Hi Ed, (01)
Comments below. (02)
Chris (03)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Edward Barkmeyer [mailto:edward.barkmeyer@xxxxxxxx]
> Sent: 21 January 2011 21:00
> To: mail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Cc: '[ontolog-forum] '
> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Ontology of Rough Sets
>
> Chris,
>
> you wrote:
> > Hi Ed,
> >
> > Late delivery is a common business feature in financial contracts,
> > such as foreign exchange.
> > I have always treated the contract as describing a possible world -
> > which might be actual - and a late delivery (and a partial late
> > delivery) as a counter-part (in the actual world) of the delivery.
> > (This is a solution you indicate below).
> > In the case of your late shipment, doesn't the comment cash out as any
> > actual shipment made after now that is a counter-part of the
> > contracted/agreed shipment will be late. In this case, nothing changes
> > state.
>
> To be clearer, the conceptual shipment may acquire an instance/counterpart
> when it originally goes on the schedule, i.e., when it is created as an
object
> pursuant to an order under a contract. At that point it has a number of
> properties -- the supplier, the customer, the quantity, the item, the
order
> and the expected delivery date. Once the manufacturer fulfills the order
by
> making and shipping the parts, it acquires additional properties -- a
> container, a related carrier, a carrier contract, etc., and it starts to
acquire
> real 'states', notably location at time. (04)
If one is 4D, then it does not acquire properties - it always has the
properties. One needs to adopt a 3D approach to allow for this.
It seems to me you are giving a 3D view here.
Nothing wrong with that - provide you acknowledge your stance.
One could also say that one is 4D, but what is happening is epistemic - one
gains knowledge about these properties at some point.
Again, one needs to acknowledge the stance one is taking. (05)
All of this can be handled by ordinary
> relations, a few of which are ternary. But it becomes "late" when the
> delivery date passes and the delivery has not happened. The business
rules
> are written in terms of a class called 'late shipment', which can be
defined in
> terms of other properties of a shipment, with a bit of trickery for the
'time is
> past' relation. But the shipment does not satisfy the class predicate
when it
> is created. (06)
Which shipment in which possible world?
The shipment described by the contract (in the possible world defined by the
contract) cannot be late - by definition.
In other possible worlds, its counterpart is late. (07)
It comes to satisfy the class predicate precisely via the trickery for
> 'time is past'. (08)
What trickery? I cannot see any.
There are times when one needs the indexicality of 'now', but not here as
far as I can tell. (09)
And the recovery actions could involve substitute shipments
> and reassignment of some other properties of the original shipment. We
> can and do timestamp all these decisions and changes. The problem is the
> relationship of the whole knowledge about the shipment to certain
> predicates and other relations, which are both true and false if you don't
> specify a time interval. The problem is that they resemble other
> propositions about the shipment that are constant -- true or false for all
> time -- because they refer to intrinsic/essential properties of the
shipment
> and not to accidental properties. (010)
If one wants to include intrinsic/essential/accidental properties this
involves taking a position. Fine, but acknowledge the position and do not
presume that other people also have to adopt that position. (011)
>
> Put another way there are wffs that look like propositions and are of four
> kinds:
> - those that are constantly true or false over all (interesting) time
> - those that explicitly refer to time and state and are thus constantly
true or
> false
> - those that implicitly refer to time and explicitly refer to 'state',
like 'late
> shipment', for which we may have work-arounds
> - those that cannot be evaluated because they refer to state without time (012)
This only works if one adopts the very particular stance you are proposing.
In a 4D/possible worlds stance your statements are just plain false.
Therefore, I assume you are not adopting this stance. As I said earlier, it
is important to qualify statements like this with the stance you are
adopting. (013)
>
> I would like to disallow the last group, because there is no meaningful
> semantic model for them, but I don't know how to characterize them. And
> the problem is that when you inject time concepts into a knowledge base
> that was originally about instantaneous decisions, you find 'propositions'
> like that, primarily in rule antecedents.
>
> > Maybe our knowledge of the world changes states - however, as I said
> > in an earlier mail on this thread, that is epistemic.
