Re: Cyc Subject Predicate Object

Well, I've had some experience at moderating discussion lists, refereeing between small & independent businesses and academia, as well as with corp giants and government - so will chime in.

I agree with both positions. 

A fairly common and in my view accurate position coming primarily from education related scientists suggests that the guild has become so effective in modern times that it would protect itself against an Einstein or da Vinci from ever being discovered, who today many believe may never make it through public education due to the dysfunction of our institutions. 

One of the most important functions I've gleaned all these years (and value) from the Internet and Web has been to allow access to new ideas, and for intelligent humans to learn at their own speed - indeed the problem has proven to be the lack of an incentive to share knowledge, and the copying of same by the few orgs in the world often in a position to benefit from it, regardless of org type. The real challenge, of which I've dedicated some years to working on, is to manage both quality and quantity while still managing continual learning and work flow in the digital work place. No easy task, but I'm hoping these forums will help us get there.

The advice to Richard to start an MKE community was I think the appropriate path in terms of how the current primitive email lists must work in order to prevent overload, which is threatening the very value of the medium. If I were moderator, and I have been for dozens of similarly quality forums in the past on different topics, I'd restrict the posts on an OWL list to those directly relevant to OWL, including improvements and challenges, with the occasional post/link to related lists (same for an MKE list). 

No doubt some would find both valuable, and no doubt that both would occasionally benefit from cross pollination of ideas and experience. And indeed let us not forget the challenge of adoption relative to the stated mission of the organization- that generally serves well for guidance on such issues. One mistake many academic communities make, which does help to restrict wide adoption and participation from essential contributors, is to focus on careers and conferences. For example I have seen the same conference posts dozens of times in related lists, which frankly irritates me every bit as much as Richard's persistent efforts, and I am frustrated that after all these years we still do not have the ability to filter out duplicates.

In my line of work I am reminded constantly that virtually all R&D sits on a shelf collecting dust. The world needs more who challenge authority, for therein lies most of our progress as human beings. It is not a comfortable task, and it's easy to overdo it, particularly for intelligent and passionate innovators, but where would we be without them?

.02- MM
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: dmurphy@infratecture.com 
  To: Rinke Hoekstra ; Richard H. McCullough 
  Cc: Semantic Web at W3C ; OWL at W3C 
  Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 6:55 PM
  Subject: Re: Cyc Subject Predicate Object


  at the risk of being Unpopular (and acknowledging that i am Uncredentialed), i will go ahead and chime in...

  don't we want to build a Big Tent, here?  shouldn't anyone who has thought Deeply about Reasoning with a Computer be allowed to participate?

  i have been programming computers since 1969 and i think i can tell when someone knows what he is talking about and when he does not.  does anyone doubt that Richard knows about Reasoning with a Computer?

  Sir Tim BL, have your ideas about the Semantic Web been so widely adopted that you can afford to turn down contributions from an Unlikely Ally?

  Jim Hendler, what if Richard's research adds two or three more links to ProfilesInTerror that were not there before?  isn't that worth tolerating MKE?

  Ian Horrocks, what if Richard's ideas suggest an optimization to Cerebra that allows you to process rules 20% faster?  isn't that worth reading through a few extra posts to this list?

  i, for one, welcome Richard's contributions and suggest that if any Reasoner is isomorphic with OWL, that we welcome their contributions to this community.

