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[ontolog-forum] What is a good conversation? [was - ISO merged ontology

To: "[ontolog-forum]" <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: Peter Yim <peter.yim@xxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, 11 Apr 2009 06:38:42 -0700
Message-id: <af8f58ac0904110638k75d27ba9s39beaf040099b2a8@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> [Azamat]  Somebody of us is fully missing the whole sense of public forum
> and public forum debate, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_forum_debate, ...    (01)

[ppy]  Sorry Azamat, wrong reference ... Ontolog is neither modeled
after "Corssfire" <en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossfire_(TV_series)> nor
"WWE" <www.wwe.com>.
We have no plans to grow our size/popularity or reach our community
goals with those modus operandi. (see my response to RonWheeler below
for more details.)    (02)

I did not ask you to give up your responsibility, opportunity,
obligation or even conscience ... I simply told you that
[ontolog-forum] is *not* the place to hold the debate you wanted to
have in the tone you opted to use. As DougHolmes suggested, there are
plenty of places on the web to vent about public policy.    (03)


>> [RonW]   I would take issue with the characterization of the
>> discussions in the forum to be just "tavern talk".
>> ... I do get a sense
>> that some of the discussions are leading to better ways of
>> thinking about ontology and are breaking new ground.    (04)

[ppy]  Thank you. I will take that as a compliment.    (05)

I did not "characterize" Ontolog as such, I said "All we are *supposed
to be*, is a good conversation ..."    (06)

That's all we were supposed to be ... until we got lucky and started
to get *really* great people - knowledgeable, passionate, generous,
tireless, ...  donating their time and expertise. This resulted in a
rich body of knowledge that community ended up amassing (see:
http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ &
http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?WikiHomePage#nidZ ). Some may
not care, but I, and a lot of the community members, do. Therefore, as
a co-convener, I am trying to do my best to sustain an environment
that is conducive to the continued growth of this community treasure.
(Being a KM professional, you, Ron, already know this) Besides what is
explicitly stated in the membership policy, I reckon we need to *build
the community over trust and respect* (this is just one of many
options ... and definitely not the only one that works well). My role
as a co-convener is so guided, and hence I encourage conversations
that leads to better trust and respect. and discourage the opposite.    (07)

[ppy]  To all those who are not aware:    (08)

The Ontolog infrastructure and content are ALL pro bono - they are
available because of the generosity of members of this community who
volunteered them . We are not spending (much less "wasting" taxpayer
money) on this (although, even if it were publicly funded, I doubt if
I would do it differently by much.)  Therefore, please recognize that,
getting answers from someone on [ontolog-forum], participating in a
virtual Ontolog Invited Speaker event, or the like, is a "privilege",
not a "right."   Let's just be appreciative.    (09)


Sincerely.  =ppy
--    (010)


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Azamat <abdoul@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, Apr 11, 2009 at 12:09 AM
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] ISO merged ontology effort "MCO"
To: "[ontolog-forum]" <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>    (011)


Peter,
Somebody of us is fully missing the whole sense of public forum and public
forum debate, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_forum_debate, where you
are supposed to be a pundit, not a censor.
There are now two topics of high technological importance, all ontologies
project, dubbed neon, and all ontologies standard candidate, dubbed mco.
Both supported or would be supported by the public funding and may affect
your life or your children or your business. Now suppose i am running such a
multi-million research project, again giving you promises and hopes. Even if
you, as a good professional, know that the project good for nothing, another
mindless waste, I can't refuse your rights to quest, request, ask, demand,
or insist. Moreover, if i am asked in the right place, the Ontolog Forum, i
have to give clear answers to your clear questions, regardless who is asking
and how you are requesting. This is now my public duty, for "Every right
implies a responsibility, every opportunity, an obligation; every
possession, a duty" (JD Rockefeller Jr). Otherwise, the community will judge
by default, if already judged.
Regards
Azamat    (012)


----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter Yim" <peter.yim@xxxxxxxx>
To: "[ontolog-forum]" <ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, April 11, 2009 3:54 AM
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] ISO merged ontology effort "MCO"    (013)


Azamat,    (014)


Thank you very much for adopting a more civil tone in your post this time.    (015)

That said ... a CoP (community of practice) allows its members to "get
to know" one another ... who has the knowledge, who they could rely
on, who they would enjoy working with, who they would  want to have a
dialog with, etc.  ... Therefore, please do not feel indignant if
other members of the community choose not to respond (which would be
what I'd suggest.)    (016)

