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Ontology: “the philosophy of being and existence.”
The importance of ontology is increasingly recognised across the social sciences, which is why it is worth trying to get a good grasp on its meaning. However, unless you already know what ontology is, the above definition does not really get you much closer to understanding the meaning and importance of ontology. To reach a clearer picture of what ontology is, we will pick apart the definition, ask some ontological questions, and finally contrast ontology with two other branches of philosophy: ethics and epistemology.
Let us start with the term ‘philosophy’. The vagueness of the word ‘philosophy’ is a common barrier to understanding the meaning of ontology. ‘Philosophy’ implies multiple meanings, some of which need separating out, and some of which are not relevant to the current discussion. We can instead think of ontology arising in three main respects:
- Controversies about being and existence
- Questions with multiple plausible answers
- Long running academic disputes
- Everyday disagreements
- Assumptions about being and existence
- Beliefs held by individuals
- Implications of texts
- Ideas we accept as true for various purposes
- Theories about being and existence
- Systems of thought
- Religions
- Approaches to social science
Ontology: “the controversies, assumptions, and theories that are about being and existence”
We now need to outline what is meant by ‘being’ and ‘existence’. Too often, the two words are understood simply to be synonyms, or at least the difference between them is ignored. There is much to be gained by interpreting the words ‘being’ and ‘existence’ as meaning different things. ‘Being’ can be held to refer to the state of consciousness and experience (of humans, but also of animals, and depending on your ontology, perhaps also of god(s)). ‘Existence’ can be held to refer to everything that is real (of which ‘being’ is a part). For the sake of clarity, we could therefore substitute the word ‘being’ with the word ‘experience’ and the word ‘existence’ with the term ‘reality’.
Ontology: “the controversies, assumptions, and theories that are about experience and reality”
Therefore, when we engage in ontology as social scientists, we need to be aware of some key questions:
- what is experience?
- are there different types of experience?
- is there something beyond our experience?
- are there other experiences and experiencers?
- is there something (a reality) beyond experience altogether?
- does this reality exist regardless of whether we experience it?
- to what extent is human experience separate from the rest of reality?
- what is that reality made of?
- how does this reality relate to time?
- what is time anyway?
- are there layers to reality?
- is one of those layers the human being?
- are there layers ‘above’ the human being, e.g. ‘society’ or ‘god’?
- is god real?
- is society real?
- are ideas real?
- what is the difference between the reality of society, the reality of ideas, and the reality of human beings?
- how does the reality of these things differ from the reality of cells, molecules, atoms, and particles?
These are just some of the ontological questions (or ‘controversies’) that social scientists should consider. All too often, social scientists ask ‘is there an objective reality?’ and offer their yes/no answer, without fully exploring the meaning of the question, and without considering the multitude of other closely related ontological questions.
Having offered a definition for ontology and a list of ontological questions, we will conclude by putting some boundaries around ontology, distinguishing it from two other branches of philosophy. Firstly, ontology is not specifically about values; it is not about what is desirable. These would be best labelled ‘normative assumptions’ or ‘ethical beliefs’, and although we may engage in an ontological debate about whether ethical beliefs are indeed ‘real’, or engage in ethical debates about whether certain ontological beliefs are desirable, we can distinguish between ontology and ethics, so that the former is about ‘what is’ and the latter is about ‘what ought to be’.
Secondly, it is common to distinguish ontology from epistemology. Epistemology is about how we can know, what we can know, and whether we can know anything at all. Commonly, epistemological questions are about the certainty with which we make claims or hold beliefs. Epistemology is very closely bound up with ontology in a number important ways. Firstly, if we are to hold ontological beliefs or develop ontological theories, we are involved in attempts to ‘know’ about the world, and therefore our beliefs/theories inevitably make epistemological assumptions. Secondly, any theory of knowledge inevitably entails ontological assumptions because, at the very least, the theory must assume that the ‘knower’ and the ‘known’ both exist in some way. Finally, if ontology is about experience and reality, we must consider that ‘knowledge’ could be considered a type of experience and/or part of reality.
The relation between ontology and epistemology is complex, but the distinction between them is simple enough: epistemology is about knowledge, while ontology is about experience and reality.
Ontology is difficult no matter how it is explained or thought about, but this should not deter us. We hold ontological assumptions whether we recognise them or not. Therefore, if we are to be reflexive and critical in our research (and indeed in our lives in general), it is essential to understand our own ontological assumptions, and then to continue to question and develop them.
In my own research, I am not only interested in my own ontological assumptions, but also the ontological assumptions of political discourse and public policy. This was the focus of my doctoral thesis: Ontological Social Policy Analysis.
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Dr Jack Newman - Research Blog 