Barry Smith

University at Buffalo
National Center for Ontological Research
  • University at Buffalo
    Department of Philosophy
    Biomedical Informatics
    Neurology
    Computer Science and Engineering
    Distinguished Professor, Julian Park Chair
  • National Center for Ontological Research
    Administrator
  • Università della Svizzera Italiana
    Institute of Philosophy (ISFI)
    Visiting Professor (Part-time)
University of Manchester
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 1976
APA Eastern Division
CV
Buffalo, New York, United States of America
  •  228
    This paper takes the form of a series of sketches of 19th century Austrian political and intellectual history, allied with a number of more general reflections designed to contribute to our understanding of some of the peculiar characteristics of Austrian thought, particularly Austrian philosophy and economics, in the period in question.
  •  227
    Tracking Referents in Electronic Health Records
    with Werner Ceusters
    Studies in Health Technology and Informatics 116. 2005.
    Electronic Health Records (EHRs) are organized around two kinds of statements: those reporting observations made, and those reporting acts performed. In neither case does the record involve any direct reference to what such statements are actually about. They record not: what is happening on the side of the patient, but rather: what is said about what is happening. While the need for a unique patient identifier is generally recognized, we argue that we should now move to an EHR regime in which a…Read more
  •  227
    Ontological relations
    with Ulf Schwartz
    In Katherine Munn & Barry Smith (eds.), Applied Ontology, Walter De Gruyter. pp. 219-234. 2008.
  •  226
    A Formal Theory of Substances, Qualities, and Universals
    with Fabian Neuhaus and Pierre Grenon
    One of the tasks of ontology in information science is to support the classification of entities according to their kinds and qualities. We hold that to realize this task as far as entities such as material objects are concerned we need to distinguish four kinds of entities: substance particulars, quality particulars, substance universals, and quality universals. These form, so to speak, an ontological square. We present a formal theory of classification based on this idea, including both a sema…Read more
  •  226
    Referent tracking (RT) is a new paradigm, based on unique identification, for representing and keeping track of particulars. It was first introduced to support the entry and retrieval of data in electronic health records (EHRs). Its purpose is to avoid the ambiguity that arises when statements in an EHR refer to disorders or other entities on the side of the patient exclusively by means of compound descriptions utilizing general terms such as ‘pimple on nose’ or ‘small left breast tumor’. In thi…Read more
  •  225
    Protein-centric connection of biomedical knowledge: Protein Ontology research and annotation tools
    with Cecilia N. Arighi, Darren A. Natale, Judith A. Blake, Carol J. Bult, Michael Caudy, Alexander D. Diehl, Harold J. Drabkin, Peter D'Eustachio, Alexei Evsikov, Hongzhan Huang, and Others
    The Protein Ontology (PRO) web resource provides an integrative framework for protein-centric exploration and enables specific and precise annotation of proteins and protein complexes based on PRO. Functionalities include: browsing, searching and retrieving, terms, displaying selected terms in OBO or OWL format, and supporting URIs. In addition, the PRO website offers multiple ways for the user to request, submit, or modify terms and/or annotation. We will demonstrate the use of the…Read more
  •  225
    Philosophie und biomedizinische Forschung
    with Bert R. E. Klagges
    Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Philosophie 30 (1). 2005.
    Die bahnbrechenden wissenschaftlichen Ergebnisse der letzten Jahre erzwingen eine neue philosophische Auseinandersetzung mit den Grundkategorien der Biologie und der benachbarten Disziplinen. Insbesondere die Anwendung neuer informationstechnischer Mittel in der biomedizinischen Forschung und die damit verbundene, kontinuierlich zunehmende Datenflut sowie die Notwendigkeit, ihrer Herr zu werden, erfordern ein konsequentes Nachdenken darüber, wie biologische Daten systematisiert und klassifizier…Read more
  •  225
    Abstract: We propose a dichotomy between object-entities and meaning-entities. The former are entities such as molecules, cells, organisms, organizations, numbers, shapes, and so forth. The latter are entities such as concepts, propositions, and theories belonging to the realm of logic. Frege distinguished analogously between a ‘realm of reference’ and a ‘realm of sense’, which he presented in some passages as mutually exclusive. This however contradicts his assumption elsewhere that every entit…Read more
  •  224
    On the ontology of functions
    with Stefano Borgo and Riichiro Mizoguchi
    Applied ontology 6 (2): 99-104. 2011.
