Re: [ontolog-forum] Self Interest Ontology: Ontology of Social Reality

["AzamatAbdoullaev" <abdoul@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Rich: "I like your version of this, but I would use the word ?interaction? instead of ?conversation?; interactions between individuals should be the primary focus of the ontology, with less emphasis on the aggregation of people into various kinds of groups."

 

Social reality is created by humans through social interactions while pursuing the intentions, interests, ambitions, and ends, personal, cultural, political, economic, or social. Existing above the biological reality of first needs, cognitive reality of thoughts, intentions and desires, social or institutional reality involves intelligent agents (humans), objects, events, and relationships, with regular systems, structures and institutions (as governments, parliaments, unions, corporations, universities, armies, churches). 

It all looks that the self-interest, enlightened and unenlightened, looking after your own wellbeing or after the national development, with altruism are key to formation of social world of intelligent beings.

The big issue with social reality, as we exchanged with Doug, what is here reality and construction, which social things exisiting really and which are just socially constructed, as consensus realities. If money, wealth, God, races, nations, governments, gender, customs, classes, are just social conventions, having no foundations in reality. If humans, knowledge, language, culture, technology are the only social things to be among hard social facts. If social reality is objective or subjective reality (or some mixture), as the book on the Social Construction of Reality suggesting. And if the institutional fabric of modern social reality has any good/solid ontological grounds. The quesions outnumber answers.

 

Azamat

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Rich Cooper

To: '[ontolog-forum] '

Sent: Monday, September 05, 2011 10:23 PM

Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Self Interest Ontology: Ontology ofSocialReality

Dear Azamat,

 

I like your version of this, but I would use the word ?interaction? instead of ?conversation?; interactions between individuals should be the primary focus of the ontology, with less emphasis on the aggregation of people into various kinds of groups.  Grouping can come later, as can charitable functions.  First lets construct the simplest model possible for representing self interest of interactions. 

 

As Milton Friedman showed fifty years ago, no one person can make even something as simple as a pencil, which has wood from a forest log, said wood shaped by a factory into the hexagonal or cylindrical shape needed, and then filled with lead, topped with a rubber eraser, and held in place by a metal clasp. 

 

The social reality of that pencil depends on many individuals, each doing a small part of the tasks needed to create the pencils, then distribute them to geographically convenient locations, ensure that they are sold, paid for, and the investments of each party returned to fund development of more pencils plus created wealth.  If no wealth is created in an activity, and if this continues for a long enough period, then that activity eventually ceases to function because it runs out of invested wealth from prior activities, invested by individuals.  At least, it should, but government groups are able to take funding from the public commons and continue the activity by bleeding wealth from the creators of the pencils.  

 

Friedman pointed out that there is no central planner, no government regulation, no outsiders needed to construct and socially realize that pencil in the hands of consumers.  The flow of wealth and labor is what makes the pencil available to consumers.  Those involved in the flow of wealth and labor enjoy profits of their own in performing the various activities. 

 

Central planning and government controls are only useful in preventing harmful side effects, such as destruction of forests that belong to others (the public for example), noxious chemicals that may be used in the process and then disposed of into the public commons with damaging effects, financial crimes related to the individuals involved in production and distribution, robbery and theft related to production distribution and sale methods, or other ways in which the pencils are not smoothly made available to individuals in the public in the linear models of activities by individuals. 

 

Note that each individual involved in the pencil related activities has his own self interest motivating him to perform his activity requiring labor and invested wealth.  The signal (a la biosemiotics) that ties the process together is price.  Individuals in each activity react to the price they can get for their activity, the cost they experience in performing their activity, and the created wealth they enjoy as a result of those activities, are what keep the whole process synchronized and working. 

 

Use Case 1 ? the biosemiotics case ? has the structure to model this kind of activity.  Expanding Use Case 1 through instances of Use Case 2 (the nonterminal aggregation of terminal Use Case 1 instances and other nonterminal Use Case 2 instances) can construct the ontology, IMHO. 

 

How can these factors be represented in an ontology?  Activities can be represented in the usual industrial engineering IDEF0 model.  Cost, price, investment, labor and margin can be represented as heuristics describing these meta level measures, and the agents involved can be represented as controls or mechanisms, as the IDEF0 terminology names these classes. 

