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Re: [ontolog-forum] Common Logic Controlled English (CLCE)

To: <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: <matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 19 Mar 2007 14:08:32 -0000
Message-id: <808637A57BC3454FA660801A3995FA8F04EBFAED@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Dear Adrian
In following this discussion, I'm starting to wonder why modelling seems so difficult to get right. 
 
MW: One of the problems is that there is not necessarily only one "right" way to model something. For example, if you use the 3D paradigm, then because a person is wholly present at each point in time, then each employee is a person. Of course you how have to distinguish roles from natural kinds, which just means there is no ontological free lunch. So what is right following one paradigm is wrong following another. 

One thought is that part of the difficulty stems from the old relational database habit of simply deleting things that are no longer true.  As in -- if Fred moved from Dept A to Dept B, delete "Fred is in Dept A".   It seems that, for new databases,  it would be affordable and productive to record that Fred was in Dept A from 20070101 to 20070201, and in Dept B from 20070202 onwards. 
 
MW: It is certainly true that many databases were designed on a "current state" basis, throwing history away by changing records rather than creating new ones. Even now, it is unusual to find systems that have a systematic approach to managing change, but rather ad hoc approaches have been taken as particular requirements become important. 

Another thought is that we should somehow take into account what present and future applications are going to do with the data.  This supplies context and usage examples that can help to sort out whether  Employee is a subtype, a role, and so on.  In other words, take the purpose of the modelling into account.  As John Sowa and others have pointed out, natural language evolves through analogous usage. 
 
MW: In practice I think there are two sorts of data model, what I would call Conceptual Data Models. These are aimed at providing a view independent of use (if you like an ontological view). There are then application data models that are a restricted denormalisation optimised to meet the information needs of a particular application. These are what most data models are today. Actually, Chris P will say in a minute that looking at existing applications is quite enough to show what something like an employee is (I think he has already given some examples).

A third thought is that it may help to express prototypes of at least some of the applications in executable English**, and to debug the model using that approach. 
 
MW: This is just another way of creating a model, and would be able to tell us if the model was valid, not if it was accurate.

>From your experience of modelling, does any of this make sense? 
 
MW: I think that an ontological analysis of existing systems and requirements for new systems is absolutely necessary for domain related ontology development.

                                                 Thanks,   -- Adrian

**Internet Business Logic (R)
A Wiki for Executable Open Vocabulary English
Online at www.reengineeringllc.com    Shared use is free

Adrian Walker
Reengineering


On 3/19/07, matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx <matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Dear Duane,


>
> 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.

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.

> 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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> --
> **********************************************************
> Sr. Technical Evangelist - Adobe Systems, Inc.           *
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> Blog: http://technoracle.blogspot.com                    *
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