RE: SUO: Re: World's largest individual organism
On 24/8 Bill Burkett commented on my note:
>(i) The observable things that we typically don't interpret as signs (like
>your chair), that are not part of sign systems, don't figure into my
>equation of what "meaning" is - they are extraneous to it. And I'm
speaking
>at meta-level here,
Of course we can only ever talk about non-sign things using signs, and in
discussing meaning in a sense we are using signs at a meta-level, however,
in the final analysis, for me we have to be able to treat non-sign things
as the ultimate referent of meanings wherever possible (see also below).
>(ii) I believe that your categories (A) and (B) as physical phenomena are
>not distinct categories. Science divides the world into categories and
>phenomena based on observer-independent differentia and is also
independent
>of location/space and time.
1. I strongly challenge that any differentia are totally
observer-independent, though of course science tries to make them as much
so as possible.
2. Given that an SUO is aimed at facilitating communication that ultimately
will depend on one person interpreting the signs another has used in the
way intended, it seems to me a properly designed survey asking whether a
physical phenomenon in a defined context is seen as a sign or a non-sign is
a totally valid scientific measure.
3. In my extensive experience of information systems, old and new, good and
bad, thinking about (A)'s as far as possible rather than (B)'s in analysis,
design, and documentation is a vital ingredient to meeting the real user
requirements (e.g. using the sign "Product" rather than "Product number",
"Person" rather than "Employee ID", "Invoice" rather than "Invoice
number"). Of course, there comes a point in design where the identifiers
have to be considered, but my message is delay this a long as possible, and
continue to think of the (A) as primary, and the (B) as secondary. I
believe one of the strengths of much of ontology work to date has been
(possibly unconscious) following of this precept, so lets keep it that way
in SUO.
Yours, Martin
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---------------------- Forwarded by Martin King/UK/IBM on 25/08/2000 09:03
---------------------------
WBurkett@pdit.com on 24/08/2000 20:44:30
Please respond to WBurkett@pdit.com
To: Martin King/UK/IBM@IBMGB, "SUO (E-mail)"
<standard-upper-ontology@ieee.org>
cc:
Subject: RE: SUO: Re: World's largest individual organism
Martin,
Thanks for your additional thoughts. I think comparing our breakdowns is
useful, too, so let me add a few more thoughts.
> To compare my classification with Bill's, his (1) seems close to my (B),
Agreed. Except for the notion of "belief" I think they are the same.
> his (2) to my (C),
Agreed - Sort of. I think your (C) is a subset of the phenomena in (2).
The symbol "poetry" is not involved in the phenomena described by your (C).
> and his (3) with no direct correspondence, but treatable
> as (A)'s, (B)'s, and (C)'s. My (A) does not seem to be covered by Bill's
> set apart from (3) being a very limited special case of an (A).
Agree and disagree. (3) could certainly be treated as an (A) - John noted
the scenario of instrumenting a brain and observing the electrical behavior
thereof. However, (3) can ONLY be treated as a (B) (and, thus, participate
in a (C)) within the mind of a single individual. (This phenomena,
incidentally, is called "unlimited semiosis".) Because it is only
accessible to the person experiencing it, I consider it outside the scope
of
the work we need to do - it doesn't matter to the SUO.
You are also correct that my breakdown doesn't explicitly cover your (A).
There are two reasons for this:
(i) The observable things that we typically don't interpret as signs (like
your chair), that are not part of sign systems, don't figure into my
equation of what "meaning" is - they are extraneous to it. And I'm
speaking
at meta-level here, considering the sign system as the "object language" I
am talking about (I think I got that right - the subject language is used
to talk about the object language??) This is not to say that the
notion/concept of a chair is outside or extraneous to the the SUO as a sign
system.
(ii) I believe that your categories (A) and (B) as physical phenomena are
not distinct categories. Science divides the world into categories and
phenomena based on observer-independent differentia and is also independent
of location/space and time. Since your (B) depends crucially on the
observer, my conclusion is that it is not valid scientific categorization
of
external, real-world phenomena - it's entirely arbitrary.
Bill