> >
>
> This has nothing to do with epistemics. The knowledge being processed is
> what we have recorded as "fact", and any relationship to the "real world"
is
> dependent on unmodeled factors. It is possible that the shipment is
really
> in Baltimore, even though we have recorded that it is in Memphis.
Handling
> correction to the knowledge base is a different problem. (014)
I think, from your example, you are looking at a different aspect of
epistemic.
The epistemic issue here is that systemically we do not know the future. So
when we look at the contact, we know it describes a possible world, we just
do not know whether it describes the actual world - i.e. the one we are in.
By epistemic here, I do not mean we have made a mistake in what we have
recorded (e.g. it is in Baltimore not Memphis) - just that we do not know
something. (015)
>
> (We do have a project dealing with capturing assertions from supply-chain
> messages from multiple sources in IKL and evaluating their consistency and
> credibility, but that is an entirely different issue.)
>
> > As you say, temporal words can sometimes be about temporal and modal
> > relationships.
> >
> > EB> The 4D idea that a thing in a different state is a different
> > EB> thing,
> >
> >> and 'objects' are actually sequences (or more generally, lattices) of
> >> things in states
> >>
> >
> > Just to be clear, some 4D approaches build up the 4D objects from
> > their states.
> > However, I think it is often simpler to take the objects as just 4D
> > simpliciter. If one wants to consider their states, then these are
> > temporal slices that are also 4D simpliciter.
> >
> > EB>, but it is totally out of
> >
> >> line with the intuition of the domain experts.
> >>
> >
> > Jubien starts his book on properties with several examples of 4D talk
> > in everyday natural language. There seems to be a growing consensus
> > that talk about events and processes are naturally 4D. The first half
> > of the football match, etc. I'm sure football referees intuitions can
> > stretch to first halves.
> >
>
> People have no problem with the idea of happenings in time, and states of
> the world in time. No one has a problem with models of Chris Partridge,
or
> a shipment, playing a role in a proposition that describes a situation and
> refers to time. The intuition failure is the model of states of an
individual
> thing in time. They don't think of Chris Partridge, or a shipment of
goods, as
> a 'situation' in time. (016)
Not sure what you mean here by a 'situation' in time.
We often think of people, especially historical figures, as situated in
time, and having states - Chris Partridge's childhood - Picasso's blue
period.
If you mean we have conflicting intuitions, I agree.
Also, not sure why you privilege domain expert's and their intuition.
Intuitions are easily tutored - so not a good basis for much.
Maybe, I have missed the point - would an example help? (017)
>
> -Ed
>
> > Chris
> >
> >
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-
> >> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ed Barkmeyer
> >> Sent: 21 January 2011 18:39
> >> To: [ontolog-forum]
> >> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Ontology of Rough Sets
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Christopher Menzel wrote:
> >>
> >>> On Jan 21, 2011, at 9:46 AM, doug foxvog wrote:
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>> ...
> >>>> A standard distinction between a set and a class, is that
> >>>> membership in a [set] cannot change, while membership in a class can.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>> I think it's useful to distinguish two claims when it comes to the
> >>>
> > identity
> >
> >> conditions of classes:
> >>
> >>> (1) Classes are not extensional (i.e., distinct classes can have the
> >>> same members/instances)
> >>>
> >>> (2) Classes can change their membership.
> >>>
> >>> In the formal semantics of a number of KR languages, (1) is true
> >>> but,
> >>>
> > strictly
> >
> >> speaking at least, (2) is not. Notably, classes in OWL are
> >> explicitly
> >>
> > non-
> >
> >> extensional: since a class is stipulated only to *have* an extension
> >> in
> >>
> > OWL's
> >
> >> formal semantics, nothing prevents distinct classes from having the
> >> same extension. The same is true of RDF. However, simply because
> >> there is no formal notion of change built into OWL's semantics, there
> >> is no
> >>
> > possibility,
> >
> >> within a given interpretation, that a class change its membership.
> >> As
> >>
> > noted
> >
> >> in an earlier message in this thread, without augmenting the notion
> >> of an OWL interpretation somehow, change can only be represented
> >> formally in terms of something like a series of interpretations that
> >> are thought of as temporally ordered. That said, (2) does seem to be
> >> a strong *intuitive*
> >>
> > idea
> >
> >> in the KR, AI, and database communities.
