RE: SKOS dodges the identity crisis?

> From: Miles, AJ (Alistair)
> Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 1:46 PM
> Subject: SKOS dodges the identity crisis?
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> I did some more thinking about SKOS, and wrote up an idea at:
> 
> http://esw.w3.org/topic/SkosDev/DodgeIdentity
> 
> I would very much like to know if you think this looks sound, 
> workable,
> reasonable, viable, or not ... all thoughts welcomed :)
> 
> We really have to get this sorted.

On that wiki page you say,
"... So if URIA and URIB do not denote abstract 
concepts, what do they denote? 

Well, what if we say that each of these URIs actually denotes a 
description of a concept? ..."

I agree with this, basically, with a few refinements. 
How about this, each of those URIs are *mapped* to a portion of 
a "specification of a conceptualization"[1].

And it is this conceptualization, or meaning, that denotes the 
concept, not the URI. The conceptualization denotes the concept 
*for the conceptualizer*, in the sense of discriminating it from 
any other concept known to the conceptualizer. Even though the 
conceptualizations of the two agents differ, it may turn out 
that they denote the same thing, just as in the parable of the 
blind men and the elephant, each man has a different 
conceptualization but they all denote the one elephant.

This leads back again to the importance of agency and context.

Recently, nothing explains for me better the importance of 
these ideas than the work of Luc Steels, of the Free University 
of Brussels. References are on my web log: http://kashori.com/

John Black

[1] What is an Ontology? 
http://www-ksl.stanford.edu/kst/what-is-an-ontology.html

> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Al.
> 
> ---
> Alistair Miles
> Research Associate
> CCLRC - Rutherford Appleton Laboratory
> Building R1 Room 1.60
> Fermi Avenue
> Chilton
> Didcot
> Oxfordshire OX11 0QX
> United Kingdom
> Email:        a.j.miles@rl.ac.uk
> Tel: +44 (0)1235 445440
> 
> 
>

Received on Monday, 22 November 2004 15:04:48 UTC