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An super ontology is list of the types of things that exist.

My personal super ontology right now is that there are objects, relations between objects (which themselves are objects), and changes in relations between objects (time).

What other super ontologies have been proposed? That is, what are the theories for what sorts of things this world is comprised of?

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  • Can you clarify if you are asking about ontologies in the information/knowledge engineering sense, or the philosophical? Given the name of this forum I expect the latter but just checking. The Wikipedia link you provide lists various upper ontologies (sensu information science). Some of these are backed by actual ontological theories, for example BFO. So this list would be a good place to start. – cmungall Feb 9 at 2:11
  • @cmungall philosophical sense. Thank you for checking, and thanks for the suggestion. – Pro Q Feb 9 at 4:24
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    The Wikipedia article you linked has a list of 17 upper ontologies, with descriptions, so what exactly is the question for us? – Conifold Feb 9 at 6:30
  • Blimey. I study ontology but can make little or no sense of these 17 ontologies. What is an 'upper' ontology? – PeterJ Feb 9 at 10:42
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    It may help to go to Internet Archive and download "Approaches to Metaphysics" Ed. William Sweet, and read the Introduction and ch. 10 by William Bradley. There are other good articles in there too. There is the idea that there must be some kind of "fitness" to inquire about the world before we begin any inquiry. – Gordon Feb 9 at 15:39

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