- From: Phillip Lord <phillip.lord@newcastle.ac.uk>
- Date: Tue, 31 Mar 2009 12:28:58 +0100
- To: "Matthias Samwald" <samwald@gmx.at>
- Cc: "Oliver Ruebenacker" <curoli@gmail.com>, "Pat Hayes" <phayes@ihmc.us>, "public-semweb-lifesci" <public-semweb-lifesci@w3.org>
"Matthias Samwald" <samwald@gmx.at> writes: > To use a (still quite naive) physics example: 'Temperature' is a quality of an > object (say, a solution in a petri dish). This quality only inheres in the > solution, but not in a single molecule. I think this is wrong; temperature can be applied to a single molecule. If my physics has not disserted me, I think it can also be applied to a vacuum; i.e. a bit of space with nothing in it. > Rates of change could be described as qualities of qualities (I think > the top-level ontology DOLCE allows this, but it would be difficult in > BFO, for example). It can't be done in BFO, as qualities can't have qualities. You'd have to describe the rate of change as a quality of the thing; so both velocity and acceleration would be qualities of a continuant that is moving over time. > Reaction equations describe stochastic processes, that's why you can > have non-integer molecule numbers I think you can't have non-integer molecule numbers because it makes no chemical sense. Half a molecule is a whole molecule of a different kind. Phil
Received on Tuesday, 31 March 2009 11:29:44 UTC