    This special issue of Applied Ontology is devoted to the foundation, the comparison and the application of functional theories in all areas, with particular attention to the biological and engineering domains. It includes theoretical and technical contributions related to the description, characterization, and application of functions.
  •  224
    Switching Partners: Dancing with the Ontological Engineers
    with Werner Ceusters
    In Thomas Batcherer & Roderick Coover (eds.), Switching Codes: Thinking through Digital Technology in the Humanities and the Arts, University of Chicago Press. pp. 103--124. 2011.
    Ontologies are today being applied in almost every field to support the alignment and retrieval of data of distributed provenance. Here we focus on new ontological work on dance and on related cultural phenomena belonging to what UNESCO calls the “intangible heritage.” Currently data and information about dance, including video data, are stored in an uncontrolled variety of ad hoc ways. This serves not only to prevent retrieval, comparison and analysis of the data, but may also impinge on our ab…Read more
  •  222
    Interdyscyplinarne perspektywy rozwoju, integracji i zastosowań ontologii poznawczych
    with Joanna Hastings, Gwen A. Frishkoff, Mark Jensen, Russell A. Poldrack, Jane Lomax, Anita Bandrowski, Fahim Imam, Jessica A. Turner, and Maryann E. Martone
    Avant: Trends in Interdisciplinary Studies 7 (3): 101-117. 2016.
    We discuss recent progress in the development of cognitive ontologies and summarize three challenges in the coordinated development and application of these resources. Challenge 1 is to adopt a standardized definition for cognitive processes. We describe three possibilities and recommend one that is consistent with the standard view in cognitive and biomedical sciences. Challenge 2 is harmonization. Gaps and conflicts in representation must be resolved so that these resources can be combined for…Read more
  •  221
    Dalla metafisica classica all'informatica medica
    In Smith Barry (ed.), Ontologia, , 154--158, Naples: Guida. pp. 154-159. 2003.
    In un articolo comparso sul Wall Street Journal del 13 novembre 2oi:n viene descritto il modo in cui i computer potrebbero essere utilizzati al fine di allertare i responsabili della salute pubblica in relazione ad eventuali problemi provocati dal bioterrorismo. L'autore nota come gli attacchi biologici sarebbero probabilmente contraddistinti da picchi statistici negli acquisti senza ricetta medica di rimedi per specifici disturbi di tipo comune e come i dati che riguardano tali acquisti possano…Read more
  •  221
    Dieses Buch betritt Neuland. Es ist eine Einführung in das neue Gebiet der angewandten Ontologie, jenem multidisziplinären Arbeitsgebiet, in dem Philosophen gemeinsam mit Informatikern und Vertretern der jeweils thematischen Wissenschaftsbereiche, in unserem Fall mit Biologen und Medizinern, daran arbeiten, wissenschaftliches Wissen informationstechnisch zu repräsentieren. Es zeigt, wie Philosophie eine praktische Anwendung findet, die von zunehmender Wichtigkeit nicht nur in den heutigen Lebens…Read more
  •  221
    The development of ontologies for the purposes of data curation is an important element in modern-day data and information sciences. Unfortunately, much of the work on these applied ontologies is associated with a relativist or conceptualist point of view, according to which ontologies represent (for example) the concepts in the minds of human beings. The paper describes a series of problems with such views, and defends an alternative realist interpretation.
  •  220
    The International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health provides a classification of human bodily functions, which, while exhibiting non-conformance to many formal ontological principles, provides an insight into which basic functions such a classification should include. Its evaluation is an important first step towards such an adequate ontology of this domain. Presented at the 13th Annual North American WHO Collaborating Center Conference on the ICF, 2007.
