Matthew -On Feb 19, 2012, at 10:18 AM, Matthew West wrote: I would have expected you to support them in this from your remarks, rather than be critical.
"Different perspective" would be my preferred term.
If the world of ontology would clearly & openly state: "An ontology is useful for this & not for that" I'd be far happier & less acrid.
If logic would help with the maintenance & design of software systems, I'd be all for it. But if logic hobbles the use of terms to a single meaning, then clearly logic isn't much use in maintaining/developing systems. The context of my view is commercial business systems, not life sciences. I don't know if geology is closer to a life science.
As always I revert to my favorite, oft-repeated example... a life insurance company that found 70 different names for the core business concept (term?) "policy number." In a business environment where product lines are bought & sold, systems are custom built by different teams & packages are bought, the reality is there will be many (illogical) names for the same thingy.
At one point I entertained delusions that ontologies would help with this issue (one conceptual label = many physical labels). Obviously I no longer hope in that direction. ___________________ David Eddy
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