Re: [VM,ALL] Revised scope statement

On Thu, Jun 17, 2004 at 11:10:30PM +0200, Bernard Vatant wrote:
> > > What (simply?) establishes identity is identifier + application context.
> > 
> > I understand you to be saying that the URI "X" identifies
> > something different in the context of Application A and in
> > Application B, in other words:
> > 
> >     The thing identified by URI "X" in Application A is not the
> >     same as the thing identified by URI "X" in Application B.
> 
> Exactly.
>  
> > I'm not sure I understand...
> 
> You are. But do you agree?

This is what I don't understand: If two things are different, why not
give them different URIs?  For example, 

    http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/title

is the "canonical" (i.e., supported by DCMI Namespace Policy)
identifier for dc:title.  It is the Identifier that people are 
supposed to use in their metadata.

On the other hand, one might want to assert that a translation
of the definition of dc:title into Japanese "translates":

    http://dublincore.org/usage/terms/history/#title-003

-- a URI (not yet supported by official DCMI Namespace Policy)
which denotes a specific historical version of dc:title.

The two applications contexts are different ("instance
metadata" as opposed to "document for a translation"), but
the thing referred to is for some practical purposes basically
the same (if you squint hard enough).  However, the fact that
they are not _exactly_ the same thing is reflected in the fact
that those two things are identified with two different URIs.

In effect, I'm having trouble picturing differences which
would be great enough to make one say that, in effect, given
certain circumstances, "URI X" != "URI X", yet not great
enough to assign them different URIs.

Tom


-- 
Dr. Thomas Baker                        Thomas.Baker@izb.fraunhofer.de
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Personal email: thbaker79@alumni.amherst.edu

Received on Friday, 18 June 2004 07:42:09 UTC