RE: Question about ontology

 

Hi Paul maybe we're strenuoulsy agreeing on some points! comments
beow. 

On 10.09.2013 12:20, Paul Oude Luttighuis wrote: 

> Hi J, 
> 
>
My reaction inline. 
> 
> Cheers, 
> 
> Paul 
> 
> FROM:
jmcclure@hypergrove.com [mailto:jmcclure@hypergrove.com] 
> SENT:
dinsdag 10 september 2013 19:38
> TO: public-owl-dev@w3.org
> SUBJECT:
RE: Question about ontology 
> 
> Well sure a statement can be actively
or passively stated for instance. And there's no dispute that the
physical organization of a set of triples can be altered without
changing the semantics of its statements (but so what?). 
> 
> That
wasn't the point I was trying to make. 
> 
> I do strenuously dispute
though that you can "turn adjectives nouns and verbs into each other".

> 
> Would you say then that the following pairs of sentences
essentially mean different things? 
> 
> · "Johan and Mary are married."
versus "There is a marriage of John and Mary." 
> 
> · "John drives the
car." versus "The driver of the car is John." 
> 
> · "That is a 30 feet
high house." versus "The height of that house is 30 meters." 
> 
> ·
"The liquid is in a bottle." versus "The liquid is bottled." 
> 
> My
point remains that the lexical category of a word is not essential for
the meaning (concept) behind the word. 
> 
> JMc: Did you miss my very
first statement "Well sure a statement can be actively or passively
stated" ? 
> 
> And I strenuously argue that any ontology that ignores
adjectives and prepositions is seriously, deeply flawed -- such an
ontology makes assertions such as yours ("no difference...(between)... a
relation/predicate and (its) object") almost reasonable! 
> 
> I am not
saying that ontologies should ignore anything. I am just saying that one
should look through (or behind) the lexical category of a word.
Ontologies shouldn't model adjectives, nouns, verbs or any other lexical
category, they should model concepts/units of meaning to begin with. The
words are in there "just" to get the concepts across to humans. Words
are a *VEHICLE* for meaning, not a *CONTAINER* of meaning. The lexical
category of a word it gets from the more or less arbitrary grammatical
context of the rest of the sentence. 
> 
> JMc: C'mon you're ignoring
prepositions as being semantically meaningful in human communication. I
will add that this process of intellectually translating vehicles into
containers ultimately leads to masses of artificial constructs that
further distance the brilliance of ontologists from the common sense of
the general public.
> 
> My problem is that there IS a difference.
Objects are nouns. Subjects are nouns. But predicates can NOT be nouns;
nouns can NOT be predicates. Rather, common nouns connote types of
things: they are but labels for distinguishing generic identities. Nouns
are not candidates for predicates! 
> 
> The only reason why predicates
cannot be nouns is that predicates are semantic and nouns are lexical.
But, nouns can most definitely be used for indicating predicates, as
verbs can. And, preciates can be reified to become objects. From what
you are saying, I understand that you use an intensional paradigm for
looking at the world, like the object-oriented paradigm does. There is
nothing wrong with that, but my point is that that's a *CHOICE*, it's
not "given by nature". It is very well possible (as well as practical)
to do without that choice. 
> 
> JMc: Actually my friend, grammar IS a
given by nature -- if you view 'nature' as that which is already
established prior to each our lives. I find your logic about why nouns
cannot be predicates, refreshingly new -- normally I simply point to the
FACT that statement=s+p+o, and s+o are nouns, so the CONNECTOR between
them canNOT be a noun without rendering the definition essentially to be
statement=noun+noun+noun, the result being completely at odds with our
language and our grammar as developed over a pretty long period. Good
gawd man, ontologists are making up new words even!
> 
> Another point
worth mentioning is that my "choice" is irrelevant in this context. What
I do privately is my business, but whenever I sit down with you to
discuss how to EXCHANGE information in as lossless a manner as possible,
then this "choice" could not be more relevant, it's a decision point
regarding our subsequent exchanges.
> 
> But what do we see as a
consequence of using nouns for predicates? Well, first off, you see
tendencies to define property hierarchies that DUPLICATE noun
hierarchites -- same noun, first upper cased in the noun hierarchy and
then lower-cased in the property hierarchy -- golly how pregnant with
meaning that first letter is made to be! 
> 
> I don't see why this
would be a consequence. I just take the freedom to use that lexical
category for the name of a concept that communicates best in a given
situation. I need no duplication. Why would I? If I have modeled
illness, I have modeled ill. It's the same concept for a start. If a
person has it, I can call him ill. But if a doctor studies it, I'd
probably call it an illness. 
> 
> And even if you think that "ill" and
"illness" are essentially different, you must agree that they at least
share meaning. I'd rather prevent myself from having to introduce
zillions of rules like "IF X has an illness THEN X is ill." 
> 
> "ill"
is an adjective and "illness" is a noun -- obviously both connoting the
same meme. But look how imprecise you're being even just here.... THEN X
is ill .... really? In your grammar-less world, is "ill" a class -- in
which case should it be THEN X is-a ill? Yes, I do readily agree that
there's a class of "all ill things" but, seriously, who talks of "all
ill things"? And what a mess it is to sort out the essential nature of
ABC when ABC is said to be both an X and an "Ill Thing". Rather, I
maintain, the adjectives (each a Class) should be related using some
other property than rdf:type. 
> 
> OK, now you didnt address my point
in this part. And that is that in addition to Class IIlness and Class
IllThings, many would create a property called "illness" so that they
can associate a certain illness with say a Person...
> Nelson_Mandela
illness Respiratory_Congestion... THIS IS STUPID and I see it being done
over and over and over. 
> 
> How can the outcome of a massively bloated
noun-infused property hierarchy be said correct? Ever heard of Occams
Razor? 
> 
> Good that you mention Occam's razor. It supports my point.

