Re: [ontolog-forum] Ontology of Self Interest

["Rich Cooper" <rich@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Doug,

Comments below,

-Rich

Sincerely,

Rich Cooper

EnglishLogicKernel.com

Rich AT EnglishLogicKernel DOT com

9 4 9 \ 5 2 5 - 5 7 1 2

-----Original Message-----
From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of doug foxvog
Sent: Friday, August 12, 2011 1:58 PM
To: [ontolog-forum]
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Ontology of Self Interest

On Fri, August 12, 2011 10:30, Rich Cooper said:

> Dear Doug,

>

> Let's suppose that we can construct an ontology

> that can be used to demonstrate which beliefs

> logically follow from observed facts.

People's beliefs will generally follow from a combination of prior beliefs and a selection of "facts" that one learns whether or not the "facts" are supported by observation and logic.

Ideally, supported by observations, but that is rare to the point of extinction. 

The positions of the below groups (and more) will be less fact based and more interest based.

> Socialists,

> Libertarians, Tea Partiers, Big or Small

> Governmentalists, Ecologists, Global Warming pro-

> or o-pponents, or any other grouping of self

> interests.

Yes, and it is interest we are modeling, but interests are also facts, if asserted in an ontology.  Agree?  Or do you have a way to represent interests differently from facts and rules?

> How would you go about doing so?  Is the top node

> in the lattice partitioned into value systems or

> into behaviors, or are both involved in the top

> partition, the reduction of the nil top node to

> the next level down?

There are many types of concepts which need to be covered.  Physical objects, emotions, events, etc.  Any top node would have to include them all.  The top node should be equivalent to owl#Thing or Cyc's #$Thing.

That part is beyond my own experience, since I haven't used either Owl or Cyc.  I am treating this first try as a draft of highly focused concepts, and yes, we can merge this with an existing framework, but I would prefer to stay with the simplest representation while we can.  Moving it into another lattice is too big a step to take while we are focusing exclusively on self interest ontologies for now, IMHO.  But if you can do the merge as we go along, that might be useful. 

> How do the values and behaviors interact to

> support or contradict each other?  What facts are

> sufficient to make an unambiguous constructive

> proof for any of our opposing assertions posted so

> far?

I find that people question facts which get in the way of their positions.  This is the reason that tobacco companies challenged evidence that smoking causes cancer and other diseases and why fossil fuel companies challenge evidence of anthropogenic global warming.

Scientists always have a hard time because theories are always open to revision.  They rarely prove things, but may give probabilities for their conclusions being correct.

-- doug

Agreed, but fortunately we are only looking at a small slice of the universe by considering self interest ontology. 

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