Re: SUO: Universal Time, other universals, and cultural context
>"Bernard Vatant" <bernard@universimmedia.com> stated:
> > >>> My deep conviction - and I hope it's shared by many people in
>this forum -
> > >>> is that any ontology is deeply rooted in a language and
> > >>> cultural context, and cannot be easily exported to other contexts.
> > >>
>Pat Hayes thinks:
> > >> My deep conviction is exactly the opposite. If the SUO reflects any
> > >> linguistic bias then it will be the less useful for it, which is one
> > >> reason why NL intuitions should be avoided, or at any rate treated
> > >> skeptically.
> > >
> > On 16.05.2001 15:56 Uhr, "David Whitten" <whitten@lynx.eaze.net> wrote:
> > > I'm not sure which side my deepest convictions lie.
> > > I think an ontology is not the same as a world view.
> > > a world view is deeply rooted in a language and cultural context.
> > > an ontology is a set of propositions.
> > >
> > > a proposition may have language and cultural context embedded in it.
> > > Consider a proposition stated by someone from a fatalistic, deterministic
> > > culture.
> > > Consider a proposition stated by a rigorously informal 'mystical' culture
> > > that believes all experience is wheels within
>wheels/dynamically redefined.
> > >
> > > I expect these two propositions would have a different 'meaning', even if
> > > they both purport to describe the same 'event' at some 4-D location.
> >
> Bill Andersen <andersen@ontologyworks.com> stated:
>
> > I don't think I agree with much of this at all. Call me a purist, but no
> > logical theory or set of propositions *is* an "ontology". An Ontology
> > (big-O) is an inventory of the things that one takes to exist. A
> > proposition (the kind of thing capable of bearing a truth value) is one of
> > those things that one finds in some folks Ontologies.
> >
> > An "ontology" (small-O) is the term commonly misused to name the latter
> > concept. It may have a logical expression, in which case the name is OK,
> > but this needs to be kept separate.
>
>Hmm. in thinking about it, I realize that I have something more attached
>to the word "ontology" (small-O) than just a set of propositions, so I
>may need to rephrase/back-off from my earlier definition.
>
>A theory, to me, is a set of propositions.
>
>An ontology, to me, includes
>a set of facts (connectives with relations and constant names and functions)
>a set of rules (for-all/there-exists statements with variables/quantifiers)
>a taxonomy of facts (constant-names) ordered with
>structural predicates like instance-of/class-of/has-a.
Just for the record, I call all of these assertions or axioms or
sentences, and would use KIF to write them all. The distinctions are
not of any semantic importance (though they may be practically
important, I understand.)
>A well-defined model theory suitable for logical inference.
>
>Conceptually, at least, an ontology is closed under logical inference.
Ah, that is what is usually called a (logical) theory. I think it is
useful to have a term for a set of sentences accepted as true which
is NOT closed under logical inference. Theories tend to be infinite,
and therefore tricky to put on computer disc files.
Pat
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