RE: SKOS Extensions ... broaderDirect/narrowerDirect ... ?

No comment on why or how to sort out the matter Alistair has raised, but
in case you find it useful, here are some examples of how arbitrary the
"immediate parent" can be.

The first is from EMTREE:

	"cattle		
	     bovids	
	          artiodactyla	
	               ungulate	
				       placental mammals	
				            mammal	
							    vertebrate	

Shown below is the subtly different entry for "cattle" in the CAB
Thesaurus.  These examples illustrate that the concept of hierarchical
level in thesauri is relative, not absolute, and that the choice of
levels is driven by perceived user needs, not theoretical principles.
In other words, the presence of a BT/NT relationship, even if the
convention BT1, BT2, etc. is used to distinguish between levels, does
not indicate what semantic distance separates the pair of linked terms.
In different thesauri, a case could be made for giving the immediate BT
of cattle as ruminants, or as mammals, or as animals.

from CAB Thesaurus (1995 edition):  

	Cattle		
	   BT1   Bos	
	      BT2   Bovidae	
	         BT3   ruminants	
	            BT4   artiodactyla	
	               BT5   mammals	"
	  
The above is an extract, by the way, lifted from my chapter on Thesaurus
Relationships in the 2001 book by Bean and Green on "Relationships in
the Organization of Knowledge"	

Cheers
Stella

*****************************************************
Stella Dextre Clarke
Information Consultant
Luke House, West Hendred, Wantage, Oxon, OX12 8RR, UK
Tel: 01235-833-298
Fax: 01235-863-298
SDClarke@LukeHouse.demon.co.uk
*****************************************************



-----Original Message-----
From: public-esw-thes-request@w3.org
[mailto:public-esw-thes-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Miles, AJ
(Alistair)
Sent: 02 June 2005 19:41
To: public-esw-thes@w3.org
Subject: RE: SKOS Extensions ... broaderDirect/narrowerDirect ... ?



N.B. this does beg the question as to whether skos:broader and
skos:narrower should themselves be transitive, given that everyone will
use them to make their assertions, or should rather not be transitive
themselves but have super-properties that are transitive.

Food for thought.

Cheers,

Al.

---
Alistair Miles
Research Associate
CCLRC - Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
Building R1 Room 1.60
Fermi Avenue
Chilton
Didcot
Oxfordshire OX11 0QX
United Kingdom
Email:        a.j.miles@rl.ac.uk
Tel: +44 (0)1235 445440



> -----Original Message-----
> From: public-esw-thes-request@w3.org 
> [mailto:public-esw-thes-request@w3.org]On Behalf Of Miles, AJ
> (Alistair)
> Sent: 02 June 2005 19:33
> To: public-esw-thes@w3.org
> Subject: SKOS Extensions ... broaderDirect/narrowerDirect ... ?
> 
> 
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> The properties skos:broader and skos:narrower are transitive.
>  This means that in an open world, it's impossible to know 
> whether one concept is the immediate parent of another, which 
> makes e.g. building tree representations hard.  One way 
> around this is to define sub-properties of 
> skos:broader/skos:narrower that are not transitive, and use 
> these to make assertions.  
> 
> Given this requirement, I was thinking of putting a couple of
> properties into the SKOS Extensions Vocabulary [1] called 
> something like 'broaderDirect' and 'narrowerDirect' ... any 
> objections?
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Al.
> 
> [1] http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/extensions/spec/
> 
> ---
> Alistair Miles
> Research Associate
> CCLRC - Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
> Building R1 Room 1.60
> Fermi Avenue
> Chilton
> Didcot
> Oxfordshire OX11 0QX
> United Kingdom
> Email:        a.j.miles@rl.ac.uk
> Tel: +44 (0)1235 445440
> 
> 
>

Received on Friday, 3 June 2005 08:40:18 UTC