Re: [ontolog-forum] "Constructivism"

[paola.dimaio@xxxxxxxxx]

Hi Chris

I am not going to fuel this argument however I realise I need to defend my statement, at least briefly.
First, a definition. Please read constructive in a broader sense of the word, and not solely as indicating the relevant philosophical, mathematical, art schools of thought

As to your evaluation, he key, as you well know, is context, as well as your own personal perspective

The term 'lethal' applied in medical context has different meaning than in social science context.
A lethal dose or lethal substance is a statement of a medical fact, 

Naming a tool, enviroment or methodology 'lethal'  in my world is making implicit statement
about its destructive nature. (which in turn I distinguish from disruptive, but I am not going to bore you with that)

But of course if you do not abstract the term from the context that is most familiar to you,
you will not see the negative implication in using the word 'lethal' - and that would simply reflect

constructivist in this sense, perhaps
  (hilosophical perspective derived from the work of Immanuel
Kant which views reality as existing mainly in the mind, constructed or
interpreted in terms of one's own perceptions. Note: In this
perspective, an individual's prior experiences, mental structures, and
beliefs bear upon how experiences are interpreted)

Regarding the 'tests', I am afraid that validity of configuration, effectiveness, ability of  natural language expressions to communicate methaphors and concepts, and their influence on behaviour is still left to heuristic evaluation and intuition, although I am working on a method
watch this space

The notion is rooted in 'conflict theory'

To get the idea of where I am coming from 
http://www.sagepub.com/booksProdDesc.nav?currTree=Subjects&level1=700&level2=720&level3=724&prodId=Book9369
(in particular, see the semantics of anger)
And Jake Lunch work 'peace journalism' item below
http://www.mediachannel.org/originals/warandpeace2.shtml



Cheers
PDM

On 1/18/07, Christopher Menzel <cmenzel@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

> The idea is good, and I can join the tool - purely on an
> experimental basis to start with -
> the problem is going to get us all to agree as to what we want to
> say, in terms of content and form
>
> for example, I have a problem with the word 'lethal' as it has non
> constructive implications,

I don't understand what you mean by "(non)constructive".  Could you
clarify?  What tests do you have to determine whether a word is
constructive or not?  And why avoid them?  What do you do if you are
building an ontology for a pharmaceutical company that has introduced
a property called "lethal dose" for a variety of drugs?  Do you tell
them they have to start using a different word?

> I dont use non constructive words, especially in writing (we all
> have our idiosyncrasies  I guess) - can we live with that?

It certainly doesn't seem to me to be an idiosyncrasy that someone
who has to build ontologies in real world domains from existing
terminology can live with.

Chris Menzel


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