Ontology and Epistemology - research

Source:

http://britbohlinger.wordpress.com/2009/08/31/exam-revision-epistemology-and-ontology/

Ontological and epistemological positions provide fundamental aspects of research as they concern the philosophical questions what counts as reality and how beings come into being as well as what constitutes knowledge and how knowledge comes to be established. Two core positions can be distinguished in either area: positivist and constructionist.

• positivist ontology: the world is ‘out there’, it operates in a systematic and lawful manner, discrete and observable events, reality is separate from human meaning-making;
• constructionist ontology: assumes the world we can study is a semiotic world of meanings, represented in signs and symbols, language is central to this position;

• positivist epistemology: knowledge can only be gained by gathering facts in a systematic and objective manner, predominantly by the experimental method and by testing of hypotheses in order to gradually build laws. The aim is to refine them and achieve applicability on a universal level;
• constructionist epistemology: knowledge is constructed rather than discovered, it is a representation of the ‘real world’ and interpreted by the researcher. Knowledge is subject to time-space configurations and a means of power (e.g. doctors as ‘architects of medical knowledge’). Scientists and their institutions shape the production of knowledge by their choices and values.

Introducing Students to the Generic Terminology of Social Research
Jonathan Grix

Ontology

Ontology is the starting point of all research, after which one’s epistemological and methodological positions logically follow.

Examples of ontological positions are those contained within the perspectives ‘objectivism’ and ‘constructivism’. Broadly speaking the former is ‘an ontological position that asserts that social phenomena and their meanings have an existence that is independent of social actors’. The latter, on the other hand, is an alternative ontological position that ‘asserts that social phenomena and their meanings are continually being accomplished by social actors. It implies that social phenomena and categories are not only produced through social interaction but that they are in a constant state of revision’ (Bryman, 2001, pp. 16–18).

If ontology is about what we may know, then epistemology is about how we come to know what we know.

1. You feel loved because someone gives you money

2. You feel loved because some wrote a little heart on a piece of paper

Epistemology

‘the possible ways of gaining knowledge of social reality…claims about how what is assumed to exist can be known’ Two contrasting epistemological positions are those contained within the perspectives ‘positivism’ and ‘interpretivism’. These terms can be traced back, and illuminated by reference to, specific traditions in the philosophy of social sciences. Broadly speaking, the former ‘is an epistemological position that advocates

the application of the methods of the natural sciences to the study of social reality and beyond’. The latter, on the other hand, can be seen as an epistemological position that ‘is predicated upon the view that a strategy is required that respects the differences between people and the objects of the natural sciences and therefore requires the social scientist to grasp the subjective meaning of social action’

1. You repeatedly receive money from someone that says they love you.

2. You see different actions of "being there" of different circumstances, (eg. being picked up at the busstop, calling to see how you are feeling when you are sick, etc).

Example

Plato’s famous allegory of the cave is instructive for making us aware of the root of ontology and epistemology, for it shows how very different perceptions of what constitutes reality can exist. Prisoners in a cave are chained in such a way that they can only see forwards, to a wall, upon which shadows of artefacts, carried by people behind them, are reflected in the light of a fire. The prisoners give names and characteristics to these objects, which, to them, represent reality. Plato then imagines a scene in which one prisoner leaves the dark cave and sees that not only are the shadows reflections of objects, but also that the objects are effigies of reality.

The passage cited above mirrors how some people can come to think in certain ways, which are bound by certain cultural and social norms and parameters, for example those established by disciplines in academia. Any premises built upon the experience of the cave dwellers are certain to differ from those who are on the outside. It is for this reason that we need to be aware of, and understand, that different views of the world and different ways of gathering knowledge exist.