- From: Jon Awbrey <jawbrey@att.net>
- Date: Thu, 09 Aug 2007 05:44:40 -0400
- To: Arisbe <arisbe@stderr.org>, Inquiry <inquiry@stderr.org>, Ontolog <ontolog-forum@ontolog.cim3.net>, Semantic Web <semantic-web@w3.org>
o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o ROL. Note 2 o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o JA = Jon Awbrey JS = John Sowa Re: Re: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/2007-08/msg00194.html CC: Arisbe List, Inquiry List, Ontolog Forum, SemWeb List John, Let's look again at the concept of "inter-operability" that you outlined last time. I'm a little hesitant about calling it that just yet, and would prefer to call it "inter-translatability" until I know more about it. JS: Consider the following three notations: JS: 1. The first-order subset of Peirce's Algebra of Logic of 1885. JS: 2. The first-order subset of Frege's Begriffsschrift of 1879. JS: 3. Any of the three concrete notations in Annex A, B, or C of the Final Draft International Standard of Common Logic of 2007. I am told by people who apparently understand these things that having not just 2 but 3 distinct languages on the Rosetta Stone was crucial to finding the key, but let me first consider a far simpler example of the ilk that I know from practical endeavors. Something that I spent a goodly portion of the (19)80's doing, and in such primitive computing circumstances that I had to write all of the necessary utilities myself, was to translate an articula x_1 of one language, medium, or type L_1 (written x_1 : L_1) into an articula x_2 of another language, medium, or type L_2 (written x_2 : L_2), perform a computation on x_2 : L_2 that would yield an articula y_2 : L_2, then translate y_2 : L_2 back into the corresponding y_1 : L_1. Here is a diagram of the process: x_1 : L_1 ----------> x_2 : L_2 | | | | | | | | V V y_1 : L_1 <---------- y_2 : L_2 The more solid arrows indicate the actual computations. The more dashing arrow, the road not taken, as it were, suggests the virtual computation, in effect exchanging x_1 : L_1 for y_1 : L_1 or transforming x_1 : L_1 into y_1 : L_1. Breaking here ... Jon Awbrey JS: My claim was that any statement s1 expressed in notation #1 can be translated to a statement s2 in notation #2 (and vice-versa) in such a way that s1 and s2 have exactly the same truth values in all possible models (in Tarski's sense) or states of affairs (in Peirce's sense). JS: Furthermore, s1 can be translated to a statement s31 in notation #3, and s2 can be translated to a statement s32 in notation #3 in such a way that s1, s2, s31, and s32 have the same truth values in all possible models or states of affairs. JS: That is what I meant by interoperability: any person with any philosophical views of any kind can, if he or she wishes, map any statement from #1 to #2, or from #2 to #1, or from #1 to #3, or from #2 to #3 -- and back to the original language -- in such a way that the truth values in the source and target languages are identical. JA: I think that I follow the business of inter-translatability between two formal languages, L_1 and L_2, sparing the italics until we are in Rome, translations that preserve the models, the whatevers that their various signs are supposed to be about. But I can't help sensing that there is just something wrong with the conclusions that you jump to in that last paragraph. JA: Part of the problem may be that I do not consider Peirce's AOL of 1885 to be the ''ne plus ultra'' of his logic. There are bits and hints of deep insights and radical innovations in his Logic of Relatives (1870) that are either missing or not as explicit in his papers of the 1880's. And there are features of his work on Logical Graphs that reform basic conceptions of what we mean by logic in the first place. JA: Your last paragraph echoes once again the wish for an ontologically or a philosophically neutral language. Whether that is a will o'th' wisp or not, as I suspect that it is, it does not describe the facts of the matter in this case. There are definite ontological assumptions -- in particular those affecting the role of "individuals" in the "universe" -- that one takes for granted in the systems that devolve from Frege, but those same assumptions are quite expressly examined and not assumed in the intentions that inform Peirce's calculi for his Logic of Relatives. JA: So if you are claiming merely that you can attach meanings to Peirce's language in a way that makes it say the same thing as the meanings you attach to some other thinker's language, then fine, I guess that might be possible, and the fact that you can interpret them so might even be a significant property of the languages and their relationship. But I would not go so far as saying that these languages are saying the same things, because that equivalence is relative to a pair of choices that you made in equating them. Your reading would have to be reductive on one side of the balance in a way that it's not on the other side of it. o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o inquiry e-lab: http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/ ¢iare: http://www.centiare.com/Directory:Jon_Awbrey getwiki: http://www.getwiki.net/-UserTalk:Jon_Awbrey zhongwen wp: http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jon_Awbrey http://www.altheim.com/ceryle/wiki/Wiki.jsp?page=JonAwbrey wp review: http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showuser=398 o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o~~~~~~~~~o
Received on Thursday, 9 August 2007 09:48:35 UTC