SUO: RE: Reductions Among Relations

["John F. Sowa" <sowa@bestweb.net>]

Lee,

Thanks for mentioning this example, which is also pertinent
to the discussion about meaning-preserving translations that
I have had with Jon Awbrey:

JLA> Do you remember this contribution by Adam Pease a while back?
>
AP>>> In a long ago thread, I suggested that the SUO need to support stating

>> > things such as
>> > 
>> > Hamlet the fictional character
>> > Hamlet an edition of the printed play
>> > A performance of Hamlet
>> > A performance of Hamlet captured on video and encoded as a bit stream
>> > The text of Hamlet as character strings
>> > What Fritz Lehmann has called a "conceptual work" - the timeless 
>> > informational content of the play
>> > 
>> > These notions require a well worked out theory of semiotics but this would

>> > have a practical focus rather than being an academic exercise.
>> > 
>> > Adam

JLA>What the primitive informational unit can be, if it is not a sign, escapes

>me.

I agree with Lee.  The term "sign" is more traditional and
shorter than "informational unit".  Whether any signs are or
can ever be "primitive" is an empirical question.

Some observations:

 1. The Hamlet example illustrates the pervasiveness of
    metonomy in ordinary language.  It occurs everywhere,
    in every discussion from the most mundane to the most
    abstruse.

 2. It is important to recognize it, analyze it, and state
    principles for interpreting it.  Ideally, those principles
    should be stated in sufficient precision that they can be
    implemented in automatic recognition procedures.  However,
    doing that in full generality is still a major research
    project.

 3. Metonomy is so valuable for human communication that I
    would not recommend that people stop using it.  Instead,
    the burden is on us as logicians, ontologists, and
    semioticians to formulate principles for interpreting it
    when it occurs (i.e., in almost every sentence).

 4. I intend to take advantage of metonomy in everything and
    anything I write, but I am willing to acknowledge the need
    for clarifying my use of metonomy when it is unclear.  

John Sowa