Ontology

From Geography

Latest revision as of 09:34, 25 October 2012

Contextual understanding

Ontology refers to the filosophical theories (or meta-theories)'compromises theories, or sets of theories, which seek to answer 'the question of what the world must be like for knowledge to be possible' (Aitken and Valentine, 2006, p.5). The Dutch translation of ontology is 'zijnsleer'. It describes the being of a complex whole of things. In this sense, as noted by Bhaskar, every account of science presupposes an ontology (Johnston, Gregory, Pratt & Watts, 2000, pp.561). Ontology can be viewed as a framework. For example entities are formed by ontology. One needs to understand and accept the framework of a specific field in order to be able to understand and ask the correct questions about this research field. The reality of life and what is real is subjective to framing and ontology. Therefore possible of change. Changing ontologies can broaded a field with a way of looking at things and asking new questions. The birth of humanism can be seen as a change in ontology, framing of scientific questions changed together with the view of the world.

Ontological traditions

Bhaskar distinguishes three broad ontological traditions within the philosophy of science:

• Classical empiricism: in which 'the ultimate objects of knowledge are atomistic events'. From this point of view he claims, that 'knowledge and the world may be viewed as surfaces whose points are in isomorphic correspondence': having a direct one-to-one relation with each other.

• Transcendental Idealism: in which the ultimate objects of knowledge are artificial constructs imposed upon the world. In this perspective knolwedge is seen as a structure rather than a surface' - a structure constituted by the thinking subject.

• Transcendental Realism: regards the ultimate objects of knowledge as the 'structures and mechanisms that generate phenomena' and'regards 'such objects exist and act independently of their identification' (Johnston, Gregory, Pratt & Watts, 2000, pp.561-562)

Ontology in Collaborative planning in an Uncollaborative World

Collaborative planning assumes a mature level of civic literacy among widely informed publics. Clearly, the more sophisticated discourses were largely restricted to the small focus groups, comprising those of expertise and experience. Government motivation in sponsoring and resourcing these deliberations was multiple: a genuine desire to learn public views; a need to legitimize policy-making to overcome the democratic deficit in a contested society missing an agreed form of self-government; and a keenly felt objective to do at least the minimum to avoid litigation, given the region’s strict legislative framework around equality and discrimination. But the composite of these imperatives did not amount to a clear coherent conviction about the efficacy of collaborative planning.

The reality of the planning world itself distinguishes between statutory plans, such as the regional and metropolitan strategies, and the non-statutory plans, such as city visions and urban programmes. When it comes to development decisions, the former exercise greater legal authority. Yet, paradoxically, the latter often contain more of the creative and imaginative outcomes of public discourses, whereas the statutory plans lapse into a largely conventional landuse framework. Thus, although the assumption is that more proactive creative public engagements have yielded a new notion of planning, most aspects of those plans that are legally based and resource-linked remain in reality orthodox and cautious. An alternative view is that visionary processes can produce fanciful ideas that are not rooted in any real options for practical delivery.

References

• Aitken, S. & Valentine, G. (2006). Approaches to Human Geography. SAGE publications Ltd, London.

• Johnston, R.J., Gregory, Derek, Pratt, Geraldine. & Watts, Michael. (2000). The Dictionary of Human Geography. Blackwell.

• Brand, R, Gaffikin, F (2011). Collaborative Planning in an Uncollaborative World published by SAGE

Contributors

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