Re: Disambiguation; keeping the "U" in "URI" (& Documents, Cars, Hills, and Valleys)

[Danny Ayers]
>
> >Manos Batsis wrote,
> >> There is no ambiguity, just incomplete semantics.
> >
> >Incomplete semantics is one of the sources of ambiguity. Filling out
> >the semantics to eliminate ambiguity involves specifying the context
> >of use sufficiently to eliminate all but (at most) one candiate
> >referent.
>
> I think the key may lie in Thomas' remark earlier about 'it only pushing
it
> up a level'. Up a level we have a lot more power.
>
> What if we consider the URI to represent a *set* then the assertions :
>
> A http://www.markbaker.ca/index.html has long hair
> B http://www.markbaker.ca/index.html is hosted in Florida
>
> can be made 'in the wild', in that A & B refer to a different element in
the
> set http://www.markbaker.ca/index.html
>
> If we wish to reason with such statements, then locally we can pull out
the
> element of the set of interest, and give it a local unique identifier (if
> necessary).

I think that this is the old intention vs. extention dichotomy.  Is a thing
known by its definition or by its properties?  In actual practice among
people, both are usually in play.

Cheers,

Tom P