Ontology

Notes Concerning Semantics

The Atheists' Dogma

In December of 2002, I encountered overwhelming opposition when contesting the quality of the definitions of several significant words often used by atheists in their arguments for distinguishing atheism from religion. The discussion was prevalent in the early days of atheist discussion forums. The discussions were usually started by a Christian. And the atheists will proudly trot out the definitions of the words, and if that is not enough, they have the analogy, "Atheism is a religion, like bald is a hair color."

I inherently understood the Christians' argument, although I could not articulate the reasoning. I recognized something wrong with the atheist's reasoning.

It is a strange argument that the people who claim that they do not have a religion believe that they understand the definition of religion better than the people who proudly proclaim to live a religion. It just does not seem possible to the atheists that the dictionary definitions about religion and atheism are flawed, and also to the Christians.

I knew something was wrong, but I wanted to search further for the root of the social problem. I thought the problems with the atheists were unique to their emergence in contemporary culture. I wound up monitoring the political duopoly from the conservative talk show point of view.

Early Encounter with Category Mistake

Back in the mid-seventies in Indianapolis, I was about ten years old; fourth, maybe fifth, grade. Mom was a computer programmer as long as I could remember. I cannot remember the exact situation in which I learned that her title was "Systems Analyst." Although I could not identify it as a category mistake, I thought something was wrong, that is too general. I did not notice her analyze anything other than removing and exchanging the tubes in the black and white televisions. 

Mom was a computer program analyst, and I guess now, that was when she was promoted to a managerial position, or qualification. I don't think she was a manager in Indianapolis, because the FMC shop was a small operation from what I could see. I would not think there were any more than thirty people employed, and if they weren't computer people, they were janitors. I do not think they were doing any sales out of what was probably a satellite computer system for payroll. I really don't know what they were doing for the company. 

Mom was a trouble-shooter. Possibly "program forensics."

From my sense of rules for scientific reliability, I have derived a format. I am the artificer.

I am designing a knowledge classification system based on that formatting system and any other meta-data collations that can be identified as being reliable for subdividing a category. And I think that makes me a Systems' Analist.

I believe that a true knowledge classification system has (visual or spatial) qualities that cannot be separated from the essence of the entity that it is.

I am a cartographer and I have to research the systems of the topics in order to identify the topic to its placements in the hierarchies of the classification system.

When I analyze lists, I am a taxonomist.