Ron,
You are still missing the point of the foundation ontology. It provides
the conceptual vocabulary to specify the meanings of type of things like
geographical entities. It will not be necessary to have an exhaustive list
of instances, only a few well-known instances of each category is needed to
make the meaning clear.
The methodology would have to be agreed to by the design team before the
main work starts. That should take, I estimate, a week for a preliminary
workshop open to all participants, assuming preparatory discussions.
Disagreements are settled by voting. Anyone who can't agree to the adopted
method can drop out of the project.
I don't doubt that specialized ontologies can be developed by communities
of interest as well as by individuals. But unless they are mapped to a
common foundation ontology, they will not be able to interoperate with
accuracy. Mappings that are only used for highly error-tolerant tasks such
as search, presenting a human with a list of possibilities, will be easier
to create but can be useful only in such limited applications. For
automated reasoning in error-intolerant applications, post-hoc mapping to
achieve the required level of accuracy will be more costly than building a
new ontology in the same domain. And one will still be left with the
n-squared complexity of creating multiple such mappings, as opposed to order
of n for creating new interoperable ontologies by reference to a common
foundation ontology. (01)
Pat (02)
Patrick Cassidy
MICRA, Inc.
908-561-3416
cell: 908-565-4053
cassidy@xxxxxxxxx (03)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-
> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ron Wheeler
> Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2008 8:56 AM
> To: [ontolog-forum]
> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Semantic Web shortcomings [was Re: ANN:
> GoodRelations - The Web Ontology for E-Commerce]
>
> You are describing an open source project where each member "who is
> interested" puts in his/her 2 cents and the core group decides what
> gets
> committed.
> This is difficult to fund with taxpayers' money since there is no one
> who can be held accountable and no organization who can commit to
> delivering a pre-defined deliverable.
>
> I suspect that while we wait for some rich, disinterested party to come
> up with $1,000 per item (number tossed about earlier) with no concern
> for the scope, budget, timeline, qualification of participants, etc. we
> will produce a lot of subject specific ontologies that have to be
> integrated.
>
> The GoodRelations ontology will likely be very helpful to me at some
> point and I am going to have to accept what compromises are part of the
> bargain just as I do when I select an open source package as the basis
> of an application that I am building.
>
> I know that if I pick up a "foundation ontology" that includes a
> geographical section, I am going to have to expend some effort on it if
> I want to include every town in Canada where my client has a store. If
> it was prepared by a European or Asian group, I may have more to do
> than
> if the project leader is from Transport Canada or CN Rail.
>
> I doubt if the GoodRelations ontology and anyone's geographical
> ontology
> is going to cause me a lot of integration problems.
>
> OTOH I have done enough with open source to understand that the
> selection of components has a direct bearing on the amount of work that
> you have to do and you have to do your due diligence carefully.
> We will depend on the groups preparing the ontologies to do their jobs
> well and to form alliances with other groups to deal with conflicts and
> boundary conditions.
> We will depend on forums like this to do the peer review and to provide
> references of combinations that work and ones that do not.
>
> Eventually, "ontology stacks" will arise similar to LAMP, where there
> is
> a general agreement that the ontologies are "compatible" to some well
> understood level.
>
> At least I hope that this will be true.
>
> Ron
>
> Patrick Cassidy wrote:
> > Ron -
> > I thought the point was clear, but I will clarify anyway:
> > [RW} > I can see how this group would collapse into jurisdictional
> disputes.
> >
> >> Who gets to define the medical ontology - drug companies, medical
> >> equipment companies, HMOs, hospitals, WHO, etc.?
> >>
> > Any member of the project who is interested. Membership in any
> working
> > group should be fully open - no one can feel 'left out' of anything.