 

Complications arise when individuals bind together into groups.  They form pluralities of companies to log, machine, fill, cap, package, distribute, market and sell the pencils.  Each of these activities requires some cooperation among the individuals in each of the various groups.  Transportation of ICOMs to activity sites, movement of ICOMs among the activities, design and interpretation of controls, allocation, scheduling and depreciation of mechanisms, all require coordination among individuals.  Adam Smith addressed the individual models as self organizing. 

 

Groups can scale the efforts of individuals, but there is an inherent loss of efficiency in such scaling.  Sometimes that loss is taken out of the least powerful indiviudals? opportunities for compensation, and sometimes it is taken as financial loss from the investors who risk their stored wealth.  Any individual who feels that her expenditures are not justified by her wealth creation results should be freely able to move to another group, or to practice on her own. 

 

Given a public value hypothesized by one individual, and given the cost of scale factors for the related ICOMs and activities, and given the cost of implementing the scaling, it seems to me that the ideal form of group is one which acts in exactly the same manner as the other groups; the hypothesized public value is only realized at some profit to the group which performs the scaling, whether that group be a company organized for commercial purposes or a government organized to realize that hypothesized public value. 

 

With this line of reasoning, it seems to me that all such activities should be self funding.  Hypothesized value should be agreed to by any individual who is involved the activity on a self interest basis. 

 

That is, the hypothesized public value should be realized at a profit to the public.  The said profit should be measured and made available to those who police all activities, not just the companies; government entities should also be policed to ensure that there is no cheating, that there is financial value to the public as agreed to by the public, and that the use of the cost price and profit metrics are related to the government entities just as they are to the companies organized for commercial activities.  The only difference should be in the way hypothesized value and allocated funding is agreed to by individual of the public who specifically benefit, or who cause the public wealth to be depreciated by their own activities. 

 

For this reason, I believe the ontology should model the costs of governing activities, the public price of not governing, the profits accruing to the public, as agreed by individuals of the public due to the governing activities, and the funding of the governing activities in the same way that individuals and their activities should be modeled in producing pencils.   Not everyone uses pencils and therefore not everyone should be forced at gunpoint to fund them, consume their products and services, or otherwise participate in the governing activities in any way different from the pencil activities.  Friedman pointed out how choice, denied by governing activities but provided by commercial activities, leaves out the checks and balances that make the wealth creation system work. 

 

Complications arise when the governing activities are funded from the public at large through taxes, fees, losses, borrowing, or money supply extensions.  There are only individuals who benefit from the activities; there is no individual public at large ? benefits are not evenly distributed nor evenly costed.  So that leaves the beneficiaries, using Doug?s term, as special interest groups (SIGs). 

 

The SIGs that benefit from each activity are not the same as the SIGs that benefit from the products and services resulting from those activities.  The individuals in those SIGs should be treated in the same way, with the same regulations, as individuals are.  That is, there should be no bribery (whether funded from lobbyists or campaign contributors), no conflicts of interest (by individuals engaged in the activities or benefitting from the products and services), no cheating or other adverse tactics and strategies on the part of those who benefit at the expense of those who don?t. 

 

One problem with that approach is that it leaves out those who simply cannot take care of themselves without help.  While aware of that issue, I would prefer to hold off addressing it until we can solve the simpler problem of modeling self interest of those who can take care of themselves.  Perhaps when that model is well developed, we can begin refining it help those who can?t help themselves, but are not cheating in any real sense of that word.  That part should be addressed in the second phase so that we can focus on the direct beneficiaries of the various activities. 

 

Thanks for a thoughtful suggestion. 

 

-Rich

 

Sincerely,

Rich Cooper

EnglishLogicKernel.com

Rich AT EnglishLogicKernel DOT com

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---

From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of AzamatAbdoullaev
Sent: Monday, September 05, 2011 3:56 AM
To: [ontolog-forum]
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Self Interest Ontology: Ontology of SocialReality

 

I inclined to view the "self-interest" as a piece of the Ontology of Social Reality, which encompasses such social interactions as conversation, speech and communication. 

As far as conversation is about exchange of ideas, views, emotions, and information between people, the conversants can lead conversation for its own sake, for religious, commercial or political ends.

