DOLCE: A Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering (2022)¶
Local reference identifier:
xwkont:ref:dolce-borgo-2022Slug:dolce-borgo-2022Editorial status:candidateCreated:2026-07-01Modified:2026-07-05
Descriptive Metadata¶
| Field | Value | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Title | DOLCE: A Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering | Comprehensive modern restatement of DOLCE theory, "mainly based on the work of Masolo et al. (2003)" per the paper's own text, plus later refinements (roles, DOLCE-CORE). Also standardized as ISO/IEC 21838-3:2023, "Information technology — Top-level ontologies (TLO) — Part 3: Descriptive ontology for linguistic and cognitive engineering (DOLCE)" — same TLO standard family as BFO (Part 2) and TUpper (Part 4). Confirmed via multiple independent standards-body catalog listings (ISO, IEC, VDE, NEN, BSI, AFNOR) 2026-07-05; the standard's own full text was not fetched (paywalled, consistent with xwkont:ref:bfo-2020's ISO/IEC 21838-2 precedent). |
| Creator | Stefano Borgo, Roberta Ferrario, Aldo Gangemi, Nicola Guarino, Claudio Masolo, Daniele Porello, Emilio M. Sanfilippo, Laure Vieu | Confirmed via direct primary-source read (arXiv preprint), 2026-07-01. |
| Contributor | unknown | |
| Publisher | Applied Ontology, IOS Press | |
| Source type | journal article | |
| Version or edition | Applied Ontology, 2022 | |
| Identifier or URL | DOI: 10.3233/AO-210259 (https://doi.org/10.3233/AO-210259); arXiv preprint: https://arxiv.org/abs/2308.01597 |
|
| Access date | 2026-07-01 | |
| Snapshot / Stable identifier | DOI given above serves as the stable identifier; arXiv preprint additionally has its own permanent arXiv ID (2308.01597). | |
| Rights/license | unknown | Not verified in this pass. |
Source Relation Notes¶
This paper is a later, more comprehensive companion to xwkont:ref:dolce-wonderweb-d18 (Masolo et al., 2003) — it explicitly restates and extends the 2003 theory, incorporating later refinements: OntoClean-based role treatment (Borgo et al., 2010; Masolo et al., 2004, both external to core DOLCE — see Citation and Locator Notes), and the 2009 DOLCE-CORE relabeling of endurant/perdurant to object/event. Cite this paper (not the 2003 D18) for any claim about DOLCE's current comprehensive theory, including explicit statements about what DOLCE does and does not formalize.
Rights and License Notes¶
Not verified in this pass. Treat as unknown rather than guessed.
Citation and Locator Notes¶
Recommended citation: Borgo, S., Ferrario, R., Gangemi, A., Guarino, N., Masolo, C., Porello, D., Sanfilippo, E.M., & Vieu, L. (2022). DOLCE: A Descriptive Ontology for Linguistic and Cognitive Engineering. Applied Ontology, IOS Press.
Directly verified 2026-07-01 by fetching the arXiv preprint PDF (arxiv.org/pdf/2308.01597) and extracting text manually (Python zlib stream decompression + TJ-array parsing, since no PDF-text-extraction tool was available in this environment and the WebFetch tool could not parse the compressed PDF streams directly).
Key findings used across crosswalks:
- "DOLCE does not formalize functions and roles" — a direct quotation confirming that DOLCE's Role treatment (as cited in docs/crosswalks/concepts/role.md) comes from DOLCE-driven approaches (Borgo et al., 2010; Masolo et al., 2004), not core DOLCE itself.
- Roles in those DOLCE-driven approaches are "concepts that are anti-rigid and founded" — confirms role.md's OntoClean-based characterization, but the source is external extension literature, not core DOLCE.
- DOLCE-CORE (2009, Borgo & Masolo) relabeled endurant/perdurant to object/event, distinguished by whether they have space or time as their main dimension — relevant context for continuant-occurrent.md.
- Quale confirmed: "the position occupied by an individual quality within a quality space" (e.g., two qualities of the same color shade occupy the same position/quale within the color space, while remaining numerically distinct qualities) — confirms quality.md's Quale definition closely.
- InformationObject appears as part of DUL (DOLCE Ultra Lite), an OWL-oriented extension pattern — not confirmed as the same thing as "DOLCE Lite Plus" cited in docs/crosswalks/concepts/information-artifact.md; the exact relationship between DUL and DOLCE Lite Plus was not confirmed in this pass and needs further checking.
Reused for docs/adr/ADR-0022-reinforce-eight-source-scope-against-self-classification.md (2026-07-05): DOLCE's ISO/IEC 21838-3:2023 standardization (added to this record's Title field above) is direct evidence of self/field-classification as a "top-level ontology" per ISO/IEC 21838-1:2021 §3.20's own definition — confirming ADR-0015's inclusion of DOLCE on the same grounds already used for BFO and TUpper's ISO standing.