- From: Jon Awbrey <jawbrey@oakland.edu>
- Date: Mon, 22 Jan 2001 20:44:05 -0500
- To: Arisbe <arisbe@stderr.org>, Conceptual Graphs <cg@cs.uah.edu>, RDF Logic <www-rdf-logic@w3.org>, SemioCom <semiocom@listbot.com>
- CC: Dietrich Fischer <fischer@DARMSTADT.GMD.DE>, Mary Keeler <mkeeler@u.washington.edu>, Jack Park <jackpark@VERTICALNET.COM>, John F Sowa <sowa@bestweb.net>
¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤ RDF Logic SIG: At the instance of an off-list querent regarding this author's intention, parentage, and state of mind in writing his most recent contributions to the PH-thesis that you find newly instanced here, I find myself instanced to add this new gloss to the preceding instances of the theme in question: instance 'vt' 1 : to illustrate or demonstrate by an instance, 2 : to mention or as a case or example : CITE. [Webster's] Further, in accord with a very common and general, if a sometimes colloquially applied rule for transforming certain types of nouns into verbs, say, whereby "instanced" is easily understood, by any interpreter who choses to do so, as a rough but a brief semantic equivalent to the periphrastic formula "made an instance", the only question of interpretation then remaining is what sense of the noun "instance" might reasonably and/or charitably be expected to make the most fitting contribution of sense to the context in question. So, one may consider this data: instance 'n' 1a : (archaic) urgent or earnest solicitation, 1b : INSTIGATION, REQUEST, 2a : (archaic) EXCEPTION, 2b : an illustrative case, 2c : (obsolete) SIGN, TOKEN, 2d : (obsolete) CIRCUMSTANCE, DETAIL, 3 : the institution and prosecution of a lawsuit : SUIT, 4 : an event that is part of a process or series. [Webster's] Given the inkling, that I imagine most folks hereabouts have probably gathered by now, that one of this author's missions in life is to recycle, to revive, and to reuse archaic and obsolete, but perfectly good senses of words -- think of it as "software re-usability, the early years" -- you may easily suspect that no sense of the term should go unturned in the pursuit of its most fitting meaning. But I will no doubt try again, until I find a way to pose it that works for whatever forms of common sense abilities are the most prevailing ones here. Like I said before, and will no doubt say again: It's a dirty job, but somebody's got to do it. Many Regards, Jon Awbrey ¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤~~~~~~~~~¤
Received on Monday, 22 January 2001 20:46:38 UTC