Re: [ontolog-forum] master data vs. ontologies

[Steven Ericsson-Zenith <steven@xxxxxxx>]

Dear William,

a. Recall that I spoke about the use of a proof. I did not include how a proof might make you feel.

b. Your concern over consistency relates to the question of boolean "truth" values. And I assume, you refer to Godel's incompleteness, Tarski's undefinability, and the Church or Turing thesis. Of course, these are demonstrated for truth systems. 

c. My colleagues (actually, David Shepherd) successfully demonstrated the implementation of the IEEE 754 standard. They did this by converting the standard into Occam and then Occam to CSP, the language in which the machine microcode was specified. This was then demonstrated to be equivalent to the RTL hardware description from which the device was manufactured. This is electrical engineering and at this level there is no concern about quantum effects.

It is not widely appreciated that truth based systems are inherently, and necessarily, dualist. As a result it is hardly surprising that there are logical statements that are ambiguous or may only be specified by an external language. Essentially, and this deals with foundational matters. To overcome it you must eliminate the notion of truth in favor of direct and holistic behavior (or action) where such inconsistency is impossible (essentially because you are not speaking about the world, you are simply describing it). 

Inconsistency is a long standing problem in logic but it is not insurmountable. The confusion came from holding truth to be something in the world. The moment we escape metaphysics the problem disappears.

d. Pure Mathematics draws necessary conclusions from premises of any kind and is not a natural science. Natural science applies pure mathematics (that is capable of telling us beautiful lies) and it is the role (in my world) of Logic to build the bridge between Pure Mathematics and the natural sciences (i.e., I do not hold with Logicism). There are certainly aspects of computer engineering that are pure mathematics but this does not make computer engineering a natural science. 

There are, however, things in natural science that can inform the engineering of computing machines, and indeed, this is where I spend a good deal of time. Engineering is a fine profession and there is no shame in using the term, although this does seem to be a very European view.

Engineering is driven by human economics and gathering a proof (that a bridge will not fall down, for example) would be incredibly expensive. And this is why good engineers have good intuitions. It is also why few efforts of the kind I describe above for the IEEE standard have been funded.

At which point does engineering become science? I think this is a good question and it may well take place in coming decades in bioengineering. But my guess is that we will all need to have longer lifespans and longer careers before this happens.  

e. I was being informal in my use of the term "compatible" - I mean only that a proof should be continuous through specifications.

Regards,

Steven

On Thu, Feb 12, 2015 at 4:47 PM, William Frank <williamf.frank@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Steven Ericsson-Zenith <steven@xxxxxxx>

wrote:

"Let me just note a couple of peripheral issues. 

1. Proof of a software program is only of use to you if the behavior of the underlying hardware is formally proven and that proof is compatible with the proof of the program. "

 This is one of the most puzzling sentences I have ever read.  

a. Why is a proof useless because it does not prove that everything is also OK in the world to which the thing proven might be related and by which it might be affected?   The use of a proof helps convince you that *at least that part* of the problem is less likely to cause us trouble. 

b. Even the proof does not guarantee that we have absolute certainty, since of course many proofs that convince many people prove to be incorrect.  If I recall, the *consistency* proof on Copi's Symbolic Logic was for sure wrong for the first two editions, as each edition had been shown to be inconsistent, in a more convincing manner.  (The consistency proof in edition three has stood.)

c. the idea that we could prove anything about underlying hardware is amazing.  I though that the physical sciences were of their very nature inexact, and that the behavior of all physical objects was unpredicatable, to one degree or another.    If I am wrong, something awfully big has happened in science that passed me by.  I would truly love to hear it named. 

d. this seems to be related to your claim, Steven, that there is 'no such thing' as 'computer science.'  Where I went to school, 'computer science' was defined to be a branch of **pure mathematics** that had many (as always) inexact applications in computer engineering.     This idea fell on deaf ears last time I raised it in this forum, and I have continued to wonder why.  I can't imagine why it is a controversial view, except perhaps that there are all those computer science departments out there that teach a little computer science, and alot of computer engineering, and don't make the distinction they should.  (Then, I taught for a while at a school that had a department of 'poultry science', which likewise did not distinquish the specialized zoology from the engineering). 