For the 4th time, may I request that you move the exploration of
"whether or not NeOn is a good project" to a different venue. This
could have been a good conversation, if it had started with the right
tone ... but unfortunately, it did not -- and I think we have missed
the chance ... at least, to do it on [ontolog-forum] because of that.    (017)


Thanks & regards.  =ppy
--    (018)


On Fri, Apr 10, 2009 at 1:11 PM, Azamat <abdoul@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> PY wrote: "All we are supposed to be, is a good conversation."
>
> Well, Peter. As far as "a good coversation...at the end of the working
> day"
> suggests a mutual expressions of views, exchange of ideas and information,
> i
> am informally asking the neon coordinator or project officer and the mco
> chair, some friendly questions:
> 1.Which "single-ontology style" do the NeOn people aim to enhance, if any?
> 2. How are they going to collect domain ontologies, as a assortment, a
> library or as an integrated system?
> 3. Where are they planning to place upper ontologies?
> 4. How are the networked ontologies related with the possible standardized
> ontology system of top classes and meanings?
> 5. How the MCO folks are planning to create a "baseline ontology" from
> three
> partial ontologies of restricted scope. And what sort of "semantic
> foundation was originally developed in the US Army" released recently to
> the
> public? this as as the dessert.
>
> Wish to underline the John's caveat against ostensible ontology
> standardization (very often there are ostensive ends and real goals):
> " 1. It should be consistent with accepted principles and practices in
> every
> branch of science, engineering, business, and the arts."
>
> I'd say even more: the standard ontology should be built as a integrative
> framework of all key branches of knowledge.
> Regards,
>
> Azamat Abdoullaev    (019)

...    (020)

On Fri, Apr 10, 2009 at 12:23 PM, Doug Holmes <dholmes@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> Ron,
>        I'm pretty sure that Peter is referring to emotional phrases that, in
> common usage, serve primarily to insult individuals, groups of
> individuals and possibly the ideas they hold.  Saying "you aren't
> reasoning correctly and here's why.." is very different from saying
> "you and your friends are unprincipled idiots..." .   In my view, this
> forum is a lot more focussed on the first and is likely to find the
> second type of comment distracting and inappropriate. To me, "waste of
> the taxpayers money",  was a huge inductive leap in the direction of
> the second category, and Peter is right to head it off.  There are
> plenty of places on the web to vent about public policy; hopefully the
> Ontolog forum will avoid that distinction.
> Doug    (021)

> On Apr 10, 2009, at 11:32 AM, Ron Wheeler wrote:
>
>> I am having trouble understanding what you mean by
>>
>> "Uninvoked accusations bordering on being libellous to specific
>> individuals or organizations, don't count as good conversations"
>>
>> If you think that someone said something libellous, you should at
>> least
>> quote the statement in question.
>>
>> The suggestion that a project is a "waste of taxpayers money" is not
>> libellous. If it were, democratic politics as we know it in the
>> western
>> world would come to an end.
>> There are any number of expenditures by governments from sugar
>> subsidies
>> to aircraft carriers that some people will assert are not good uses of
>> their tax dollars.
>>
>> If the suggestion was that the contract was obtained through bribery
>> or
>> some illegal means, then you have a point. I did not see that
>> accusation.
>>
>> We know that Azemet is not a fan of NeON. I have never seen anything
>> in
>> the forum discussion before, that says that members must agree to
>> support a specific project regardless of their analysis of its value.
>> That would certainly not be in keeping with your description  of the
>> forum as
>>
>> "All we are  supposed to be, is a
>> good conversation (at the "watercooler" or the "tavern at the end of
>> the working day")."
>>
>>
>> What would be interesting is a factual discussion about why NeON is a
>> good idea.
>> I may have missed this but I have not seen anyone challenge Azemet's
>> points, only his right to say them.
>> It is time for NeOn's supporters to make their case.
>>
>>
>> I would take issue with the characterization of the discussions in the
>> forum to be just "tavern talk".
>> While I confess that I am often unable to understand some of the
>> topics,
>> I have a great deal of respect for the effort put in to tackle
>> difficult
>> issues (often with difficult people) and provide a well organized and
>> reasoned approach to the subject at hand.
>> I am not enough of an expert to make a very credible analysis but I do
>> get a sense that some of the discussions are leading to better ways of
>> thinking about ontology and are breaking new ground.
>>
>> Ron    (022)

