John:
I like your comments about Esperanto and Hebrew. I think that you point
you make can be applied by analogy to ontology as well: the questions
for me then are:
- how does an artifice such as a formally modelled ontology (cf
Esperanto) become used in a manner that grows organically as an
interoperable means of discourse (cf post-1945 Hebrew)?
- in the other direction, how does an informal "language" ("folksonomy",
community tagging etc, cf orally transmitted Hebrew/Yiddish before 1945)
become codified in a manner that provides stability, predictability and
interoperability without losing its organic character? (01)
Peter (02)
-----Original Message-----
From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John F.
Sowa
Sent: 07 March 2007 21:18
To: [ontolog-forum]
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] [ontology-summit] PLEASE, PLEASE!! (03)
Duane, Keith, and Peter, (04)
I support the principle of collaborative tagging. My only
complaint was about calling the result a folksonomy. (05)
Following is the URL and abstract of an article that describes
the principles involved: (06)
http://arxiv.org/abs/cs.DL/0508082
The Structure of Collaborative Tagging Systems (07)
Scott Golder, Bernardo A. Huberman (08)
Collaborative tagging describes the process by which many users
add metadata in the form of keywords to shared content. Recently,
collaborative tagging has grown in popularity on the web, on
sites that allow users to tag bookmarks, photographs and other
content. In this paper we analyze the structure of collaborative
tagging systems as well as their dynamical aspects. Specifically,
we discovered regularities in user activity, tag frequencies,
kinds of tags used, bursts of popularity in bookmarking and a
remarkable stability in the relative proportions of tags within
a given url. We also present a dynamical model of collaborative
tagging that predicts these stable patterns and relates them
to imitation and shared knowledge. (09)
I think that the word "folksonomy" trivializes an extremely
important principle. In fact, it is essentially the underlying
mechanism that has produced the vocabulary and syntax of every
natural language on earth. (010)
Artificially constructed languages, such as Esperanto, are
similar to natural languages, but Wittgenstein was completely
disgusted by them. He didn't explain his distaste in detail,
but I suspect that he felt they lacked the richness, subtlety,
and "life" of a true natural language. (011)
However, I think a language such as Esperanto could evolve into
a natural language after a generation or two of widespread use.
Something like that happened to Hebrew after its revival as
a living language in Israel. Then it took on a new life and
evolved into something quite different from Biblical Hebrew. (012)
John (013)
_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/
Subscribe/Config:
http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontolog-forum/
Unsubscribe: mailto:ontolog-forum-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Shared Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/
Community Wiki: http://ontolog.cim3.net/wiki/
To Post: mailto:ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (014)
_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/
Subscribe/Config: http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontolog-forum/
Unsubscribe: mailto:ontolog-forum-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Shared Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/
Community Wiki: http://ontolog.cim3.net/wiki/
To Post: mailto:ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (015)
|