SUO: Re: Lifecycle Integration Schema
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LIS. Discussion Note 4
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Matthew,
I'm not sure we're done with things yet,
and now I have to learn yet another new
multitude of connotations for the words
"normative" and "informative" -- in the
mean time I'll use "definitive" to talk
about collections of statements that we
can use as logical definitions and I'll
use terms like "comment", "description",
or "example" for the more informal bits
of information constraining the meaning
of a term.
But let me step down a step to these terms:
| abstract_object
|
| An <abstract_object> is a <thing> that does not exist in space-time.
|
| EXPRESS specification:
|
| ENTITY abstract_object
|
| ABSTRACT SUPERTYPE
|
| SUBTYPE OF (thing);
|
| END_ENTITY;
|
| http://www.tc184-sc4.org/wg3ndocs/wg3n1328/lifecycle_integration_schema/lexical/abstract_object.html
| possible_individual
|
| A <possible_individual> is a <thing> that exists in space and time.
|
| This includes:
|
| - things where any of the space time dimensions are vanishingly small,
| - those that are either all space for any time, or all time and any space,
| - the entirety of all space time,
| - things that actually exist, or have existed,
| - things that are fictional or conjectured and possibly exist
| in the past, present or future,
| - temporal parts (states) of other individuals,
| - things that have a specific position, but zero extent in
| one or more dimensions, such as points, lines, and surfaces.
|
| In this context existence is based upon being imaginable within
| some consistent logic, including actual, hypothetical, planned,
| expected, or required individuals.
|
| EXAMPLE. The pump with serial number ABC123, Battersea Power Station,
| Sir Joseph Whitworth, Shakespeare, and the starship "Enterprise" can be
| represented by instances of <possible_individual>.
|
| EXPRESS specification:
|
| ENTITY possible_individual
|
| SUBTYPE OF (thing);
|
| END_ENTITY;
|
| http://www.tc184-sc4.org/wg3ndocs/wg3n1328/lifecycle_integration_schema/lexical/possible_individual.html
It must be clear that there is nothing very definitive or
definitional about the lead off statements in these texts?
At this point I only know the word "thing", which appears to be
an undefined primitive, though we have had a characterization of
how it is intended to be used in particular contexts of discussion.
And we have the constraint on the application of the words that tells us
that things are partitioned into abstract_objects and possible_individuals.
But I have no information that allows me to apply
the criterion of "existing in space and time".
It is always possible that the information is meant to flow
the other way around, and that maybe I should have started
at the bottom of the ordering, if there is a bottom?
Some of the examples only add more difficulties to the mix.
By what sort of decision process can I judge whether the
Starship Enterprise is "imaginable within some consistent
logic, including actual, hypothetical, planned, expected,
or required individuals"? The catch here is not so much
the "imaginable" as it is the "consistent".
At this point I still have to treat "abstract_object" and
"possible_individual" as undefined terms, but as ones that
are constrained in their relative meanings by their declared
logical relations to each other, and also to the term "thing".
It is interesting that we can have these quanta of information
about relations long before we have information about essences.
The classical example of this occurs in axiomatic geometry, where
"point" and "line" are terms that remain undefined in any absolute
sense, and yet are constrained to take up their roles in a relation
that is described by axioms, in this way being "defined in relation"
to each other.
I am also reminded of another relation that John Sowa points out
between his analogous arrays of Abstract and Physical categories:
| Each abstract category on the right of Figure 2.7
| [Figure 2 on the web page] is said to 'characterize'
| the corresponding physical category on the left:
|
| a schema characterizes an object;
| a script characterizes a process;
| a description characterizes a juncture;
| a history characterizes a participation;
| a reason characterizes a structure; and
| a purpose characterizes a situation.
|
| John F. Sowa, 'Knowledge Represntation', p. 75.
| http://users.bestweb.net/~sowa/ontology/toplevel.htm
This is very important, as it brings us to the threshold
of Peirce's sign relations. I will return to it again.
And it bears on the Note that you appended to "thing":
| NOTE 1. Every <thing> is identifiable within a system.
| System identifiers created by other systems and received
| as part of a data exchange may be stored for future reference
| as an identification, referring to the originating organisation
| or system.
Jon Awbrey
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