The issue seems to me: how important it is capture an accurate
representation of what the information in a system is referring to? (01)
In some cases, it needs to be more accurate than person > employee. For
example, if both HR systems for two companies have employees as a sub-type
of persons, and the companies are merged. And the HR systems are to be
merged. Then merely being an employee is not fine enough grained - one needs
to know which company an employee is an employee of. (02)
My understanding is that one of the threads going though ontology work is
that it provides a representation that helps semantic interoperability by
providing a common representation. So, I would expect, there to be some form
of ontological analysis that reveals that employees are not simply sub-types
of persons, so that when HR systems are merged, one does not get these
problems. (BTW in most large companies there are a variety of legal entities
and the HR department needs to know which employs whom - so this issue would
come out even within a system). (03)
To show that this is not a wholly unrealistic expectation, the original
ontologist's analysis of the ancient Athenian version of employment
(slavery) was as a relative (relation) - not a sub-type. (04)
Aristotle, Categories: SECTION 2, Part 7. "... All relatives have
correlatives: by the term 'slave' we mean the slave of a master, by the term
'master', the master of a slave;" (05)
So by employee we mean employee of an employer? (06)
Regards,
Chris (07)
-----Original Message-----
From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of
matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx
Sent: 19 March 2007 07:50
To: ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Common Logic Controlled English (CLCE) (08)
Dear Duane, (09)
>
> If the original statement was framed within a domain specific
> ontology such
> as an HR department at a company that hires only humans, the
> statement as
> written by John is fine IMO. I inferred nothing more that
> all employees are
> persons. Regardless of the definitions of employee and
> person, the statement
> is true. (010)
MW: I beg to differ. If you take a 4 dimensionalist view, then a
person would be person-for-the-whole-of-his-life, an employee is
just an aggregate of temporal parts of a person - the temporal
parts that were working for a particular organization. Since by
this definition an employee is not a person-for-the-whole-of-his-
life, then employee is not a subtype of person. (011)
> What can be argued is that person and employee are
> terms that have
> limitations however as John noted, that can be fixed by defining such.
>
> I do not see why this is causing so much discussion.
>
> Duane
>
>
>
>
> On 3/18/07 12:45 PM, "Chris Partridge"
> <mail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> > John,
> >
> > If you look at some of the standard textbooks on data
> modelling you will
> > find that:
> >
> > a) They recognise that some systems fudged the distinction
> between employee
> > and role (as you note)
> > b) that it is not a good idea to do it, and
> > c) offer their own way of modelling this.
> >
> > My experience with legacy systems re-engineering is that
> not all (or even
> > many modern) systems make this mistake. But am sure my sample is not
> > representative.
> >
> > See (for example),
> > Data Model Patterns: Conventions of Thought by David C. Hay
> >
> http://www.amazon.com/Data-Model-Patterns-Conventions-Thought/
> dp/0932633293/
> >
> ref=pd_bbs_2/002-8927839-5907206?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174246335&sr=8-2
> >
> > The Data Model Resource Book, Vol. 1: A Library of
> Universal Data Models for
> > All Enterprises by Len Silverston
> >
> http://www.amazon.com/Data-Model-Resource-Book-Vol/dp/04713802
> 37/ref=sr_1_1/
> > 002-8927839-5907206?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174246404&sr=1-1
> >
> > (As an aside, I seem to recall Matthew West's 'High Quality
> Data Models
> > paper' notes this - or something similar as a common
> modelling error -
> > Matthew can confirm whether this is the case.)
> >
> > To return to an old topic: one can regard employee as a
> role or a temporal
> > stage of a person - depending upon your 3D/4D inclinations.
> A description of
> > the 4D approach is in my book.
> >
> >
> http://www.amazon.com/Business-Objects-Re-Engineering-Computer
> -Professional/
> >
> dp/075062082X/ref=sr_1_1/002-8927839-5907206?ie=UTF8&s=books&q
> id=1174246688&
> > sr=1-1
> >
> > Regards,
> > Chris
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > [mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf
> Of John F. Sowa
> > Sent: 18 March 2007 14:27
> > To: [ontolog-forum]
> > Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Common Logic Controlled English (CLCE)
> >
> > Peter,
> >
> > That's the way most businesses handle their personnel:
> >
> >> Since when is an "employee" a sub-type of "person"?!
> >
> > However, one of the major mining companies used mules
> > to pull ore out of the mines. (They didn't want to use
> > anything that might create sparks that could trigger
> > an explosion if there were any stray gasses around.)
> >
> > When they computerized their system, they assigned
> > employee numbers to the mules. For that company, you
> > could generalize the ontology in either of two ways:
> >
> > 1. Assume that Employee is a subtype of Animal.
> >
> > 2. Assume that Person could include nonhuman animals.
> >
> > But in any case, whenever you say X is a subtype of Y,
> > you mean "every X is a Y." That is all it says.
> >
> > John
> >
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>
> --
> **********************************************************
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