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Re: [ontology-summit] Defining "ontology"

To: Ontology Summit 2007 Forum <ontology-summit@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: Charles D Turnitsa <CTurnits@xxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2007 10:15:29 -0500
Message-id: <OFE01D9808.8F62D17E-ON8525726C.0053703F-8525726C.0053D3E5@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Leo,
    (01)

 Thanks for the response.  I just took a look at your slide, and I find
myself a little surprised that you place a thesaurus at a higher level of
expressiveness than a taxonomy, but perhaps this is another sand trap of
nomenclature...
    (02)

 I have, over the past year, drawn one of the major differences between a
thesaurus and taxonomy at the fact that a thesaurus shows things like
synonym and homonym relationships, but these tend to focus on the term (or
symbol) level, whereas a taxonomy tends to organize things into a
subsumption hierarchy, which shows a growth of meaning from a root entity
to any leaf.  In my understanding, the taxonomy tends to have a greater
capacity to show meaning, than a thesaurus.
    (03)

Chuck
    (04)



ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote on 01/22/2007 09:20:00 PM:
    (05)

> Charles,
>

> I agree with you. A number of us through the years have come up with

> similar ontology continuums or spectrums. I prefer my Ontology

> Spectrum*, but that's natural, I guess. It was developed over time

> to act as an educational aid. I found that many folks understood

> notions such as taxonomies, database schemas, UML models, but they

> didn't know how these related to the new kid on the block,

> ontologies. Was a thesaurus an ontology? No. Was a UML model: no,

> not yet. And term vs. concept (placeholder for real world referent)

> is a crucial distinction. The former is a word/phrase (string,

> utterance) that indexes the latter, which is a representation of the

> meaning of that term (at least approximately). The important point

> is that these concepts/placeholders are meant to stand in for real

> world referents, since ontology is about the things of the world.  I

> also attach a newer slide that tries to show those distinctions,

> along with their typical use cases:

OntologySpectrumApplication-Obrst06.jpg.
>

> Thanks,

> Leo

>

> *If you look at the current Wikipedia article on the subject, it's

> not completely accurate: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_spectrum

> . I independently developed the Ontology Spectrum in Fall, 1999, and

> it really represents one dimension, though it is depicted diagonally

> (for increased space) as though it were two dimensional: the one

> dimension is in terms of expressivity of the model. Also the 4 way

> stations of taxonomy, thesaurus, conceptual model, and logical

> theory are semantic models; that is why I don’t include glossaries,

> term lists, etc., directly -- they are not models but are human

> language lists and definitions. Mike Uschold, Mike Gruninger, and

> Chris Welty and I have talked about this topic of the co-invention

> of the semantic/ontology spectrum for quite some time. Personally, I

> prefer my Ontology Spectrum because I overlay onto the specific

> models additional information, such as the kind of parent-child

> relation, related database and modeling languages, and logic

> information. But all of these ontology spectrum/semantic continuums

> are sound: they represent the best distillations of solid

> generalizations especially good for educational purposes.You are

> probably referring to the presentations I gave at Ontolog last Jan

> 19/26 2006: "What is an ontology? - A Briefing on the Range of Semantic

Models
> ", http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?ConferenceCall_2006_01_12.

>

> _____________________________________________

> Dr. Leo Obrst       The MITRE Corporation, Information Semantics

> lobrst@xxxxxxxxx    Center for Innovative Computing & Informatics

> Voice: 703-983-6770 7515 Colshire Drive, M/S H305

> Fax: 703-983-1379   McLean, VA 22102-7508, USA

>    (06)

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