> >>
> >> The particular problem I have recently got involved in is the
> >> intrusion of temporal concepts into would-be ontologies in business
> applications.
> >> In the supply-chain area, for example, it is important to be able to
> >> talk
> >>
> > about
> >
> >> schedules and shipments being "late". Getting past the indexical
> >> issues, which are fixed by translating the intuitive "now"
> >> into specific time relationships, the particular problem is that
> >> shipments
> >>
> > and
> >
> >> orders do change state, and actions are taken on the basis of
> >>
> > reclassification.
> >
> >> A major problem for us is that the industry folk throw these concepts
> >> into what was an ontology for the "snapshot" model of decision-making
> >> -- the state of the world at the time the decision is to be made.
> >> This gives
> >>
> > rise to
> >
> >> formalizing ideas like "proposition X is false at time A and true at
> >> time
> >>
> > B."
> >
> >> And that problem arises from the idea that states of things are
> >>
> > characterized
> >
> >> by propositions, which seems to be fundamental to applications of
> >> ontologies. The 4D idea that a thing in a different state is a
> >> different
> >>
> > thing,
> >
> >> and 'objects' are actually sequences (or more generally, lattices) of
> >>
> > things in
> >
> >> states, is a means of producing a formal semantics, but it is totally
> >> out
> >>
> > of
> >
> >> line with the intuition of the domain experts. They cannot then
> >>
> > "validate"
> >
> >> the ontology -- they don't understand it.
> >>
> >> I have said in that forum that solving the problem is beyond my
expertise.
> >>
> > It
> >
> >> is my conviction that the problem is not really "time", but rather
> >> "change
> >>
> > of
> >
> >> state" or "alternative states", and in that sense, "time" is a means
> >> of
> >>
> > labeling
> >
> >> "alternative possible worlds".
> >>
> >> All we are saying is that the intuitive notion of change is endemic
> >> to a
> >>
> > lot of
> >
> >> ontology applications. We can usually constrain the immediate
> >> application to avoid the problem or create a convenient work-around,
> >> but that usually means that the next application the business wants
> >> to use the ontology for requires re-writing it.
> >>
> >> -Ed
> >>
> >> "Mathematicians are like Frenchmen. Whatever you say to them they
> >> translate into their own language and at once it becomes something
> >> entirely different."
> >> -- Goethe
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>> Finally, the idea that sets are extensional and classes are not is
> >>>
> > definitely
> >
> >> not standard among logicians and mathematicians, who typically
> >> associate the notion of class with theories like VNBG, wherein both
> >> classes and sets are extensional.
> >>
> >>> -chris
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >> --
> >> Edward J. Barkmeyer Email: edbark@xxxxxxxx
> >> National Institute of Standards & Technology Manufacturing Systems
> >> Integration Division
> >> 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8263 Tel: +1 301-975-3528
> >> Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8263 Cel: +1 240-672-5800
> >>
> >> "The opinions expressed above do not reflect consensus of NIST, and
> >> have not been reviewed by any Government authority."
> >>
> >>
> >>
> ________________________________________________________________
> >> _
> >> Message Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/
> >> Config Subscr:
> >> http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontolog-forum/
> >> Unsubscribe: mailto:ontolog-forum-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >> Shared Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/ Community Wiki:
> >> http://ontolog.cim3.net/wiki/ To join:
> >> http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?WikiHomePage#nid1J
> >> To Post: mailto:ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
>
>
> --
> Edward J. Barkmeyer Email: edbark@xxxxxxxx
> National Institute of Standards & Technology Manufacturing Systems
> Integration Division
> 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8263 Tel: +1 301-975-3528
> Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8263 Cel: +1 240-672-5800
>
> "The opinions expressed above do not reflect consensus of NIST, and have
> not been reviewed by any Government authority." (018)
_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontolog-forum/
Config Subscr: http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontolog-forum/
Unsubscribe: mailto:ontolog-forum-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Shared Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/
Community Wiki: http://ontolog.cim3.net/wiki/
To join: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?WikiHomePage#nid1J
To Post: mailto:ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (019)
|