  life is too short and computers are too feeble,

  delbert

  >-----Original Message-----
  >From: Rinke Hoekstra [mailto:hoekstra@uva.nl]
  >Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 04:55 AM
  >To: 'Richard H. McCullough'
  >Cc: 'Semantic Web at W3C', 'OWL at W3C'
  >Subject: Re: Cyc Subject Predicate Object
  >
  >Dear Richard,
  >
  >Since the discussion about your contributions has been opened-up (yet 
  >again). I would like to join Giovanni in expressing my concern that the 
  >larger body of subscribers to this mailinglist is not particularly 
  >interested in your contributions.
  >
  >Just some statistics: about 40% of the posts to the semantic-web@w3.org 
  >mailinglist in the past 6 days were sent by you, none of which have 
  >received a reply.
  >
  >It would be a shame to see this mailinglist go down in the same way as 
  >the SUO/SUMO mailinglist a few years ago (has it already been 4 years?). 
  >And I wholeheartedly support Giovanni's suggestions.
  >
  >Best,
  >
  > Rinke
  >
  >Richard H. McCullough wrote:
  >> 
  >> I did exactly what you are suggesting - 4 YEARS AGO.
  >> My recent emails constitute a status update, with
  >> new tools that members of this ML can use NOW.
  >> 
  >> But I don't want to SPAM anyone.
  >> Unless I receive some inquiries from this ML,
  >> you won't hear from me again.
  >> 
  >> Dick McCullough
  >> knowledge := man do identify od existent done;
  >> knowledge haspart proposition list;
  >> http://mKRmKE.org/
  >> 
  >> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Giovanni Tummarello" 
  >> <g.tummarello@gmail.com>
  >> To: "Richard H. McCullough" <rhm@pioneerca.com>
  >> Sent: Thursday, February 15, 2007 4:58 AM
  >> Subject: Re: Cyc Subject Predicate Object
  >> 
  >> 
  >>> Richard, are you sure your posts are appropriate in this ML?
  >>> While they might seem on topic, there is no reply nor hint of direct
  >>> interest and they involve what appear to be idiosyncrasies and are
  >>> anyway are hard to follow.
  >>> I think you should open a newsgroup of your own (look into Google
  >>> groups and yahoo) for respect for those who have just interest in what
  >>> the ML is about. the W3C Semantic Web initiative (questions and
  >>> answers related to the standards, announcements of new projects
  >>> (please note that people just anonunce, dont insist on things unless
  >>> they're asked directly and think that the reply interests more) )
  >>> Sincerely
  >>> Giovanni
  >>>
  >>> On 2/15/07, Richard H. McCullough <rhm@pioneerca.com> wrote:
  >>>>
  >>>> 1. Here's my first cut at organizing all those
  >>>> first-level concepts in the Cyc hierarchy.
  >>>> Looks like we should call this one an
  >>>> Entity-Relation-Proposition hierarchy.
  >>>>
  >>>> # <html><xmp>
  >>>> # KEHOME/kb/spo.cyc
  >>>> # Feb/15/2007
  >>>>
  >>>> begin hierarchy Entity-Relation-Proposition;
  >>>> Thing;
  >>>> # entity
  >>>> / Entity;
  >>>> / IndexicalConcept;
  >>>> / Individual;
  >>>> // TemporalThing;
  >>>> /// SomethingExistiing;
  >>>> //// Entity;
  >>>> / Intangible;
  >>>> / PartiallyIntangible;
  >>>> / PartiallyTangible;
  >>>> / TangibleThing;
  >>>>
  >>>> # characteristic
  >>>> / Relation;
  >>>> // FixedArityRelation;
  >>>> /// BinaryRelation;
  >>>> //// Property;
  >>>>
  >>>> # context
  >>>> / Microtheory;
  >>>> # proposition
  >>>> / CycLQuery;
  >>>> / CycLTerm;
  >>>> / DocumentationConstant;
  >>>> / ELSentence-Assertible;
  >>>> / ELTemplate;
  >>>> / ELVariable;
  >>>> / Path-Generic;
  >>>> / PathSystem;
  >>>> / ReformulatorHighlyRelevantFORT;
  >>>> / ReformulatorIrrelevantFORT;
  >>>> / SubLSymbol;
  >>>> / TheTerm;
  >>>>
  >>>> # group
  >>>> / SetOrCollection;
  >>>> // Collection;
  >>>> /// Class;
  >>>> /// CoreConstant;
  >>>> // Set-Mathematical;
  >>>> end hierarchy Entity-Relation-Proposition;
  >>>>
  >>>> begin hierarchy imaginary;
  >>>> Nothing;
  >>>> end hierarchy imaginary;
  >>>>
  >>>> # propositions
  >>>> # Thing has Property = Value;
  >>>> # individual isu class;
  >>>> # species iss genus;
  >>>> (#$Property #$Thing #$Value);
  >>>> (#$isa individual class);
  >>>> (#$genls species genus);
  >>>>
  >>>> # mKR relation CycL
  >>>> nonexistent is Nothing;
  >>>> existent is Thing;
  >>>> # entity is Entity;
  >>>> # characteristic is Relation;
  >>>> # proposition is Proposition;
  >>>> # isu is isa;
  >>>> # iss is genls;
  >>>> #</xmp></html>
  >>>>
  >>>> 2. I'm still looking at the internals of the ERP hierarchy.
  >>>> I've found more Collections, and lots of Type classes.
  >>>> I think all these Type classes have the same error -- using
  >>>> "isu","iss" relations instead of "ismem" relations. I'm not
  >>>> aware of any reason for having these Type classes.
  >>>> My guess, pending further investigation, is that all the
  >>>> Type classes should be removed from the hierarchy.
  >>>>
  >>>> Dick McCullough
  >>>> knowledge := man do identify od existent done;
  >>>> knowledge haspart proposition list;
  >>>> http://mKRmKE.org/
  >>>>
  >>>>
  >>>>
  >>>>
  >>>
  >>>
  >> 
  >> 
  >
  >-- 
  >----------------------------------------------
  >Drs. Rinke Hoekstra
  >
  >Email: hoekstra@uva.nl Skype: rinkehoekstra
  >Phone: +31-20-5253499 Fax: +31-20-5253495
  >Web: http://www.leibnizcenter.nl/users/rinke
  >
  >Leibniz Center for Law, Faculty of Law
  >University of Amsterdam, PO Box 1030
  >1000 BA Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  >----------------------------------------------
  >

Received on Saturday, 17 February 2007 02:51:49 UTC