Re: SUO: Re: Proposed SUO Content Outline
Adam --
Actually, I think you may know that the operative part of my statement
about
representation was "or whatever". I've left a snippet of the original text
to provide
some context. It seems that a significant majority here are convinced that
it just
ain't ontology unless it's represented in a particular form of logic.
It's not that I disagree with this, necessarily - it's more that I want to
focus on content.
In this respect, I hold a view that has been expressed by John and Jon, and
I think others
(who I hope I'm not misrepresenting) that formal representation is
premature before
clear understanding.
I do believe that representation is ultimately important. For me, the
design point of
representation is accessibility and navigability. This is because I
envision
the SUO, and a large universe of ontologies, as a reference utility to
resolve
ambiguities and disjoint semantics among multiple applications. The main
image
I carry in my mind for SUO, and ontologies in general, is a database. But
I wouldn't
make database representation a prerequisite to making progress on issues of
meaning.
Doug
> Douglas,
> I'd like to agree heartily with your comment below about backing up
> suggestions with axioms. I suspect it's a lot easier for people to
> disagree about abstract concepts when using English to describe different
> approaches. There's just too much room for ambiguity and
> misunderstanding. If folks who are suggesting alternate approaches could
> axiomatize those approaches, I suspect we could either reach agreement
more
> quickly, or at the very least, define precisely where differences of
> opinion lie. The latter, in and of itself, would be a very valuable
> scientific result.
>
> Adam
>
>
> >
> >My expectation coming into this group was that an SUO would be used
> >to express these kinds of issues. In general I would like to see us
> >spending less time trying to convince each other of some particular
> >point of view, and more time working on how to reconcile multiple
> >points of view, through axioms (or whatever representation) that
> >articulate what is common, what needs to be differentiated, and for
> >what purpose.
> >