- From: Jeff Heflin <heflin@cse.lehigh.edu>
- Date: Thu, 23 May 2002 14:57:20 -0400
- To: www-rdf-logic@w3.org
> "R.V.Guha" wrote: > > Jeff Heflin wrote: > > > First of all, I think the problem with the Cyc ontology is it is too > > big. Semantic Web ontologies should be small and modularized. > > > > Second, in order to avoid making every user learn logic and study > > every > > ontology, I envision "ontology certification authorities." These > > organizations will consist of logicians who make sure that an > > ontology > > is correct, summarize it and give it a seal of approval. Users can > > then > > freely pick and choose these ontologies with some confidence that > > they > > will behave as they expect. Note, users are still free to create > > their > > own ontologies and to use uncertified ontologies. Anyway, I think a > > variation of this solution is viable. > > > > > Jeff, > > If we can't make use of large ontologies like Cyc or TAP, which could > provide wonderful launchpads for bootstrapping the whole enterprise, > we should seriously re-examine our approach. I do understand that some > AI communities have reservations about aspects of KBs such as Cyc, > but they do represent a significant commitment of resources which > should be usable by the SW. I think reusing exisiting ontologies is a good thing. I'd just like to see the Semantic Web versions of Cyc released in much smaller components, so someone can use part of it without having to buy into the whole thing. BTW, I like the idea of TAP, but the same comment applies. Why do I need the baby products stuff if all I want is the sports stuff? Each domain should be a serparte ontology that I can pick and choose from. > I would also like to plead against the use of concepts such as > "ontology certification authorities" staffed by logicians. If the > infrastructure we build is so hard to understand that we need > professional logicians to approve it before it is safe for consumption > by others, it will be sad. I also don't see a bunch of logicians > understanding medicine or law or ... well enough to provide a seal of > approval of an ontology of that topic. I can just imagine the state of > Kansas approving an ontology which set the value of pi to be 3 ;-). > But seriously, an approach that relies on this kind of certification > process as part of the infrastructure is antithetical to the net ... > it reminds me too much of central planning. I disagree. Trust on the Web is commonly handled by digital certificate authorities such as Verisign. I'm proposing an ontology equivalent to such authorities. You can take them with a grain of salt, but they'll give many people a nice warm fuzzy. Just to be clear, I did not suggest that every ontology would have to be approved by an authority (that would certainly go against the nature of the Web). I only meant that ontologies designed for mass public use could benefit from being certified, because that would give users a comfort level without having to double-check that buying into the ontology didn't mean they have to give away their first-born. One other thing, I agree about the danger in staffing such organizations entirely with logicians, they would have to include domain experts as well. Jeff
Received on Thursday, 23 May 2002 14:57:23 UTC