Space, time and the representation of geographical reality

Abstract

Geographical information science is interesting from a philosophical point of view because the distinctions that its practitioners find themselves compelled to make have important resonances with distinctions that have been proposed in other contexts. An example is the dichotomy between object-based and field-based presentations of geographical data. This paper explores the relationships amongst a set of closely aligned distinctions which have appeared in the literature on both spatial and temporal reasoning in philosophy, cognitive science, geographical science, linguistics and other fields. Any systematic account of such distinctions must inform the construction of a workable ontology for spatio-temporal sciences such as geography.