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Re: [ontolog-forum] What is Data? What is a Datum? 2013-01-09-0930

To: ontolog-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
From: Kingsley Idehen <kidehen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 10 Jan 2013 14:51:44 -0500
Message-id: <50EF1BD0.5010609@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
On 1/10/13 2:32 PM, Ed Barkmeyer wrote:
> On 1/9/2013 8:36 AM, John F Sowa wrote:
>> >Sjir,
>> >
>>> >>I would just have said that a datum is a proposition that is taken to
>>> >>be, or asserted to be, true.  The context for that role is any context
>>> >>in which the proposition is taken to be true.
>> >I agree.
>> >
>> >I would also add that not all data is propositional.  For example,
>> >the list of names and numbers in a telephone book consists of paired
>> >instances of two kinds of data.  Each pair becomes a proposition
>> >when the instances are inserted in an appropriate schema:
>> >
>> >      "The person named _________ has the telephone number ________."
> I disagree.  That is, the meaning of each pair in the telephone
> directory is a proposition of that form, and the pair is a datum. It is
> not necessary to express the sentence per se.
>
> Is John saying that the name of the person is not by itself a
> proposition?  I would argue that, if one considers the name of the
> person alone to be a datum, then it expresses a different proposition,
> to wit:  There exists a person whose name is X. Further, the presence of
> the name in the telephone book implies the proposition:  There exists a
> telephone number N such that the person named X has telephone number N.
> Both of these follow from the proposition that is the meaning of the
> pair (datum).
>
> The distinction I am making is in what the datum is.  I argue that a
> datum is a proposition.  A value without any interpretation is not a
> datum.  It is a child without a meaning.
>
Thus, in Turtle notation [1] for RDF model based data representation 
syntax, the following is an example of a Datum (a single proposition), 
right?    (01)

<#PersonX> <#hasPhoneNumber> <tel:+999-999-9999> .    (02)

While this is Data i.e., more than one proposition, as in:    (03)

<#PersonX> <#hasPhoneNumber> <tel:+999-999-9999> ;
                     <#knows> <#PersonY> .    (04)

Links:    (05)

1. http://www.w3.org/TeamSubmission/turtle/
2. http://www.w3.org/TR/turtle/ .    (06)

--     (07)

Regards,    (08)

Kingsley Idehen 
Founder & CEO
OpenLink Software
Company Web: http://www.openlinksw.com
Personal Weblog: http://www.openlinksw.com/blog/~kidehen
Twitter/Identi.ca handle: @kidehen
Google+ Profile: https://plus.google.com/112399767740508618350/about
LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/kidehen    (09)

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