> > You also seem to focus on a lot of specialized concepts, but that
> is not
> > the purpose of developing a common foundation ontology. A foundation
> > ontology will contain representations of the most basic primitive
> concepts
> > with which all the specialized concepts can be created as
> combinations of
> > the basic concepts. That is the path to interoperability - agree on
> a basic
> > set of concepts with which you can specify all the specialized
> concepts of
> > interest to you, and in that manner everyone can define the
> specialized
> > concepts however they consider it appropriate, using the primitives
> that are
> > agreed on. By using the same set of primitives it does not matter
> how much
> > people disagree on the logical representation of any specialized
> term; it is
> > the logical representation that specifies the intended meaning, and
> > different representations of a specific term by different groups are
> not the
> > same concept in a merged ontology of two specialized groups: they
> will have
> > different names (different namespace prefixes for those terms) and
> different
> > logical structure. The relations between the two - similarities and
> > differences - will be immediately evident from a comparison of the
> logical
> > structures. If the logical structures are different, the terms mean
> > different things. If they are intended to represent the same
> instances,
> > then the two different definitions constitute different theories of
> that
> > type of entity, but this does not create a logical contradiction
> within the
> > merged ontology, because the different theories are isolated within
> > different contexts in the merged ontology. The two systems can still
> > communicate, but in communication the fact that they have different
> theories
> > will have to be taken into account, and the differences will need to
> be
> > isolated in order for comparisons to be made. If this sounds
> complicated,
> > it is only what is absolutely necessary for accurate communication:
> the
> > automated systems are *forced* to do what people *should* do when
> > communicating - precisely define terms and account for different
> > assumptions. It is also a mechanism for recognizing different
> assumptions,
> > and can lead to one or both disagreeing groups to change their
> definitions.
> >
> > Ontologies that are developed separately cannot be merged into a
> single
> > consistent ontology without an effort comparable to the effort of
> building a
> > new similar ontology from scratch. This is a consequence of the need
> for
> > the merging agent (person or machine) to actually **understand** the
> > meanings of the terms to be merged. Machines can't, so it is
> necessarily a
> > labor-intensive task for one or more experts. From observing
> ontology work
> > for over a dozen years, it is abundantly clear to me that waiting for
> a
> > common ontology to emerge from multiple specialized ontologies is
> hopeless
> > unless a properly funded task finds the common basic terms and
> relates the
> > different ontologies through those terms. Funding a common
> foundation
> > ontology is unavoidable, and the only question in my mind is how many
> > trillions of dollars will be wasted before some agency finally takes
> that
> > insignificant financial risk.
> >
> > Pat
> >
> > Patrick Cassidy
> > MICRA, Inc.
> > 908-561-3416
> > cell: 908-565-4053
> > cassidy@xxxxxxxxx
> >
> >
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-
> >> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ron Wheeler
> >> Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 7:22 PM
> >> To: [ontolog-forum]
> >> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Semantic Web shortcomings [was Re: ANN:
> >> GoodRelations - The Web Ontology for E-Commerce]
> >>
> >> Patrick Cassidy wrote:
> >>
> >>> John,
> >>> Concerning your point:
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>> The best designs are developed by small groups. After they have
> >>>> proved their value on at least one important application, a
> >>>>
> >> committee
> >>
> >>>> can evaluate them, note missing or inadequate features, and polish
> >>>>
> >> up
> >>
> >>>> the details.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>> This may well be true of foundation ontologies, though a
> >>>
> >> foundation
> >>
> >>> ontology is different enough from other artifacts to give one
> doubts
> >>>
> >> about
> >>
> >>> any analogies. Even if it is true, it is not inconsistent with
> >>>
> >> development
> >>
> >>> by a large group (50-100 participants), since each part of the
> >>>
> >> ontology
> >>
> >>> beyond the top level or two is likely to be the focus of a small
> >>>
> >> subgroup,
> >>
> >>> and the group as a whole would serve the function of the
> "committee"
> >>>
> >> to be
> >>
> >>> sure that the work of the subgroups integrates with everything else
> >>>
> >> and can
> >>
> >>> handle the applications of interest to the whole group.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >> I can see how this group would collapse into jurisdictional
> disputes.
> >> Who gets to define the medical ontology - drug companies, medical
> >> equipment companies, HMOs, hospitals, WHO, etc.?
> >> Software engineering belongs to who?
> >> What about process control - Equipment suppliers, system
> integrators,
> >> engineers?
> >> Transportation - carriers, travel agents, shipping companies,
> >> governments?
> >> Homeland Security - can you imagine the FBI adopting an ontology set
> up
> >> by Scotland Yard or the KGB or the Chinese Army let alone the CIA or
> >> Pentagon? If the FBI went along what would be the resistance from
> state
> >> and municipal police?
> >>
> >> How is the funding to be divided up? So much per term and
> relationship
> >> defined?
> >>
> >> What about the funding agencies/companies - do they get a final say?
