Re: Agent terminology

Hi Graham,

I think I've been trying to make the same point... I actually think the 
use of agent in provenance ontologies aligns with the use of agent in 
the wider world.


Paul

> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> 	Graham Klyne <mailto:GK@ninebynine.org>
> July 14, 2011 11:47 PM
>
>
> Paul, all,
>
> I'd just note that I think that, for our purposes, widespread usage of 
> a term
> outside the provenance community should trump established usage within 
> the
> community. I think a big part of our goal (if not our entire goal) is 
> to make
> the available work on provenance more widely usable.
>
> #g
> --
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> 	Paul Groth <mailto:p.t.groth@vu.nl>
> July 14, 2011 8:40 PM
>
>
> Hi Reza, All:
>
> I think it's important to note again that Agent is defined in a number 
> of other provenance ontologies and they generally share the same 
> meaning. Wikipedia says it nicely:
>
> Agent may refer to one who acts for, or in the place of, another, by 
> authority from him.
>
> But why do we need agent for provenance. My feeling is to denote 
> *responsibility*.
>
> Who owned the Picasso then?
> Who approved the publication of the document?
> Who can I attribute that quote to?
> Who made a particular decision?
> What party made this ad in a web page?
>
> All these use cases are about responsibility. In order for someone or 
> something to take responsibility they need to be able to do things 
> using their own volition. Agent is a good match for this because it 
> usually refers to a person or organization, which we know have this 
> ability to act on their own. When we use it in the software sense we 
> either mean an intelligent agent (something or to mean a proxy for 
> some other agent (i.e. user-agent in http).
>
>
> In terms of trust, I would prefer that to be another discussion if 
> possible. One of the insights of the Provenance Incubator Group was 
> that provenance can be a platform for trust decisions but provenance 
> should not be intertwined with trust.
>
> Reza, I wonder if the notion of responsibility covers your trust use 
> case?
>
> Thanks,
> Paul
>
>
>
>
>

-- 
Dr. Paul Groth (p.t.groth@vu.nl)
http://www.few.vu.nl/~pgroth/
Assistant Professor
Knowledge Representation & Reasoning Group
Artificial Intelligence Section
Department of Computer Science
VU University Amsterdam

Received on Friday, 15 July 2011 08:09:02 UTC