- From: Seth Russell <seth@robustai.net>
- Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 16:49:28 -0700
- To: "pat hayes" <phayes@ai.uwf.edu>
- Cc: <www-rdf-logic@w3.org>
From: "pat hayes" <phayes@ai.uwf.edu> > >From: "pat hayes" <phayes@ai.uwf.edu> > > > > > But whatever you call it, the point is that the *logical* syntax in > > > this case is NOT the triples, but these more complicated structures > > > that are being implemented as sets of triples. So we need to somehow > > > specify the rules for what counts as being well-structured (not every > > > set of triples will be) and we will probably need a few > > > datastructuring primitives (like end-of-chain markers, cf. Lisp NIL.) > > > In other words, we will have to do a little work. Just a tad, but we > > > will need to do it. Sorry if that's not anarchic enough. (There isnt > > > anything odd or exotic about all this, let me emphasize: its is just > > > ordinary bread-and-butter datastructure design. We really do teach it > > > to our undergraduates.) > > > >Yes triples combine to form more complex structures. The individual triples > >that compose those larger structures cannot be isolated and mean anything. > >But it is a slippery slope as to where you draw the line ... and i think > >that is true of any kind of logic that deals with reality. > > Most (all?) of the logics I know draw this particular line very > sharply, so I don't see it as very slippery at all. Obviously you dont see the slope .. oh well! > >In other words > >it is the behavior of the entire graph (model) that has meaning, not an > >individual piece. > > Well, scrub round 'behavior' (graphs don't behave. At best, an > interpreter of a graph might behave, but thats not the meaning.). Ok point taken: Graph+interpreter yields behavior. > And > the basic idea of 'language' is that the meaning of a complex > statement can be somehow composed from the meanings of its parts. > (Thats what people often call the principle of compositionality, and > it applies to things like diagrams and maps as well as text.) Well I think there are a number of 20th century semanticist that would dispute that rather vigourously. But my point is that if you have a system where graph+interperter yields behavior, then the easiest way to predict the behaviro of the system after you remove selected statements is to run the interperter on the mutated graph. I don't see where the principal of compositionality comes into play. The interrelated linguistic statements in a system are not like a pile of bricks ... nor will they ever be, regardless of the language. Me thinks such a requirement is an absurbity. > > The simplest case of this that I can think of is the > >concept 'give' ... {John gave candy to Mary} .... I have coded this in > >tripels for you amusement [1]. It is just this kind of conceptual > >dependency (as Shank called it) that triples do well. > > I dont see that triples do it particularly *well*. They can do it, > but so can almost anything that can encode directed graphs. Well actually triples will outperform fixed place predicates in a distributed KB like the Semantic Web. (See Stephen Reed's post today about CycL) One reason is that we can add slots to concepts rather easily (see [1]) without breaking the whole structure, but to add a term to a fixed place predicate we need to rewrite all the old instances. Doing that is absolutely not practical in the Wild West of the Web. [1] http://robustai.net/mentography/conceptualDependency.gif Seth
Received on Friday, 18 May 2001 19:54:53 UTC