Conversation is not always involves negative emotions or topic, as it's pressed in the reference below. There are chats, nothings, gossips, table talks, banters, talkings, small talks, crossfires, or exchanges. Most conversation is spontaneous, without subjects and goals. 

But an ordered meaningful conversation, as institutional or functional conservation, has its art, topic, objectives and strategy, as well as the self-interest of the speakers.

 

Azamat Abdoullaev   

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Rich Cooper

To: '[ontolog-forum] '

Sent: Sunday, September 04, 2011 8:30 PM

Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Self Interest Ontology

 

Dear SIO-interested posters,

I found this posting on the ISRE list, which describes how certain emotions are tied to self interest in a conversation.  I think this could shed some light on Doug's view of "interest" in a way that fits the SIO:

If there is a topic, it means there is a conversation. The conversation is with another person, with whom one is in some kind of relationship. One or the other party in the conversation will feel anger if the tenor of the conversation implies that there is something defective or unworthy or wrong or culpable or immoral or stupid or the like about that person.

RC:> Note how this addresses the PERSON not the topic of conversation, and it addresses the manner of communication instead of the underlying concepts. 

Religion and politics are topics that frequently instigate anger since opposing opinion often implies defect, unworthiness, wrong-headedness, culpability, immorality, stupidity, etc. Such imputations of unworthiness lead to a sense of deprivation of one?s right to attention, respect, consideration and the like from the other party. The basic premise here is that all there is the relationship between the parties and that the relationship between the parties is usefully and importantly understood to be based in large part on the degree of attention, respect, consideration, etc. that the parties provide each other.

Conversation about any topic that leads to a sense of loss of these benefits from the other party can thus engender anger. Anger is an evolutionarily programmed response to this kind of loss. The emotion creates an action-readiness to engage in acts that punish the other party so that he/she does not again act to deprive the angered person of relational benefits (attention, respect, etc.).

For elaboration of these ideas, see:

Theodore D. Kemper, ?Power and Status and the Power-Status Theory of Emotions,? in Turner and Stets, Handbook of the Sociology of Emotions (2006).

Theodore D. Kemper, Status, Power and Ritual Interaction. Ashgate (2011).

RC:>These ideas should be reflected somehow in Doug's initial ontology, though so far we have no concept about distinguishing among the selves involved in the conversation. 

HTH,

-Rich

Sincerely,

Rich Cooper

EnglishLogicKernel.com

Rich AT EnglishLogicKernel DOT com

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-----Original Message-----
From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Rich Cooper
Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2011 1:42 PM
To: '[ontolog-forum] '
Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Semantics of Natural Languages

Let me propose that it is SUBJECTIVITY i.e. a

proper understanding of self interest, that I

think is missing. 

We have been seduced by the 'unreasonable success

of mathematics' in solving problems in a

supposedly objective world, as Somebody said.  We

need to overcome our self satisfaction at how well

math has worked and look in a different direction.

 

-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 Rich Cooper

Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2011 1:30 PM

To: '[ontolog-forum] '

Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Semantics of Natural

Languages

Hi John,

Thanks for the links, but that isn't what I am

interested in; I'm more focused on WHY Cyc (and

other approaches to developing massive knowledge

bases) is thought by so many to have failed, e.g.,

Genesereth for example. 

Before the Cyc project started, the common view

given full imprimaturitan status in the research

community was that it was KNOWLEDGE that was

lacking for full AI, and only THAT was keeping AI

from universal suffrage. 

I am looking for opinions by people who might know

as to WHY that assumption was clearly so wrong.

Knowledge is NOT enough, and that has been clearly

demonstrated by Cyc's lack of demonstrated value

in universality of intelligence. 

Small, highly focused projects, such as the blocks

world and its successful linguistic manipulation

as per Terry Winograd's (admitted) kluge, and the

surprisingly good results from very simple (also

kludged) chatbots such as Parry, and the

Somebody's Prize demonstrating lack of scalability

of said chatbots, shows SOMETHING.  But what KIND

of something?

More study of Cyc seems to belong to the same

viewpoint as theocratic studies of angel densities

and pinheads, the viscosity of ether, and mappings

of magnetic fields in thousands of points.

Instead, the Einsteinian approach of novel - dare

I say subjective -interpretations (in his case, of

the Michelson-Morley results) seems to be what is

most clearly lacking at this point in time. 

