RE: RE: SUO: Re: Ballot Comment
>Pat,
>
>At 12:53 PM 8/28/2001 -0700, pat hayes wrote:
>>>Pat,
>>>I agree with you that a function that maps things to their
>>>temporal subparts would be better than reifying the temporal
>>>subpart. Thanks also for the reference. I've ordered a copy.
>>>Since creating a temporal subpart doesn't actually conflict with
>>>any axiom in SUMO I don't see the problem that you're pointing out
>>>below.
>>
>>Do you mean, you don't understand it because SUMO doesn't have an
>>conflict? What I don't understand is how you are going to explain
>>to a potential user of SUMO what a 'physical object' is. An
>>ontology isn't just a set of axioms: it is also a perspective on
>>how to extend and utilise those axioms to create other, new,
>>axioms. Users need to be able to understand what the overall
>>perspective is, so you need to be able to say what it is.
>
>Maybe I'm just feeling mischievous today, but this is too good to pass up.
OK, I walked into that one. I shouldn't have used the form of words
"an ontology is....". What I should have said is that a useable
ontology ( in the presumed spirit of the SUO) needs to be more than
just a list of axioms.
Let me try to say what I mean more carefully.
Suppose someone presents you with some axioms, ie a formal ontology.
One might ask them to, purely as a reasonable courtesy, explain in
English (or some other human-readable form) what the axioms are
intended to be about, by way of documentation; particularly if one of
the things you are supposed to be able to do with them is to extend
them by adding other axioms. You might also ask them to say something
about the 'style' they are written in; the basic ontological (in the
informal philosophical sense) presumptions they are based on, the
approach they use to description, and so on. All this, and more,
could be reasonably regarded as an essential part of a
well-documented ontology. However, if the person were to say all this
not as helpful documentation of their intent, but as a *claim* about
the *actual content* of those axioms, then they would be saying
something very different, and much harder to justify. Hence my
earlier message:
> In an earlier message you said "What that English text ought to say
>is that this is what the formal strings are *intended* to mean. What
>they *actually* mean, if anything, is whatever can be inferred by a
>valid first-order reasoner from the axioms that are provided, and
>that is ALL. All the rest is hope and aspirations and hand-waving. "
Pat
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