A Survey of Metaphysics

Upper ontology plays critical roles in ontology development by giving developers a guideline of how to view the target domain. Although some upper ontologies such as DOLCE, BFO, GFO, SUMO, CYC, etc. are already developed and extensively used, a careful examination of them reveals some room for improvement in a couple of respects. This paper discusses YAMATO 1 : Yet Another More Advanced Top-level Ontology which has been developed intended to cover three features in Quality description, Representation and Process/Event, respectively, in a better way than existing ontologies.

YAMATO: Yet-another more advanced top-level ontology

yamato sharply distinguishes itself from other existing upper ontologies in the following respects. (1) Most importantly, yamato is designed with both engineering and philosophical minds. (2) yamato is based on a sophisticated theory of roles, given that the world is full of roles. (3) yamato has a tenable theory of functions which helps to deal with artifacts effectively. (4) Information is a ‘content-bearing’ entity and it differs significantly from the entities that philosophers have traditionally discussed. Taking into account the modern society in which a flood of information occurs, yamato has a sophisticated theory of informational objects (representations). (5) Quality and quantity are carefully organized for the sake of greater interoperability of real-world data. (6) The philosophical contribution of yamato includes a theory of objects, processes, and events. Those features are illustrated with several case studies. These features lead to the intensive application of yamato in some domains such as biomedicine and learning engineering.

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YAMATO: Yet Another More Advanced Top-Level Ontology with Analysis of Five Examples of Change.

We must now analyze the concept of a causal law, both for its own sake and because the analyses to follow will involve the concept. As usual, the solipsist is on the lookout for the most economical analysis, and theories of the Humean sort are unquestionably the most economical.

Causes and Counterfactuals

Should and could humans go to Mars? Yes, but not now and not in the near future

The goal of this paper is two-fold: first, to emphasize causality in disease ontology and knowledge representation, presenting a general and cursory discussion of causality and causal chains; and second, to clarify and develop the River Flow Model of Diseases (RFM). The RFM is an ontological account of disease, representing the causal structure of pathology. It applies general knowledge of causality using the concept of causal chains. The river analogy of disease is explained, formal descriptions are offered, and the RFM disease definition is refined by describing causal chains in terms of causal relations. The definition is updated to coincide with the actual RFM classes found in its upper-level ontology, YAMATO, which brings to light some challenges in developing both YAMATO and the RFM. The RFM is also discussed in relation to another ontological account of disease. Strategies are offered toward interoperability between these theories.

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Causality and the ontology of disease

Space situational awareness (SSA) is vital for international safety and security, and the future of space travel. By improving SSA data-sharing we improve global SSA. Computational ontology may provide one means toward that goal. This paper develops the ontology of the SSA domain and takes steps in the creation of the space situational awareness ontology. Ontology objectives, requirements and desiderata are outlined; and both the SSA domain and the discipline of ontology are described. The purposes of the ontology include: exploring the potential for ontology development and engineering to (i) represent SSA data, general domain knowledge, objects and relationships (ii) annotate and express the meaning of that data, and (iii) foster SSA data-exchange and integration among SSA actors, orbital debris databases, space object catalogs and other SSA data repositories. By improving SSA via data- and knowledge-sharing, we can (iv) expand our scientific knowledge of the space environment, (v) advance our capacity for planetary defense from near-Earth objects, and (vi) ensure the future of safe space flight for generations to come.

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Preliminaries of a Space Situational Awareness Ontology

The orbital debris problem presents an opportunity for international
cooperation toward the mutually beneficial goals of orbital debris prevention,
mitigation, remediation, and improved space situational awareness (SSA). Achieving
these goals requires sharing orbital debris and other SSA data. Toward this, I
present an ontological architecture for the orbital debris and related domains,
taking steps in the creation of an orbital debris ontology. The purpose of the
ontology is to capture general scientific domain knowledge; formally represent the
entities within the domain; form, structure, and standardize (where needed) orbital
and SSA terminology; and foster semantic interoperability and data-exchange. In
doing so I hope to offer a scientifically accurate ontological representation of the
orbital domain; contribute to research in astroinformatics, space ontology, and
space data management; and improve spaceflight safety by providing a means to
capture and communicate informaiton associated with space debris.

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An Ontological Architecture for Orbital Debris Data

What are shapes? The ancient Greek geometer is perhaps the most familiar with these entities, but shape is general enough to transcend domains of inquiry. In this communication I present a broad examination of shape and related notions, such as form, boundary and surface. I aim to explore this question and describe the category of shape by identifying some of its most general features. I contrast geometric (or perfect) shapes with physical or organic shapes (the shape of objects), discuss granularity, artifactuality, the cognitive aspect of shape and introduce a preliminary ontological hierarchy of shape.

Robert J. Rovetto

Papers

Causality and the ontology of disease

Preliminaries of a Space Situational Awareness Ontology

An Ontological Architecture for Orbital Debris Data

The Shape of Shapes: An Ontological Exploration.

Defending spaceflight - The echoes of Apollo