Issue pfps-11 Re: Comments on informal meaning of the RDFS vocabulary

At 16:03 29/01/2003 -0500, Peter F. Patel-Schneider wrote:
>From: Brian McBride <bwm@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
>Subject: Re: Comments on informal meaning of the RDFS vocabulary
>Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2003 19:49:54 +0000
>
> > At 08:42 29/01/2003 -0500, Peter F. Patel-Schneider wrote:
> >
> > [...]
> >
> >
> > >Well, if one really believed RDF Schema, then the model-theoretic 
> behaviour
> > >of RDF should abide by whatever is said in rdfs:comment value.  For
> > >example,
> >
> > The following example clarifies the question very well.  Thanks.
> >
> >
> > >         ex:Cretan rdf:subClassOf ex:Person .
> > >         ex:Cretan rdfs:comment "All Cretans are liars" .
> > >
> > >would mean that the model theoretic consequences of
> > >
> > >         ex:John rdf:type ex:Cretan .
> >
> > The text in:
> >
> >    http://www.w3.org/TR/rdf-schema/#ch_comment
> >
> > is:
> >
> > [[
> > A triple of the form:
> >
> > R rdfs:comment L
> >
> > states that L is a human readable description of R.
> >
> > ]]
> >
> > What text suggests that there is any *model theoretic* consequences of the
> > natural language interpretation of L?
>
>The fact that the same wording is used to describe the meaning of rdf:type,
>etc.

I don't see this myself, but I'm not sure that further discussion will help 
clarify it further for me.

Summarizing then:

We agree that the schema document uses the same form of words for 
specifying, for example, rdf:type for which there are semantic conditions 
expressed in the model theory document, and say rdfs:comment for which no 
(or very much weaker) semantic conditions are expressed in the model theory 
document.

You are concerned that this might mislead a reader into thinking that there 
are model theoretic consequences that are not specified in the semantics 
document as illustrated in the Cretan example given above.

I have recorded this as issue:

   http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/RDFCore/20030123-issues/#pfps-11

for the WG to consider.

Please feel free to correct misunderstandings in the summary.

Brian

Received on Wednesday, 29 January 2003 16:38:13 UTC