- From: pat hayes <phayes@ai.uwf.edu>
- Date: Tue, 15 May 2001 18:17:24 -0500
- To: Miles Sabin <MSabin@interx.com>
- Cc: www-rdf-logic@w3.org
>Leo Obrst wrote, > > Pat is correct, however, in that the quoted material is really in a > > different language and as such is syntactically only a string, > > without known semantics (or only string semantics). > >Hmm ... I agree with that. My only quibble with pat centres on his >statement that quotation, with or without syntactic structure, is of >limited value. If we want to be able to assign an interpretation it's >essential. I agree. I should express myself more carefully. Remember this debate arises in the RDF context. Without reification, RDF consists of conjunctions of ground atoms. Not a very expressive language, to put it mildly. Somewhere much further along a spectrum of formal language richness and utility, reification will probably be very useful. However, RDF has a long way to go before reification should be needed, and it shouldn't be (mis)using reification to get there. Using reification to encode attribution (as in the "Ora says (that)..." examples) is a debateable issue; I concede: I think its better to think of this as more like a propositional attitude or a modality, but maybe reification is workable, if one takes care to avoid the Montague difficulties. But to try to use reification for negation or quantifiers is just plain dumb. Pat Hayes --------------------------------------------------------------------- IHMC (850)434 8903 home 40 South Alcaniz St. (850)202 4416 office Pensacola, FL 32501 (850)202 4440 fax phayes@ai.uwf.edu http://www.coginst.uwf.edu/~phayes
Received on Tuesday, 15 May 2001 19:17:29 UTC