The real history (FWIW) may be a bit more nuanced. Pat seems below to be
stating that he wasn't the first. It's the final paragraphs from (01)
http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/2008-05/msg00010.html (02)
in which Pat is responding to Bill Andersen: (03)
[BA]
The only reason I can see for the use of the term "ontology" in this
connection is to increase the chances of winning funding from people who
still attach mystic significance to the term "ontology" that they would not
to "logical theory" (04)
[PH]
Quite. But isn't that the only reason for using the word "ontology" under
any circumstances? (05)
[BA]
Surely you can't be in favor of introducing a new term that does no more and
no less work than established terms of art in logic and automated theorem
proving, can you? (06)
[PH]
I wouldn't be if the term really were new (and I resolutely ignored it when
it was first introduced) but its no longer new, and we are now stuck with
it. But it does a lot less harm if its merely a synonym than if its supposed
to have some mystical importance inherited from philosophy or the latest
vogue in management theory. Certainly I don't think we should be trying to
invent some way to separate it from 'logical theory' simply in order to
justify its existence. (07)
Pat
[end of quote] (08)
But the above concerns the term's use as a synonym for "logical theory",
whereas the present thread is addressing its use in AI. So perhaps I'm
quoting out of context? (09)
I am busy promoting ontology in a different forum at the moment. The word
seems to have some attraction there but I have discovered that, like
"semantic web", "ontology" is a sure turn-off out there to a significant
degree. So I am interested in both the history of the word and the current
experience of Ontolog folks in this labelling matter. (010)
Christopher (011)
-----Original Message-----
From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John F Sowa
Sent: 05 November 2013 05:01
To: '[ontolog-forum] '
Subject: [ontolog-forum] Early use of the word 'ontology' in AI (012)
The word 'ontology' has been used in philosophy for centuries.
But the following paper, which Pat Hayes wrote in 1978, seems to be the
first use of the word in artificial intelligence: (013)
http://www.issco.unige.ch/working-papers/Hayes-1978-35.pdf
Ontology for liquids (014)
I asked Pat if he knew of any earlier uses in AI, and he sent the following
reply. This article and two other articles that Pat cites show the
influence of philosophical ontology on AI. (015)
John (016)
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: The word 'ontology' in AI
Date: Sun, 3 Nov 2013 23:46:42 -0600
From: Pat Hayes (017)
As far as I recall, my use in the title of the 1978 paper was original.
I used it deliberately to suggest/imply that the KR problem in AI was
connected with philosophical ontology. (018)
The background to this was my reading Carnap's "Logical Structure of the
World" as an undergraduate, probably some time in 1964. Reading this blew my
mind and first got me excited about the idea of using logic to describe the
real world. When I got into AI and read McCarthy's "Situations, actions and
causal laws" (published 1963, I think I read it in 1966), I was immediately
struck by the similarity both of goals and even in places of formal (what
would now be called 'ontological') techniques. A conversation with JMcC
about this during a visit to Edinburgh (where I was a grad student in
'machine intelligence' with Donald Michie and Bernard Meltzer) is what led
to him inviting me to Stanford for the summer of 1967, when we wrote the
paper "Some philosophical problems..." (which *still* has the highest
citation count among all my publications :-) (019)
I wrote the "An ontology of liquids" and its companion paper "The naive
physics manifesto" while visiting the Dalle Molle institute in 1977-78, and
I was quite excited by them. I had private visions of creating a revolution
in AI, or at least AI in California. But they were like a lead balloon. I
got no feedback or response or communications at all, no sign that anyone
had even read them. It was quite depressing. (This was pre-Web, of course,
but there was some email contact between academics using the early ARPAnet.)
Then, about two years later, when I had just about given up, I spent a few
days at the MIT AI lab, at the time considered to be the very world center
of anti-logic, and to my surprise discovered that there was a kind of inner
cabal of grad students who were very excited by my stuff. And then that
inner cabal graduated and spread over the planet. (020)
Pat (021)
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