Why DON'T huge hunks of deduced, induced, abduced

and reduced knowledge suffice?  What is still

lacking?  Why don't gobs of special purpose

functionality, coupled with gobs of knowledge, do

the trick?

Why DO simple approaches work so well at small

scales?

Why DON't simple approaches scale well? 

Why DOESN't a simple chatbot with Cyc on its back

suffice to convince observers in a Turing test?

In the fifties or so, game theory was developing.

Turing came up with a biological explanation of

what would be called the hox genes to form complex

biological strata.  Lately, we have learned that

there are only some 20,000 genes which are

adequate for making a human bean, but that leaves

out a LOT of so called JUNK DNA, meaning genetic

structures we still don't have a clue about. 

Those are the kinds of new ideas that need to be

reduced to practice.  And that is why the patent

form, with one advance teaching AGAINST prior art,

seems interesting to me as a model of how to take

the next steps. 

-Rich

Sincerely,

Rich Cooper

EnglishLogicKernel.com

Rich AT EnglishLogicKernel DOT com

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-----Original Message-----

From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On

Behalf Of John F. Sowa

Sent: Wednesday, August 31, 2011 11:41 AM

To: ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Semantics of Natural

Languages

Rich,

Some comments:

JFS

>> About a dozen years ago, I was talking with

Mike Genesereth,

>> who said "Lenat is probably the only one who

doesn't know that

>> Cyc has failed."

RC

> That is the kind of thinking that all of us show

in one form or

> another.  We seem stuck in our structured ways

after the first four

> decades or six, unable to overthrow the past

beliefs and institute

> new untried ones.

Genesereth has been one of the strongest

proponents of classical

logic-based AI.  He has been teaching at Stanford

for years in

close collaboration with the same people

(McCarthy, Feigenbaum,

Fikes, etc.) as Lenat.  Any success stories from

Cyc would have

provided more attention (and funding) for all

kinds of projects

that used logic-based AI.  But Mike G. was being

realistic.  I

would qualify his comment, but I certainly

couldn't refute it.

In my 1984 book, I tried to take a balanced view

of the strengths

and limitations of logic-based systems.  My view

then (and with

more input since then) has been that logic-based

systems are

important, especially for applications to comp.

sci., but that

NLP systems must include logic-based approaches as

a proper subset:

  1. Large numbers of applications in computer

systems, database

     systems, programming systems, and

hardware/software design,

     require a foundation in formal logic.

  2. Natural languages can be used in very precise

ways (for

     example, along the lines of controlled NLs),

but they

     can also be used in very scruffy, very

informal ways.

  3. The overwhelming volume of NL speech and

documents use

     highly informal, often ungrammatical, and

"innovative"

     language.  (I'm using "innovative" as a

neutral term

     for what many people would call "incorrect".)

  3. I also agree with the comment by Alan Perlis

that you

     can't translate informal language to formal

language by

     any formal algorithm.

  4. I believe that you can interpret highly

informal language

     by computer, but that you need to use huge

amounts of

     background knowledge (i.e., extralinguistic

information)

     to do so.

  5. Point #4 is acknowledged by classical

logic-based AI projects

     such as Cyc.  But they assume that you need a

long gestation

     period that depends on hand-coded logical

representations

    (e.g., formal ontologies and knowledge bases).

  6. The scruffies, such as Roger Schank, disputed

that claim

     from the early days (1960s).  But they didn't

have the

     facilities for acquiring, storing, and using

such large

     volumes of information.

  7. The hardware today is more than adequate to

store and

     process the huge volumes of information

needed to support

     point #6.  One example is the IBM Watson

project, but

     there are other projects that have achieved

comparable

     success with more modest hardware resources.

The

     VivoMind applications I summarized are among

them.

> I don't see much of anything discussed about Cyc

past the

> precursors I mentioned anywhere in the public

literature;

> I'm not referring to tutorials about Cyc, but

about analyses.

For the research publications, see

    http://cyc.com/cyc/technology/pubs

For free downloads of the ontology and supporting

software:

    http://opencyc.org/

I believe that there are many useful applications

of Cyc and OpenCyc,

but I also believe that a different architecture

is necessary to

achieve something that could be called natural

language understanding.

That is what I have been discussing in talks,

publications, and emails.

John

 

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