[FRIAM] Object Oriented Ontology

[Nick Thompson]

Ah, David.  It WAS you.  I might have known.  (};-/) 

 

Has anybody else read it?

 

I guess one question I might have concerns any relation between Object Oriented Ontology and Object Oriented Programming.  Harman, disclaims much of a relation (pp 10-11), but I’m betting you see one, and even that it’s important to you.  

 

I am also wondering, as I have often done, what you experts make of the word “ontology.”  I have no idea what it means.  Never have.   It is a deeply philosophical word yet some philosophically skeptical computer folks that I know (ahem, ahem*) seem to use it.

 

Where are you David?  Are you “in country” or did we lose you to Europe?  Have you become a Eurokid?  Are you reading Lacan and sipping espresso in the shade of the plane trees en la Place de la Sorbonne.

 

Great to be in touch!

 

Nick 

 

*Who am I to cast the first stone, Owen?

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

 <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

From: Friam [mailto:friam-bounces at redfish.com] On Behalf Of Prof David West
Sent: Thursday, July 05, 2018 2:59 AM
To: friam at redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Object Oriented Ontology

 

Nick

 

Twas I that brought the book to your attention and I have read it twice and am using it as a foundation for writing a chapter in my Natural Systems Design book.

 

Happy to discuss and perhaps answer some of your questions and help you find the path through the forest.

 

davew

 

 

 

On Wed, Jul 4, 2018, at 7:51 PM, Nick Thompson wrote:

Dear Colleagues,

 

One of you [wretches], assigned me  <https://www.amazon.com/Object-Oriented-Ontology-New-Theory-Everything/dp/0241269156/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1530754578&sr=8-1-fkmr1&keywords=Graham+Harmon+Object+Oriented> this book for a little light summer reading before I left SF in March.  It was a seductive assignment.  In the first place, the book is a little book.  I LIKE little books.  Cheap and easy to carry.  In the second place, as I read around in it, I see echoes of Peirce in its monism and realism and fascination with metaphors (aka “signs”?).  Every chapter begins in an ingratiating introduction that gives promise of progress in the rational construction of a complex idea. 

 

There my praise ends.  I have started all the chapters with the greatest of good will and have gotten thoroughly lost in every one. 

 

I deeply suspect that whichever one of you [wretches] who assigned it to me has never read it from cover to cover. 

 

SO:    Will you now do that with me?  And will others join?  It would be best if we could snare a few philosophers to join us because the author does seem to be rather deeply into philosophy, both post modern and the other kind. 

 

It’s hard to believe that it has nothing to do with object oriented programing, but it may not.

 

Fess up!

 

NIck

 

 

 

Nicholas S. Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Psychology and Biology

Clark University

 <http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/> http://home.earthlink.net/~nickthompson/naturaldesigns/

 

============================================================

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv

Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College

to unsubscribe  <http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com> http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com

FRIAM-COMIC  <http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/> http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/ by Dr. Strangelove

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20180705/de3f4f92/attachment.html>