> 
> JMc: Well, you're not addressing my essential point: noun-infused
property hierarchies are bad things. Occam's Razor is about trimming the
fat; noun-based property hierarchies which substantially mimic
noun-based class hierarchies are pretty awful on several levels, that
is, such are NOT a best practice. Can we agree on that? If so, then
please take that thought to its logical conclusion, and eliminate as
possible ALL the nouns in property hiearchies - they really don't belong
there.
> 
> And I'll note that at least my metamodel DOES align with
computer science fundamentals: 
> 
> 'object' has-a 'property'
>
'object' is-of-a 'class'
> 
> In my world every defined predicate is a
(physical or virtual) subproperty of either 'has-a' or 'is-of-a' (I'm
still thinking about behavior though). I cannot say the same for most
other ontologies I've examined; sometimes these seem overly invested in
proceeding from dense philosophies than from the (relative) clarity of
our shared language and conceptualizations. 
> thanks/jmc
> 
> In
intensional paradigms, there are upfront assumptions, such as: 
> 
> ·
objects cannot be properties 
> 
> · objects cannot be processes 
> 
> ·
properties cannot be processes 
> 
> My point is: you can perfectly do
without these assumptions and still produce precise (formal) models. In
fact, it is possible to have a single-construct language (that's about
as concise as your meta-model can get) that combines and significantly
extends the expressive power of OWL, SBVR, object-orientation, workflow
models, whatever. The trick is to (1) postpone such assumptions and (2)
introduce contextuality/intersubjectivity. This implies a shift to the
intentional paradigm (with a t, that is, not an s), which is wider that
the intensional (as well as the extensional) paradigm. 
> 
> In doing
so, you don't lose ground, nor precision. Rather reversely, you gain
scalability, managed relativity, and elegance. And, because you can
reintroduce these assumptions into your model whenever you like, you
don't lose expressive power. What you have to give up though, is the
*UPFRONT* requirement that there can be only one-truth-per-model, and
the *UPFRONT* requirement of automatic reasoning. Notice the "upfront".
If you like you can restrict your model so that these properties
reappear. 
> 
> (Yes, we have applied it in practice, for clients. And
no, it is not yet en vogue.) 
> 
> Cheers! 
> 
> Paul 
> 
> thanks /jmc

