RE: some notes

> Dictionary definitions are not really definitions in any foundational
sense:
> they are kind of sketches of a meaning which themselves rely on the
> same connected web of shared knowledge (some of it about language
> itself) which they set out to explain. URIs don't have this
> surrounding context of shared beliefs and so on; and in any case,
> URIs are not NL words.

I disagree. Although dictionary definitions do not reflect the same rigor as
a mathematical definition, they certainly provide enough definition to allow
a "common usage" According to http://www.merriam-webster.com/ a
pharmaceutical is defined as a medicinal drug. So even without context, I
should be able to glean enough knowledge to know that using the word
'pharmaceutical' could be used to refer to an aspirin, but not to my dog.
While I certainly do't claim that if we had enough "URI dictionaries" we
could avoid all misuse, abuse, and disagreement, I can't help but think that
it would be beneficial to have registries play an authority role (perhaps
more descriptive than prescriptive). As someone else already stated, isn't
the difference between words and URI's (simply viewed as tokens for the
moment) that while a NL word may have different meanings represented by the
same string (token), we insist that URI's reflect the different meanings by
assigning different strings to each meaning...not so different from what is
used in referencing dictionaries as in pharmaceutical[1], pharmaceutical[2].

I also disagree that 

> NL takes ages to build up meaning through usage,

Certainly language as a whole has taken ages to reach its present state, but
new words pop into common usage overnite, btw. OK, maybe one shouldn't
consider 'btw' a word, but there are plenty examples that are, not all from
the internet/web either. If a group of KB engineers start using some URI
'.../theNewFoo', it will quickly assume some meaning among that group and
any who have a need to converse with that group regarding theNewFoo.

James Lynn
Strategic Coordination - Enterprise Standards
HP Software Services
610 595 4995

Received on Friday, 26 September 2003 12:07:41 UTC