens of thousands of scholarly articles, including articles written by Indigenous scholars, I am being accused of hate speech on my talk page. (Which an uninvolved editor has already said to be ridiculous[3]) Are these tens of thousands of articles all hate speech? I would appreciate the retraction of that allegation.Larataguera (talk) 15:43, 24 September 2022 (UTC)

References

Disambiguation page

I would suggest to consider creating a disambiguation page named "Ontology", which would distinguish "Ontology (philosophy)" and "Ontology (information science)". Bikandr (talk) 12:06, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

The main meaning of the term "Ontology" is treated by this article, which is why I would suggest that we keep this article under this term. We could create a new page "Ontology (disambiguation)" to include the wikilinks to alternative meanings. But I'm not sure that a disambiguation page is necessary unless there are more relevant articles besides those two. Phlsph7 (talk) 21:26, 14 November 2022 (UTC)

Misled by the lead/lede.

So the opening sentence is fine ... Ontology is a branch of metaphysics, about philosophy of being and existence. Got it.

Then the weight of the following paragraph makes me think that maybe Ontology is mainly about categories. It isn't. Or if it is, then get rid of the opening sentence. Perhaps this introduction has been 'adopted' by a particular cadre in current ontology academia, perhaps it just lost its way. Don't know, don't care. The second paragraph is as clear and helpful as mud. (Hint: mud is neither clear nor helpful) Given the turgid discussions above about other edits, I'm not going there. Someone braver than me can fix it. Wayne 13:02, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

Hallo and thanks for your input. You are right that ontology is not exclusively about the categories of being. But it is also true that they play a central role. I just had a look at the articles "Ontology" in the MacMillan Encyclopedia of Philosophy and in Oxford Companion to Philosophy. In both cases, the majority of text in the article is dedicated to the discussion of the different categories. I made a slight reformulation to the text in order to avoid implying that this is the only issue discussed by ontology. Phlsph7 (talk) 17:30, 25 November 2022 (UTC)

Maybe a mistaken "or" for "of" ?

In the second paragraph it seems to be a mistake, but my ignorance makes that I can't decide by myself to change it : "Ontologists often try to determine what the categories OR (OF?) highest kinds are and how they form a system of categories that encompasses classification of all entities"

In fact, if the 'or' is correct then we talk about a notion that should have a link. Mumen (talk) 15:42, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

"or" is correct here since "categories" is just another term for "highest kinds". Phlsph7 (talk) 13:42, 31 January 2023 (UTC)