On Wed, September 26, 2012 11:14, David C. Hay wrote:
> In my model of the world (dare I say "upper level ontology"),
> Enterprise Model Patterns: Describing the World, I have put a lot of
> thought into the distinctions you describe here. (01)
When was this model created? Cyc had all of these concepts by 1998,
if not by 1996 -- other than the "Other X" concepts. (IP address was
created in 1999). Cyc made the distinction of treating geopolitical
entities from geographical regions in 1998. One could use a context
in which the geopolitical entity was an agent, or one in which it was
also a piece of land. This ontology fragment has it as a piece of land. (02)
The #$comment for #$GeographicalRegion reads:
'A specialization of GeographicalThing and SurfaceRegion-Tangible. Each
instance of GeographicalRegion is a tangible spatial region that includes
some piece of the surface of a planet (usually PlanetEarth), and may be
represented on a map of the planet. This includes purely topographical
regions like mountains and underwater spaces, places defined by
demographics (e.g. language areas) and territory otherwise demarcated
(e.g. TimeZones). In "dualist" geopolitical contexts (see
DualistGeopoliticalMt), instances of GeopoliticalEntity are also
considered to be instances of GeographicalRegion. (03)
In all cases the region in question must contain some tangible component
with which it is possible to make physical contact. The instances of
GeographicalRegion contrast in this respect with the instances of
GeographicalThing-Intangible, which are wholly intangible. (04)
Examples of GeographicalRegion include RockyMountainStates-USRegion, the
ContinentOfAustralia, SinaiPeninsula, and -- in "dualist" geopolitical
contexts -- YaleUniversity and CityOfPittsburghPA. Some important types of
regions are represented by the sub-collections LanguageArea, TimeZone,
PostalCodeRegion, EcologicalRegion, ConstructionSite, and -- in "dualist"
geopolitical contexts -- GeopoliticalEntity. No instances of
GeographicalRegion are wholly indoor locations.' (05)
I urge people who want to develop ontologies of common things to
first check what OpenCyc has. It can save a lot of reinventing of
complex wheels. Cyc is certainly far from perfect and has huge
holes, but with hundreds of staff years being put into a publicly
available ontology, many parts of which are very carefully considered,
it can be used to speed up such ontology development projects. (06)
One can save staff months or years by examining what has already
been done in your field. (07)
-- doug foxvog (08)
> In my model, Geographic Location, is an place on Earth (OK, I am a
> geocentric personality, but the model can be extended skyward if
> necessary). The sub-types are Geographic Area, Geographic Point,
> Geographic Line, and Geographic Solid. (I only encountered the
> latter two late in my career, when I worked for a telephone company
> and an oil company.)
>
> Geographic Area, then, is defined as any bounded 2-dimensional place.
> (Since we're talking about the Earth, we have to recognize that it's
> really a spherically 2-dimensional place, but that's in the advanced
> class...)
>
> Geographic Area has four sub-types:
>
> 1. Geopolitical Area is a Geographic Area whose boundaries are
> defined by law or treaty. Thus you have the Geographic Areas that
> are "California", "Los Angeles County", and the like. Defining
> sub-types for Geopolitical Area depends on where you are, but I've
> come up with at least these:
> a. City
> b. Country
> c. Principle Country Subdivision (which is a really ugly name for
> "State", or "Province" or (for our UK buddies) "County") In most
> real models it turns out to be something like State or Province.
> d. Other Geopolitical Area (subject to negotiation).
>
> 2. Administrative Area is a Geographic Area whose boundaries are
> defined, typically, by an organization, such as a corporation, but
> also may be by a government. Examples of this include "South-central
> sales area" (defined by a company), "United States Pacific Command
> (USPACOM)"(defined by the US Department of Defense), and more common,
> a "Postal Area" (defined by a national postal authority).
>
> 3. Natural Area is a Geographic Area whose boundaries are defined by
> natural phenomena, such as lakes or continents.
