Chris -
OK, I don't want to dilute the meanings of well-accepted terms, so
perhaps you have a suggestion (I'll try to think of another compact phrase,
but one escapes me right now). (01)
I want to say that, for a foundation ontology to have the capability to
logically represent anything that a person might say (assuming that
'anything' is coherent), it has to have both an adequately expressive syntax
(minimum FOL) and a sufficiently large inventory of primitive concepts to
create the logical representation. A 'primitive' concept is a concept that
cannot be ontologically represented by use of ontology elements already in
the foundation ontology. (This gets into the question of what it means to
represent a meaning, but for a start we can just say that what is good
enough to get correct results in all tested applications is an adequate
representation of the meaning). (02)
If we can't say that the FO "has the expressive power of a human
language" would you have an alternative compact but comprehensible way of
saying that? "descriptive power"? I would like to use "definitional power"
but there are some that prefer to reserve "definition" to its necessary and
sufficient meaning - better to avoid that issue. (03)
Pat (04)
Patrick Cassidy
MICRA, Inc.
908-561-3416
cell: 908-565-4053
cassidy@xxxxxxxxx (05)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-
> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Christopher Menzel
> Sent: Tuesday, January 06, 2009 1:08 PM
> To: [ontolog-forum]
> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Next steps in using ontologies as
> standards
>
> On Jan 6, 2009, at 11:03 AM, Patrick Cassidy wrote:
> > The problem with letting the "market" determine standards is that
> > there has to be an effective "market", with multiple candidates, and
> > multiple users, for it to work. In the case of a foundation
> > ontology, there have been publicly available candidates for over 6
> > years, but as yet there are few users (applications, anyone?) and
> > nothing remotely resembling a "market" has developed. This should
> > give us a clue that we are dealing with a technology that is not
> > simplistically analogous to the ones we are accustomed to. On
> > reflection this should not be terribly surprising -- a proper
> > foundation ontology will have the content and expressive power of a
> > human language,
>
> I'm guessing that what you have in mind here is simply that the
> language of a foundational ontology should enable us to give adequate
> formal expression (in a sense that itself needs clarification) to
> anything we can say in a natural language. Sure thing. That said, I
> think it is best to avoid using terms like "expressive power" that
> have clear mathematical meanings to convey informal ideas. This is
> admittedly a pet peeve of mine, but one that I think is reasonable, as
> the use of such terms easily leads to confusion (since their meanings
> in informal contexts are inevitably different than their formal
> meanings). And, although I do not believe it is Patrick's intent
> here, all too often such terms are used rhetorically to suggest a
> greater degree of clarity and rigor than is warranted.
>
> > and nothing like it has been actually developed **and widely used**
> > up to now (WordNet is not an ontology in that sense).
>
> Or any other, I'd say. ;-)
>
> -chris
>
>
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