Re: Terminology Question concerning Web Architecture and Linked Data

On 8/13/07, Pat Hayes <phayes@ihmc.us> wrote:
> >Suppose Nadia had two email addresses, nadia-work@example.com and
> >nadia-personal@example.com.  She might use each to *directly*
> >identify, respectively, her work and personal email inboxes.  However
> >the organizers of a conference might be free to use either to
> >*indirectly* identify her person.
>
> They are free to use either to refer to her. On the face of it, there
> in nothing to distinguish this kind of reference from any other kind
> of reference, seems to me. What is it, in your view, that makes this
> kind of reference "indirect"?

It's that the conference organizers have no control over, nor insight
into, exactly what the URI identifies.  So any statement made about
what it identifies is guaranteed to be wrong in some contexts.

> >  If owl:sameAs were defined in terms of indirect
> >reference, then you'd be able to make silly declarations such as;
> >
> >   <http://www.number-10.gov.uk/> owl:sameAs
> >      <http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/> .
> >
> >because both of those URIs can be used to indirectly identify the UK
> >government.
>
> No, look, you can't have it both ways. Either 'indirect reference' is
> reference or it isn't.

It is.

> If it is, then this assertion can be true, for
> the reason you give.

It can be true in some contexts, but cannot objectively be true
because an objective observer would see that the membership functions
(from the REST definition of "resource") are different as a result of
the representations returned from each URI being different in
consistent ways over time.

I interpret the definition of owl:sameAs to be objective because it
doesn't say anything about context of use.  Am I mistaken?

Mark.
-- 
Mark Baker.  Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA.         http://www.markbaker.ca
Coactus; Web-inspired integration strategies  http://www.coactus.com

Received on Monday, 13 August 2007 20:03:50 UTC