Meaning & use
ontology
The branch of philosophy that studies the nature of being, existence, and reality.
See it in a sentence
Her dissertation in ontology asked what it truly means for something abstract, like a number, to exist.
The database team built an ontology defining how concepts like "customer" and "order" relate to each other.
A note on using this word
In computer science, "ontology" also means a structured model of concepts and their relationships used to organize knowledge.
Words with a similar meaning
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Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.
Another way to use it
2. noun
In computer science, a formal representation of a set of concepts and the relationships between them.
The search engine used an ontology of medical terms to connect symptoms with related diseases.
Make it your own
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