SUO: RE: Re: Focus and Volume
Jon Awbrey wrote:
>
> Philip Jackson wrote:
> >
> > John Sowa wrote:
> >
> > > But I agree with Phil, that this explanation, which required two
> > > paragraphs to state, should have been included in the original note
> > > by Jon A. As one can see, the original note merely cited the two
> > > KIF formulas, and then it went on to give some history about how
> > > the little Ducky's got their names. See the original:
> > >
> > > http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/suo/email/msg04666.html
> >
> > PJ: What seemed irrelevant to me was all the extra details about
> > the history of
> > the nephew Duck's names, the existence of a fourth newphew duck, etc.
> >
> > PJ: By itself, these extra details would not be objectionable --
> > indeed they can
> > be taken as interesting and entertaining. Yet taken in context
> > with other
> > postings, they start to add up to spam.
> >
> > PJ: A more clear cut case of this seems to be Jon's posting of the
> > myth about
> > how the trickster-god obtained his manhood. So far as I can
> > see, this was
> > basically pure spam -- there was no need to post it to SUO, and
> > it did not
> > contribute anything to SUO.
> >
> > > JS: Bottom line: Examples like these would be fine if nestled among
> > > a continuous discussion thread with the original text at the head
> > > and all the comments placed sequentially on the same page. But when
> > > they come out of the blue (especially without proper explanations),
> > > they can be disconcerting.
> >
> > PJ: Agreed.
> >
> JA:
> The Trickster myth was brought to mind by a strung out series
> of notes that began, I believe, with Pat Hayes' analogizing of
> Merged or Monolithic Ontologies to Universal Novels, followed up
> some time later by some comments from Mike Uschold. This made me
> think of the sort of thing that my high school literature teachers
> might have said, that all good novels are universal novels, but, of
> course, their universality is achieved in a very individual way, and
> not in the way that Pat so justly lampooned. Namely, a universal novel
> is one that evokes universal themes, or "archetypes", as some folks would
> call them. And the topic of "ontological relativity", or to say
> it another
> way, the "comparative and structural analysis" (CASA) of
> ontologies, was one
> of the bits of adhesive that initially trapped me in this
> gadflypaper medium.
> Now, the "Trickster's Ontological Phallus" (TOP) is obviously one
> that could
> never fit into a scientific ontology without undergoing a large measure of
> interpretive work, but the character of the episode that was salient in
> this context was the narrative continuity of the story, a quality that
> seemed to outweigh the minor issues of consistency and plausibility.
> Well, many other thoughts came to mind along these lines, but I do
> not think that I can recover them at the present moment in time.
>
> http://suo.ieee.org/email/msg03801.html
> http://suo.ieee.org/email/msg04649.html
>
=================================
Jon,
I would agree that, depending on how a SUO is formalized and constructed,
some elements of a standard upper ontology could well be expected to appear
as elements, themes or dynamics in a "universal novel", or an "archetypal
universal story / myth". I would also agree that myths have been at least
very important and perhaps essential in helping people develop ontological
frameworks for understanding the world.
Having said that, let's turn to the issue of how your ideas are presented,
and why they may sometimes be justly perceived as "spam".
Your explanation above about the trickster phallic myth is in regard to your
posting:
http://suo.ieee.org/ontology/msg02334.html
which you followed by another posting:
http://suo.ieee.org/ontology/msg02371.html
From the perspective of a SUO reader, both these postings were quotations
about/from mythology without any explanation of their relevance to SUO. The
relevance in your mind to the postings you now cite by Hayes and Uschold was
not obvious or clear. You did not even cite the postings by Hayes and
Uschold in your postings. The reader was left to guess how or if these
postings were really related to SUO, and without an explanation, a reader is
justified in perceiving them as a form of "intellectual spam".
The fact that a reader may perceive such postings as spam, and be annoyed by
them, is your fault, not the readers. Perhaps it is an indication of
intellectual laziness on your part in not providing explanations. In any
case, it is not a problem with the readers "taste", as you have suggested in
your parallel reply to a thread of correspondence between Frank Farance and
me.
In the same way, another example of intellectual spam is the messages that
you've posted which contain only a single line of information, such as "x is
in n".
It is more than difficult enough to read what you write-- you should not
also expect us to read your mind. To the extent that you post messages that
can be regarded as spam, it diminishes rather than increases the motivation
to read what you write.
Sincerely,
Phil Jackson