>> Peter Yim wrote Fri, Apr 10, 2009 at 8:23 AM PDT:
>>> On Fri, Apr 10, 2009 at 1:20 AM, Gian Piero Zarri <zarri@xxxxxxx>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> ... wasting the money of the European taxpayers
>>>> in launching questionable 14.7 million Euro projects
>>>> like NeON - see Azemat's remarks few days ago. ...
>>>>
>>>> You should, may be, buy my book...
>>>>
>>>
>>> [ppy]  Gian and Azamat, please refer to my post at:
>>> http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/2009-04/msg00013.html
>>>
>>> As I wrote Azamat privately before,
>>> //
>>> I don't play politics ... in fact I deplore that and people who do.
>>> .
>>> As far as my role at ONTOLOG is concerned, I would only ask: "is this
>>> move advancing or retarding our mission?" ... and I am calling a stop
>>> so that we don't throw the long and hard work by so many people in
>>> the
>>> community (building out this community environment and a really
>>> respectable body of knowledge) down the drain, because certain
>>> individual(s) had a bad day.
>>> //
>>>
>>> I think we all lose, if we start playing politics!
>>>
>>> Again Azamat, please do not mistake the [ontolog-forum] for the
>>> IEEE-SUO list. Ontolog is not a research institution. This is not a
>>> standards development organization. All we are  supposed to be, is a
>>> good conversation (at the "watercooler" or the "tavern at the end of
>>> the working day").  And if that spins off to research projects,
>>> development projects, standards working groups, by individual members
>>> who, through this community, discover who has the knowledge, the
>>> skill
>>> sets and the right chemistry that they can team up with to do some
>>> productive work, that would be great!
>>>
>>> Uninvoked accusations bordering on being libellous to specific
>>> individuals or organizations, don't count as good conversations (at
>>> least not here.) I am sure there are proper channels and venue for
>>> you
>>> to voice your concerns. But, sorry, [ontolog-forum] is the wrong
>>> place.
>>>
>>> Again, I cordially request that you take this conversation elsewhere.
>>>
>>> Thanks in advance.  =ppy
>>> --
>>>
>>>
>>> On Fri, Apr 10, 2009 at 7:21 AM, Azamat <abdoul@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> There is a good saying in Russia: the holy place is never empty.
>>>> Since this
>>>> respected Forum is unable to come to some joint decision on the
>>>> "holy issue"
>>>> of ontology standards, somebody else had to appear.
>>>>
>>>> So there surfaced up some astute individuals, the esteemed [Barry
>>>> Smith
>>>> (US), Pat Hayes (US)] with their less known companions [Werner
>>>> Ceusters
>>>> (US), Frank Farance (US), Nicola Guarino (Italy)] to fill the holy
>>>> place
>>>> with their secret stuff. Barring SUMO, I've never heard of any
>>>> convener of
>>>> any systematic upper ontology, if only papers and articles. The
>>>> ontologies
>>>> proposed are of restricted importance, and hardly will make any
>>>> useful
>>>> standards, see the synopsis on STANDARD ONTOLOGY: the Standard
>>>> Model of
>>>> Reality, Representation and Reasoning,
>>>>
>>>> What is to be done. By the next month the working draft of the MCO
>>>> must be
>>>> prepared. The sponsors could be asked to make the wide public
>>>> known about
>>>> the results; at least to find out the meanings of "Standardized
>>>> concept
>>>> systems", "Merged Core Ontology."
>>>>
>>>> By 2009-06, upon studying the draft to send the Forum’s regrets or
>>>> better
>>>> replacement to the SC32/WG2  as a recommended standards project.
>>>> That's it.
>>>>
>>>> Some general reflections.  There are said many degrees of
>>>> intelligence. But
>>>> there are two broad types of intelligence: shrewdness, practical
>>>> hardheaded
>>>> intelligence, and intellectual brightness, high smartness. Astute
>>>> folks are
>>>> good in business dealings, intellectuals in big science, in
>>>> searching truths
>>>> about the world. Presently, the science is increasingly converting
>>>> into a
>>>> unique business activity, huge profits, zero risk, no any
>>>> investments. More
>>>> and more public funds go there, which you don't need to hardly
>>>> earn. All
>>>> what you need is to be sharp as a businessman, like the people from
>>>> Ontoprise, selling their old software products to the EU several
>>>> times as
>>>> NeOn project, ONTORULE project; find yourself how else.
>>>>
>>>> To head-off such bad squandering, i suggest for the politicians to
>>>> accept a
>>>> special Act on Research Fraud (going as an article in the
>>>> contracts signed
>>>> with the government):
>>>>
>>>> [in case of false promises and fictitious delivery to consider
>>>> large fines,
>>>> the amount spent plus banking interests plus moral damages to the
>>>> public]. Then, I believe, the quality of research projects will go
>>>> high
>>>> while the wild commercialization of science and intellectual minds
>>>> might be
>>>> stopped.
>>>>
>>>> Azamat Abdoullaev    (023)

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