  •  219
    Equipped with the ultimate query answering system, computers would finally be in a position to address all our information needs in a natural way. In this paper, we describe how Language and Computing nv (L&C), a developer of ontology-based natural language understanding systems for the healthcare domain, is working towards the ultimate Question Answering (QA) System for healthcare workers. L&C’s company strategy in this area is to design in a step-by-step fashion the essential components of suc…Read more
  •  218
    Six questions on the construction of ontologies in biomedicine
    with Anand Kumar, A. Burgun, W. Ceusters, J. Cimino, J. Davis, P. Elkin, I. Kalet, A. Rector, J. Rice, J. Rogers, and Others
    Report of the AMIA Working Group on Formal Biomedical Knowledge Representation 1. 2005.
    (Report assembled for the Workshop of the AMIA Working Group on Formal Biomedical Knowledge Representation in connection with AMIA Symposium, Washington DC, 2005.) Best practices in ontology building for biomedicine have been frequently discussed in recent years. However there is a range of seemingly disparate views represented by experts in the field. These views not only reflect the different uses to which ontologies are put, but also the experiences and disciplinary background of these exper…Read more
  •  217
    It
    In Rudolf Haller & Wolfgang Grassl (eds.), Language, Logic and Philosophy, Reidel. 1980.
    A brief study of the logical, linguistic, psychological and ontological problem of ‘impersonalia’, which is to say of assertions such as ‘it’s raining’ or ‘es blitzt’ which seem to have no subject. Such assertions cause problems not only for defenders of traditional subject-predicate views of assertive sentences, but also for those, such as Frege, who defended a view in terms of functions and arguments.
  •  217
    Referent Tracking of Portions of Reality. Docket No. 1097.015A (USPA 2009055437)
    with Werner Ceusters and Shahid Manzoor
    In U.S. Patent Application, Us Patent Office. 2008.
    Management of information is facilitated by unambiguously tracking portions of reality over time. To track the portions of reality, a referent tracking system is used. The referent tracking system is able to communicate with other tracking systems and/or tradition information systems. Errors in the referent tracking system are detected and corrected to maintain actual representations of the portions of reality.
  •  216
    Abstract: We propose a view of vagueness as a semantic property of names and predicates. All entities are crisp, on this semantic view, but there are, for each vague name, multiple portions of reality that are equally good candidates for being its referent, and, for each vague predicate, multiple classes of objects that are equally good candidates for being its extension. We provide a new formulation of these ideas in terms of a theory of granular partitions. We show that this theory provides a …Read more
  •  216
    OBCS: The Ontology of Biological and Clinical Statistics
    with Jie Zheng, Marcelline R. Harris, Anna Maria Masci, Yu Lin, Alfred Hero, and Yongqun He
    Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Biomedical Ontology 1327 65. 2014.
    Statistics play a critical role in biological and clinical research. To promote logically consistent representation and classification of statistical entities, we have developed the Ontology of Biological and Clinical Statistics (OBCS). OBCS extends the Ontology of Biomedical Investigations (OBI), an OBO Foundry ontology supported by some 20 communities. Currently, OBCS contains 686 terms, including 381 classes imported from OBI and 147 classes specific to OBCS. The goal of this paper is to pres…Read more
  •  215
    Formalisms such as description logics (DL) are sometimes expected to help terminologies ensure compliance with sound ontological principles. The objective of this paper is to study the degree to which one DL-based biomedical terminology (SNOMED CT) complies with such principles. We defined seven ontological principles (for example: each class must have at least one parent, each class must differ from its parent) and examined the properties of SNOMED CT classes with respect to these principles. O…Read more
  •  214
    The Neurological Disease Ontology (ND) is being developed to provide a comprehensive framework for the representation of neurological diseases (Diehl et al., 2013). ND utilizes the model established by the Ontology for General Medical Science (OGMS) for the representation of entities in medicine and disease (Scheuermann et al., 2009). The goal of ND is to include information for each disease concerning its molecular, genetic, and environmental origins, the processes involved in its etiology and …Read more
  •  214
    On carcinomas and other pathological entities
    with Anand Kumar, Werner Ceusters, and Cornelius Rosse
    Comparative and Functional Genomics 6 (7/8). 2005.
