Ontological arguments are also an explicit (or implicit) feature of sociological theory itself, e.g. DURKHEIM's conception of'social facts, WEBER's (or the SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONIST'S) emphasis on individual actors, or MARX's materialism and emphasis on modes and relations in production.
One argument (HUME's view) is that ontological inquiries are bound to be inconclusive, or are even pointless. Against this, the clarification of underlying assumptions is often important. Undoubtedly debate in sociology since COMTE, much of it broadly ontological in nature, has done much to clarify the nature, while also underlining the very great complexity, of social reality (social action, social structures, etc.). However, it has done so not as a separate realm of inquiry, but as an inherent part of sociological inquiry properly conducted. Philosophy can inform these discussions, but it is no longer regarded as the kind of final arbiter it was once assumed to be. The expectation must be that ontologies will change as knowledge and individual sciences and modes of study change (compare EPISTEMOLOGY, KUHN, FEYERABEND).
a subdivision of philosophy that studies universal principles of being, its structure and its laws. Essentially, ontology expresses a picture of the world that corresponds to a particular level in the knowledge of reality and that is recorded in a system of philosophical categories characteristic of a particular period and philosophical tradition (for example, materialism and idealism). In this sense, every philosophical and, in general, every theoretical system rests on certain ontological concepts that constitute its stable content foundation but that change as cognition develops.
The term “ontology” was first used in the philosophical lexicon (1613) of R. Goclenius (Germany) as a synonym for metaphysics. It gained currency in the school of C. Wolff, for whom ontology came to signify the primary fundamental part of metaphysics, concerned with definitions of being as such. Until the early 19th century, ontology developed on the basis of speculation and consisted chiefly of ideas concerning the hidden essences of things. The flimsiness of these teachings on being was criticized by German classical philosophy and was fully surmounted by Marxism, which demonstrated the necessary ties among and unity of ontology, epistemology, and logic and, consequently, the dependence of ontological concepts on the existing level and forms of cognition.
In the 20th century the heightened level of abstract scientific cognition has presented certain basic ontological problems—the construction of an adequate ontological interpretation of abstract concepts of modern science (for example, cosmology and the physics of elementary particles) and the creation of a theoretical foundation for modern methodological approaches and trends (for example, the ontological basis of a systems approach, or of cybernetics). The issue of ontology is discussed in contemporary Marxist literature. Although some Marxist philosophers believe that ontology is not entitled to an independent existence, others assert that it should be a special branch of dialectical materialism.
Attempts to restate problems of ontology in a new, primarily subjective, personal vein, as a matter of the strata and levels of being of the personality, are characteristic of a number of schools of modern bourgeois philosophy, particularly phenomenology, existentialism, and personalism. This line of thought reflects the world view of the pessimistic, alienated individual.
E. G. IUDIN