But, it is am important distinction.  After all, if we could prove things about physical machines, as well as theoretical ones, then why would not all engineering actually be science?  Perhaps because we built it, rather than found it by the side of the road?  (Well, as I said before, I never found any Turing machines on the side of the road, and I never expect to.) I If somebody told me, I can prove my bridge will never fall down!  I can prove no one can every hack this cypher! I would have said, let me hire somebody who knows his business better than to say either of those things.  But, again, maybe something awful big has happened in science while I was not looking.   

e. finally, though it has been more than 30 years since I was a professional in proof theory, I do continue to dabble and publish in the philosophy of logic, and i was even interested in the head-of-a-pin question of whether two proofs concatenated was also a proof.  But, I did not ever hear of the concept of proofs being 'compatable' and can't find it on the web, or in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.  So, again, it is an idea I would find very interesting, if it has a definition.

On Thu, Feb 12, 2015 at 6:52 PM, Ravi Sharma <drravisharma@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

John

Your last link is a great description, still learning about transition from top of Ontology architecture quadrants to Implementation architecture, since that transition is not so smooth in-spite of having tools mentioned and standards developed (that limit RDBMS to inter operate with Ontologies  in this MDM - Ontology thread), hence this space does need to become routine! Will it ever become commodity like O-R mappers or JDBC ODBC?

Regards,

Ravi

On Thu, Feb 12, 2015 at 3:25 PM, Steven Ericsson-Zenith <steven@xxxxxxx> wrote:

Let me just note a couple of peripheral issues. 

1. Proof of a software program is only of use to you if the behavior of the underlying hardware is formally proven and that proof is compatible with the proof of the program. 

2. Not all hardware is formally specified or proven.

3. Similarly, proof of a software program is only of use to you if the behavior of the underlying translators are formally proven and that proof is compatible with the proof of the program. 

4. Not all translators are formally specified or proven.

5. In fact, 2 and 4 above are weakly stated. Few hardware devices, and certainly fewer computing machine, are formally species or proven. Not one translator in common use, of which I am aware, is formally specified or proven. And this is not to mention the ad hoc nature of most interpreters. 

Regards,

Steven

On Thu, Feb 12, 2015 at 3:13 PM, John F Sowa <sowa@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Dear Matthew, Alex, David, Ravi, and Kingsley,

MW
> What the ontologies and master data represent is essentially
> the same thing.

I agree.  And the operations performed by a computer program
are just as logical as anything specified in OWL.  (But what
that program does so logically might not be what the programmer
had intended.)

JFS
>> Anybody who has ever written a program that runs correctly
>> on a digital computer is a mathematician.

AS
> if and only if that anybody has proved correctness

My claim does not require a formal proof:

  1. Every digital computer is a logic machine.  And every program
     performs logical operations on strings of bits.  But there is
     no guarantee that what the program does has any relationship
     to what the programmer had intended.

  2. But anybody who has written a program that has performed at
     least one computation as intended has correctly anticipated
     what the computer would do for that computation.

  3. Therefore, that programmer has demonstrated the ability to think
     logically -- at least for that example.  If you want to be 99.9%
     certain, ask the programmer to demonstrate 10 correct results.

DP
> Ontologies are data models written using logic-based languages and
> can cover whatever scope is of interest.

I agree with Matthew that the notation need not be called a logic
for the specification to be called an ontology.  (And it's irrelevant
whether the person who wrote the specification used the O-word).

RS
> Do any mapping tools exist?

Many kinds of mapping tools have been developed.  Logic programming
languages such as Prolog are an example.  UML diagrams can be and
have been mapped to logic, and there are tools for using UML diagrams
(and many similar notations) to generate some or all of a computable
specification.

As Kingsley mentioned, there are also tools that map declarations
for one computable form to declarations for another.

RS
> Are organizations such as OMG and W3C doing it already

Yes.  OMG sponsored the fUML specifications for a subset of UML:
http://www.omg.org/spec/FUML/Current/

I discuss many projects and reports for various kinds of
mappings on the web page "Semantics for interoperable systems":
http://www.jfsowa.com/ikl

John








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--

Thanks.
Ravi
(Dr. Ravi Sharma)
313 204 1740 Mobile

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