> >> What if the ontology does not meet their needs, will they continue
> to
> >> fund it once they realize that their needs are not being met?
> >>
> >> What are the language(computer and human) choices for expressing
> >> ontologies?
> >> Who is responsible for translation between computer languages and
> >> between national languages?
> >>
> >> My ontology for process control or homeland security could (and
> should)
> >> be very different from someone else's since we will view objects and
> >> relationships differently and will need different results.
> >>
> >> I think that ontologies will be developed as small packages and
> >> application designers will have pick the namespaces that they
> require
> >> for their needs.
> >>
> >> Sometimes this will result in new merged ontologies being published.
> >> Some ontologies will be abandoned as better ones appear.
> >>
> >> The focus should be on identifying ontologies as they emerge,
> >> commenting
> >> on them and providing peer review to improve quality.
> >> The development of tools to support this process and the use of the
> >> ontologies as they arise is a much better place for funding to be
> >> focused.
> >>
> >> Ron
> >>
> >>
> >>> Pat
> >>>
> >>> Patrick Cassidy
> >>> MICRA, Inc.
> >>> 908-561-3416
> >>> cell: 908-565-4053
> >>> cassidy@xxxxxxxxx
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>> -----Original Message-----
> >>>> From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-
> forum-
> >>>> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John F. Sowa
> >>>> Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 2:20 AM
> >>>> To: [ontolog-forum]
> >>>> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Semantic Web shortcomings [was Re:
> ANN:
> >>>> GoodRelations - The Web Ontology for E-Commerce]
> >>>>
> >>>> Ron,
> >>>>
> >>>> Just a comment about standards:
> >>>>
> >>>> > My understanding is that most of the "best" standards have come
> >>>> > about through a consensus between the major commercial players
> >>>> > with the active (frequently funded) participation of the
> academic
> >>>> > community.
> >>>>
> >>>> The important caveat is that committees are terrible at design,
> >>>> but they're very good at evaluation. There are many proverbs and
> >>>> anecdotes about that point:
> >>>>
> >>>> - Too many cooks spoil the broth.
> >>>>
> >>>> - A camel is a horse designed by committee. (This is a slur on
> >>>> camels, which are very well designed for their environment.)
> >>>>
> >>>> - Fred Brooks' _Mythical Man Month_, in which he observes that
> >>>> OS/360 would have been far better designed by a group of
> >>>> about a dozen designers instead of 150.
> >>>>
> >>>> The best designs are developed by small groups. After they have
> >>>> proved their value on at least one important application, a
> >>>>
> >> committee
> >>
> >>>> can evaluate them, note missing or inadequate features, and polish
> >>>>
> >> up
> >>
> >>>> the details.
> >>>>
> >>>> A prime example is FORTRAN, which was designed by a group of
> >>>> "academics"
> >>>> who happened to be employed by IBM (at a time when IBM had a
> >>>>
> >> sufficient
> >>
> >>>> monopoly to throw money at researchers who weren't making a
> >>>>
> >> measurable
> >>
> >>>> contribution to the bottom line).
> >>>>
> >>>> There were a few programming languages implemented before FORTRAN,
> >>>> but they were all very inefficient (at a time when computers were
> >>>> a few thousand times slower than today's cell phones). The
> FORTRAN
> >>>> group (of about half a dozen people led by John Backus) set out to
> >>>> design a language and compiler that would produce code that was
> >>>>
> >> close
> >>
> >>>> to the efficiency of code produced by a decent assembly-language
> >>>> programmer. And they succeeded.
> >>>>
> >>>> After a couple of iterations by IBM, FORTRAN IV became a very
> good,
> >>>> very usable, and very efficient language for numeric computation.
> >>>> The ANSI and later ISO standards bodies took over. Over fifty
> years
> >>>> later, they are still producing new revisions that preserve much
> >>>> of the original core language. Today, FORTRAN is still the most
> >>>> efficient and most widely used language for high-speed numeric
> >>>> computation.
> >>>>
> >>>> For some related thoughts, see the "Law of Standards," which I
> >>>> formulated in 1991:
> >>>>
> >>>> http://www.jfsowa.com/computer/standard.htm
> >>>>
> >>>> And by the way, the original WWW was designed by a small group,
> >>>> but the Semantic Web was designed by a very large committee.
> >>>>
> >>>> John Sowa
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> _________________________________________________________________
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> >>>>
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