Re: RDF Concepts and fragids

On Sat, Apr 2, 2011 at 11:49 AM, Nathan <nathan@webr3.org> wrote:
> Hmm, I read that differently, "a URI Reference in an RDF Graph", it doesn't
> speak of URIs used outwith of RDF (as in, it doesn't try to say they are or
> are not meaningless, just that you don't know the meaning in RDF), and when
> one does use such URIs in RDF, surely the URI collision comes in to play,
> such that one would write (in RDF):
>
>  <http://example/doc#foo> a :HTMLElement .

Right or wrong, the *ideal* is that a URI means the same thing in
webarch as in RDF. For an RDF spec to suggest otherwise is a violation
of webarch (as I understand it). And RDF is supposed to be the poster
child for webarch. The RDF just puts a bit of formal dressing on top
of what we already want to say; that dressing has to be consistent
with preexisting meaning - it can't modify or transform or "formalize"
it.

Now there are legitimate situations where there may be a divergence,
but the starting assumption has to be what I said above. Without that
we don't have a single global namespace, and without that we don't
have a One Web.

Of course it's easier for the two to coincide when webarch delegates
to RDF, as in the application/rdf+xml registration. But for RDF
Concepts to presume to influence how FYN works for HTML files seems
very subversive to me, and it gives completely the wrong message about
how semantics works. We don't have RDF meaning and non-RDF meaning;
there is just meaning, and RDF is just a tool that helps us sharpen
what we say, like integral calculus or chemical diagrams or any other
formal notation. It doesn't have its own kind of meaning.

(I am using "meaning" and "semantics" in the philosopher's sense, not
in the mathematician's sense. RDF semantics is a mathematical
semantics, so it does not (nor is it supposed to) tell us what
something like dc:creator is supposed to mean. A particular semantics
in the philosopher's sense would be synthesized in the usual
compositional way via a particular satisfying interpretation. I have
nothing against mathematical semantics but it has to be realized it's
never the whole story, unless you're a mathematician.)

It certainly would be possible to divorce RDF meanings of URIs from
webarch meanings - I think this is what Ian and Harry want, and I'm
not dogmatically opposed to it. But that step ought to be done openly,
preferably with the support of the TAG.

It might also be possible to changes webarch meanings to more closely
match what people do and what they want, by updating 3986 and/or
webarch.

Jonathan

Received on Saturday, 2 April 2011 23:17:35 UTC