> 
> On 09.09.2013 23:06, Paul Oude Luttighuis wrote: 
> 
>> Hi J, 
>>

>> I'm afraid that's not so fundamental. We shouldn't over-interpret
natural language grammar (nor physical appearance for that matter) when
it comes to semantics. I can easily juggle around with adjectives, nouns
and verbs and turn them into each other without changing the meaning of
the sentence. Natural language grammar is superficial/superimposed
structure for a large part. 
>> 
>> As much as that I can say that I am
*IN* a marriage (which I am), I can say that some marriage relates me to
my wife. Also, there is no fundamental difference between a
relation/predicate on the one hand and an object on the other. They are
just different perspectives of the same. A marriage is equally a
relation as it is an object. We tend to take them apart, but for
superficial reasons (natural language grammar, or mathematics).
Reification is no exception, it's the rule. Don't we say that we take
*PART* in a relation? 
>> 
>> So, I see no problem in having "full
bottle" as the relation in this example. It relates "empty bottle" and
"liquid". The pouring is the context responsible for defining that
relation. In case we can't express contextuality, I would settle for
seeing it as the third component of the relation. This makes sense (in
this example), because you need "pouring" *FIRST* before you can have
full bottles. 
>> 
>> By the way, by saying that the difference between
*BEING IN SOMETHING* and *TAKING APART IN SOMETHING* is superficial, I
do not say that such distinction is always irrelevant. But, in case I
would feel that this distinction is relevant, I should think about what
makes the difference. This context (the differentiator), though, is
*SPECIFIC*, it's not fundamental. This even holds for the physical
context. 
>> 
>> Cheers! 
>> 
>> Paul 
>> 
>> FROM:
jmcclure@hypergrove.com [mailto:jmcclure@hypergrove.com] 
>> SENT:
maandag 9 september 2013 22:09
>> TO: public-owl-dev@w3.org
>> SUBJECT:
RE: Question about ontology 
>> 
>> Well... If 'part-of' applies to
liquid in a fullbottle, then wouldn't it be true you'd say that some car
is part-of a full-garage? No, some liquid is IN a bottle, and some car
is IN a garage. There's no need to redefine our most fundamental speech
patterns! 
>> 
>> /jmc 
>> 
>> On 09.09.2013 11:52, Paul Oude Luttighuis
wrote: 
>> 
>>> Dear Sybri team, 
>>> 
>>> My first question would be
the question of existence-dependency, in other words: which terms are
needed to define others? In this case it seems to me that "empty
bottle", "liquid", and "pouring" all preceed "full bottle". 
>>> 
>>>
The semantic structure at hand then is: the context of "pouring" defines
"full bottle" in terms of "empty bottle" and "liquid". 
>>> 
>>> In
other words: pouring *IS* not a relation between empty bottle and
liquid, it *DEFINES* such relations. 
>>> 
>>> Such contextuality
however cannot be expressed by OWL-type ontologies. 
>>> 
>>> If you
would however want to stick to the OWL world, then part-of would work
perfectly I guess, but then I would see "pouring" as part-of "full
bottle" as well. There is no upfront semantic reason not to. 
>>> 
>>>
Regards, 
>>> 
>>> Paul 
>>> 
>>> FROM: System Bridge
[mailto:sysbri1@gmail.com] 
>>> SENT: maandag 9 september 2013 13:32
>>>
TO: public-owl-dev@w3.org
>>> SUBJECT: Question about ontology 
>>> 
>>>
Hello, 
>>> 
>>> we are group of PHD students and we would like to ask
you (ontology experts) for help/advice. 
>>> 
>>> We`re trying to make a
simple expert system using ontology as knowledge base. We have come to
few problems and before making any conclusions, we would like to
confront it with you. 
>>> 
>>> We noticed that every explanation and
example we found uses object hierarchy, e.g. OneThing isPartOf
OtherThing or OneThing hasPart OtherThings. We don`t know how to model
process which also causes that resulting object will be assembled from
some other objects. For example: 
>>> 
>>> a) Object Empty bottle 
>>>

>>> b) Object Liquid
>>> c) Process: Liquid will be poured into the
Empty bottle and thus will create some new object Bottle filled with
liquid - see image attached.
>>> 
>>> What we need is to define a
relation "Pouring" that is between liquid and empty bottle. In fact we
don't really need "is part of" relations if there is a way to express
"is part of" implicitly in "Pouring" relation, because it is obvious
that the "Bottle with liquid" was created by "Pouring" the "Liquid" into
the "Empty bottle". Also the direction of "Pouring" is important for
us.
>>> 
>>> So, the question is whether you may help us either by
explaining this particular example or providing us with helpful source
of information how to solve it.
>>> 
>>> Thanks in advance
>>> 
>>> Your
sincerely
>>> 
>>> Sybri team, University of Zilina, Slovakia