>
> 4. Other Surveyed Area is any Geographic Area (other than 1-3, above)
> that is measured and whose boundaries are recorded. This includes
> the lot my house is on, the area that is the location of the World
> Trade Center in New York, and so forth.
>
> Geographic Point is just that: a Geographic Location that is a
> single point. Usually it's attributes are "longitude", "latitude",
> and "elevation", but with different systems of geographic reckoning,
> they could be something else.
>
> Note the this model requires a Geographic Location Relationship,
> which is the recursive entity type that links one Geographic Location
> to another. Sub-types of this include Geographic Definition (linking
> points to areas, lines and solids), Geographic Structure (that puts
> "Boston" inside "Massachusetts"), Geographic Overlap (one of which
> puts the "Navaho Indian Reservation" in "Arizona", and another of
> which puts the "Navaho Indian Reservation" in New Mexico. And of
> course there's Other Geographic Location Relationship, just in case.
>
> All of this is a pretty sophisticated way to represent just
> places. The Government that has jurisdiction over a Geopolitical
> Area is represented by an Organization, linked to the Geopolitical
> Area via a link class that I have cleverly called Jurisdiction.
>
> Note also that this only covers the place itself. A "place with a
> purpose" is variously called a Site, a Facility, or an Address. This
> is where one or more Parties (Persons or Organizations) are located
> to perform one or more Activities, which consume, use, or produce one
> or more Physical Assets.
>
> Note that Address (for example) has two sub-types: Physical Address
> (which has some fairly complex relationships with Geographic
> Location), and Virtual Address (which nicely covers Telephone
> Address, E-mail Address, IP Address, and so forth.)
>
> A Party may be located in one or more Addresses (Physical or
> Virtual), just as an Address may be the location of one or more Parties.
>
> Note that a physical building is located in one (or more?) Site
> (again, for example), but it is not the same as the Site. It is a
> Physical Asset.
>
> Among the simplest applications we build simply lists names and
> addresses. That's an output. To actually understand what goes
> inside that "simple" application requires way more sophistication
> than most people appreciate. I've spent a fair amount of my career
> working on this model.
>
> If you've actually read this far, you are a good candidate for buying my
> book.
>
> Regards
>
> Dave Hay
>
>
> At 08:52 AM 9/26/2012, you wrote:
>>On 9/26/2012 8:53 AM, Andries van Renssen wrote:
>> > The reason why the expression 'I dig a hole in the school district'
>> > sounds odd is: because that expression is a short-cut for 'I dig
>> > a hole in the land that has a role as school district'.
>>
>>I agree with that point. The notion of role is essential for
>>distinguishing every subdivision on planet earth. There is
>>always a reason or a purpose for the choice. That is true for
>>everything from countries and continents to things like farms,
>>parking lots, and playgrounds.
>>
>> > But the piece of land that is defined by that boundary is
>> > nevertheless a physical object, and it has a mass, although
>> > its value is unknown and not of interest.
>>
>>Space is physical, but it doesn't have a mass. An area is
>>a two-dimensional region. The political subdivisions only
>>specify coordinates that determine the area at the surface,
>>and they are silent about depth or height.
>>
>>By fiat, the governments of countries lay claim to the mineral
>>rights beneath their areas. In principle, they could claim rights
>>down to the center of the earth. But in practice, the technology
>>can only mine a few km. beneath the surface.
>>
>>When air travel became possible, national governments laid claim
>>to the air space above them, but smaller governments did not.
>>But nobody laid claim to the regions above the atmosphere.
>>Those are more distinctions by fiat.
>>
>>In summary, I recommend that any ontology for any subdivision
>>of the earth should specify the surface area S and the intended
>>role R for that area.
>>
>>Then anything else that may be associated with the pair (S,R),
>>such as the land, air, water, people, buildings, governments,
>>should be specified as the X associated with the area S as
>>considered in the role R.
>>
>>John
>>
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>
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