Ontology. Understanding existence .

 Ontology is a branch of philosophy that deals with the matters related to existence  , it may seem a waist of time to research such a fundamental characteristic  that  is  attributed to every know entity to us , such as people , animals , objects , phenomena , actions , etc.  
  Rather then questioning the existence of entities , ontology tries to describe and translate in a theoretical language the characteristics that makes us define a entity as existent or not. This branch of philosophy also studies the way in which humans perceive existence . 

  Can we state that  our understanding  of existence as objective or subjective? Can we state that the way in which we perceive existence is 100% accurate all the time ? Why do people perceive the existence of certain entities in a different way? Ontology tries to give a answers  to each of the questions above , over time , within this branch of philosophy , two main ideological currents aroused , each of them giving us a different answer for the perception of  existence : 

  1. The materialist statement : Its followers claim that  existence is the result of the whole of the entities with a material body from the universe , human perceive a entities with their senses (hearing , touch , smelling,etc) , those validating their existence. 

  This concept tries to neglect the way in which our senses  perceive certain entities from our environment , its very well known the fact that illnesses , and many other medical conditions in general , and especially those who fall in the spectrum of mental disorders , diminishes our sensors capacity to paint a accurate image of the entities we come in contact with . 

2. The immaterial statement : Tries to highlight the capital importance that our thought process and generally our mental framework have in our understanding of existence and of the environment . If we agree with this statement we take the following factors in consideration when we talk about human  understanding of existence: age , mental health , education and  physical disabilities .

   Age is a very important factor when it comes to our knowledge of existence , we perceive objects in different ways depending on our age .  For example , we can notice a huge difference when it comes to our knowledge of a car at the age of 5 , when we usually see it as a thing with wheels and the way we perceive it a the age of 20 when we see it as a complex system of mechanical components . 

   In both cases we can observe a huge difference in the knowledge of a entity , especially when it comes to its characteristics and components. Mental health and disabilities have a huge influence on a individual's perception of the environment in which he lives , even a common cold can make some of our senses nonfunctional and those limiting ability to correctly analyze the entities that we come in contact with , often receiving wrong  data about our environment . It is very well know the fact that metal illnesses can limit a individual's capacity to have a balanced relation with the environment . We can state the fact that reality is created in our minds and we translate it in the social world trough our behavior , way of thinking , gestures , etc . 

  As I mentioned earlier , the second current states that our perception of reality starts at our mental level and is exteriorized in the social world trough our behavior. 

 When we state that a entity exists we don't assume that it dosen't share common characteristics with other entities from the universe , or that all of its characteristics are exclusive to it . In order for a entity to be set apart from others it must have at least a particular characteristic that dosen't share with any other entity.

  As a conclusion we can state that existence can be labeled as both subjective and objective but the manner in which each individual perceives  it is purely subjective.

Ethics : Determining the rightfulness of human actions.

 

Ethics is a branch of the science of Philosophy that tries to determine if a human action , behavior or costume can be considered right or wrong. 

  This science sparked a series of controversies that root their origin in the following statement : Can we make a ethical judgement in a purely objective way? If we take in consideration the statement that tells us that we are the product of our experiences , we might come to the conclusion that objectivism itself is a artificial concept. 

  The objective perspective forces us to not use our personal value scale ,which is homogeneous mixture between our genetic setup and personal experiences, being the validation tool of our mental framework . 

   When we analyze things from a objective perspective we assimilate a foreign value scale in our attempt to conduct the validation process , this value scale is the reflection of the most high rated values of the society which a shared by a big number of its members.  

   Individuals often face difficulties when they have to internalize this values scale and make abstraction of the one that they inherited from the environment in which they developed , often the two scales having a very different set of values incorporated in them .

  As I mentioned earlier , validation is a key step of ethical judgement , the result of this judgement must take the form of a single , clear , generally know value (good , bad ; right , wrong ; beautiful , ugly , etc.) . As humanity evolved over the course of history , groups designed prohibitive laws which banned members from doing specific actions or adopting a certain of behavior . 

   We can state that the first sings of ethical thinking are most clearly noticeable at the moment of apparition of primitive normative systems. Ethic principles translate in to laws , norms and rules , if we take the general ethic principle of general good it translates in to laws that ban crimes , stealing , corruption , etc.

   As human economic activity evolved from hunting and agriculture to services and industry , so did ethics , translating its principles in to rules that assure social balance within a economic sector. 

    Ethics slowly developed a more pragmatic side named Deontology , which is the branch of ethics that regulates every human profession , being a collection of rules that are intend to limit any unproductive practices that may cause material or spiritual losses . 

  If we take a moment to analyze the historical development of ethics we notice that in Antiquity and the Middle Ages there was a very fine line between it and religious morality , we can state that there was in fact no real border between this two , ethics being assimilated as a theological discipline . 

    Nowadays ethics is viewed as a distinctive discipline , as a result of secularization in many of the world's states , even so , ethics still analyzes many subjects that are common to the science of theology .  Laws are the tool used by ethics to translate its principles , ideas , theories in to our day to day lives , all of this can be grouped in a couple of categories :

1.  Laws that are based  on religious believes.

2.  Secular laws.

3. Prohibitive laws.

4. Descriptive laws.

5. Laws for internal organization.

6. General laws.

7. Temporary laws.

  A collection of laws make up a normative/law  system , the features that laws have are the result of a series of influences such as : population structure , history , environment , religion , economy , etc. Because of this we can't find two states in the world that share exactly the same laws , but we can find regions in which we find law typologies that have a high distribution . 

  In this case ethics serves as a framework for the design of a normative system , the general ethic principles that a society hold will be translated in the laws of the state.

   As a conclusion we can state that ethics is a crucial component of a society's framework , it is a dynamic set of principles that members use in their analysis of events and in the judgment of people , they vary over time , constantly being influenced by a series of factor that decide if they go out of use or survive for the next generation to use.