Pat and John, I find these to be among the most sensible words I have read. (01)
Having said that, I can't help pointing out the elephant in the room,
which is the single-universe-of-discourse assumption/hypothesis/goal:
the "Esperanto Fantasy" that keeps rising from its own ashes, and that
seems to be part of our genetic program. (02)
I think our community, like the wider human community itself, could
benefit from far more application of the Darwinian insight that our very
lives depend on the robustness and flexibility that only a diverse and
complex ecosphere can provide. It's the diametric opposite of the
command-and-control attitude of the (often military) money that supports
our work. (03)
Now, if we can just find a way to create a marketplace for
identification of universes of discourse and for the long-term
maintenance of bridges between them, tourguide services, etc. The first
problem is to get past the deadly ideas that: (04)
* I am the center of the only universe. (05)
* My tribe must win the next war. (06)
* It's a "main achievement" for a lexicon to be "universally used". (07)
* Uniformity is better than diversity. (08)
* Cultural features, attitudes, ambiguities, etc. whose utility is not
currently recognized need not be conserved. Every geneticist knows
better than that, and we should, too. (09)
On 04/05/2015 10:06 AM, John F Sowa wrote:
> On 4/4/2015 9:17 PM, Pat Hayes wrote:
>> I strongly suspect that the main achievement of the semantic-web
>> / linked-data movement might simply be a universally used lexicon
>> for referring to a large fraction of the things people want to
>> communicate about, backed up with places to plug in axioms where
>> they are needed, which will not be everywhere.
> I agree.
>
> I'd also like to point out that such lexicons are used in every
> branch of science, engineering, and everyday life.
>
> Physicists continue to use Newton's words, even though the axioms
> and definitions have changed and keep changing in radically new
> ways: force, mass, energy, momentum, time, space, etc.
>
> People don't coin new words for every discovery or invention.
> They just use the old words in new ways.
>
> Eventually, the dictionary makers notice. So they add new
> "word senses" to their dictionaries.
>
> John
>
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