    Tumors, abscesses, cysts, scars, fractures are familiar types of what we shall call pathological continuant entities. The instances of such types exist always in or on anatomical structures, which thereby become transformed into pathological anatomical structures of corresponding types: a fractured tibia, a blistered thumb, a carcinomatous colon. In previous work on biomedical ontologies we showed how the provision of formal definitions for relations such as is_a, part_of and transform…Read more
  •  213
    L’ontologie de la realité sociale
    with John Searle
    In P. Livet & R. Ogien (eds.), L’Enquête ontologique, du mode de l'existence des objets sociaux, Editions Ehess. pp. 185--208. 2000.
    Part 1 of this exchange consists in a critique by Smith of Searle’s The Construction of Social Reality focusing on Searle’s use of the formula ‘X counts as Y in context C’. Smith argues that this formula works well for social objects such as dollar bills and presidents where the corresponding X terms (pieces of paper, human beings) are easy to identify. In cases such as debts and prices and money in a banks computers, however, the formula fails, because these are cases of what he calls ‘free-st…Read more
  •  213
    The future of ontologies
    In Terminology, Ontology and their Implementations, Springer Nature. 2023.
    We have now reached the point at which cloud computing and other types of advanced infrastructure are bringing about a situation in which knowledge objects can be delivered in an efficient manner to hose who need to consume them. And just as highways were the infrastructure necessary for a manufacturing economy, serving as the arteries along which raw materials and manufactured goods coming in from all directions could flow, so we believe that ontologies will in the future provide an important p…Read more
  •  212
    New desiderata for biomedical terminologies
    In Katherine Munn & Barry Smith (eds.), Applied Ontology: An Introduction, Ontos. pp. 83-109. 2008.
    It is only by fixing on agreed meanings of terms in biomedical terminologies that we will be in a position to achieve that accumulation and integration of knowledge that is indispensable to progress at the frontiers of biomedicine. Standardly, the goal of fixing meanings is seen as being realized through the alignment of terms on what are called ‘concepts’. Part I addresses three versions of the concept-based approach – by Cimino, by Wüster, and by Campbell and associates – and surveys some of t…Read more
  •  212
    We propose an ontological theory that is powerful enough to describe both complex spatio-temporal processes (occurrents) and the enduring entities (continuants) that participate in such processes. For this purpose we distinguish between meta-ontology and token ontologies. Token ontologies fall into two major categories: ontologies of type SPAN and ontologies of type SNAP. These represent two complementary perspectives on reality and result in distinct though compatible systems of categories. The…Read more
  •  212
    OmniSearch: a semantic search system based on the Ontology for MIcroRNA Target Gene Interaction data
    with Huang Jingshan, Gutierrez Fernando, J. Strachan Harrison, Dou Dejing, Huang Weili, A. Blake Judith, Eilbeck Karen, A. Natale Darren, and Lin Yu
    Journal of Biomedical Semantics 7 (1): 1. 2016.
    In recent years, sequencing technologies have enabled the identification of a wide range of non-coding RNAs (ncRNAs). Unfortunately, annotation and integration of ncRNA data has lagged behind their identification. Given the large quantity of information being obtained in this area, there emerges an urgent need to integrate what is being discovered by a broad range of relevant communities. To this end, the Non-Coding RNA Ontology (NCRO) is being developed to provide a systematically structured a…Read more
  •  210
    ARGOS policy brief on semantic interoperability
    with Dipak Kalra, Mark Musen, and Werner Ceusters
    Studies in Health Technology and Informatics 170 (1): 1-15. 2011.
    Semantic interoperability requires the use of standards, not only for Electronic Health Record (EHR) data to be transferred and structurally mapped into a receiving repository, but also for the clinical content of the EHR to be interpreted in conformity with the original meanings intended by its authors. Accurate and complete clinical documentation, faithful to the patient’s situation, and interoperability between systems, require widespread and dependable access to published and maintained coll…Read more