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Bill,
Although I think concepts are internal (call them instead
ideas or semantic senses, if you wish), I think they appropriately point to
things in the world, so the shared semantics has two aspects:sense and
reference. The latter is the thing in the world; the former is the
placeholder for that, and indexed by our language constructs. Insofar as we
share a common notion of the things in the world, we do have a common semantics,
i.e., via a common reference. One might say in fact that the degree to which our
thoughts match or map to the things in the world is the degree to which we have
a common way of thinking about the things of the world. And then, finally, the
degree to which our terminology and compositions of our terminology align with
those common thoughts is the degree to which we can communicate with reasonably
shared semantics.
What I don't understand is how my term can map directly to
a thing in the world and bypass my thoughts.
Let's
do an experiment:
Refer
directly to a specific tree without 1) using language, 2) pointing, or 3)
thinking about that tree. I'd say you can probably do without (1) or (2) (e.g., most animals), but how can you do
without (3)?
Can the tree be physically in my head? If you
say that the term-reference relation is in my head, then I would say that
term-reference relation is a concept (yes, an entity, class, relation, property,
instance, logical operatory, if you will -- as a way of characterizing the
kinds of concepts), a reified representation in my head, and that that
term-reference relation in fact can dispense with the term, since we think that
animals can know the world without necessarily having language. Is the tree in
the head of my dog? I don't think so: I think the dog has an idea about the
tree.
I still think that one of the causes of our
dissonance is that we are talking about 1) ontology, 2) logic, and 3) semantics,
and not keeping these things straight. I would say that we build engineering
models (call them engineering ontologies) which try to represent the real world.
However, those engineering models consist of two items: 1) labels and 2) the
representation of the meaning of those labels where the meaning is expressed as
formal classes, entities, relations, properties, instances, rules, etc.,
that are supposed to align with what we think is the way the real world is
and "means". Now, labels are terms, i.e., the names we give to these
representations. As such they are elements of our language, abstracted or
idealized. We have other terms we use in ordinary communication that index those
labels. Both the terms and the labels are vocabulary; their interpretations,
i.e., the actual formal models (stand-ins or representations for the real world
things) they map to, and the mappings, are their semantics. Because
a logic itself is a language, we have another filegree of potential
dissonance.
I use "concept" not because I am a conceptualist
(I'm not), but because I think that that notion abstracts over stuff like
entity, class, property, relation, attribute, instance, rule, etc.
Thanks,
Leo _____________________________________________
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
Hey Leo...
Your note hits precisely at the issue that I think plagues concept
talk.
(1) If concepts are private to bearers, then why pretend to talk about
"shared semantics", "shared meanings" and so on, as is common in the
literature on ontology in computer science? For this to work, there
would have to be something (anything!) by virtue of which such concepts could
be shared. There are, as you know, theories about how that may come
about (I'm thinking of Carnap's private language argument), but nobody's
talking about that in computer science ontology.
(2) If concepts are not private, then there must be some nexus that
supports the non-private component of them that is shared. Generally, we
of a realist bent take that to be *reality*. Barry's comment concerning
the bio-ontologist who thinks of their computational bio-ontology
representing not concepts, but biological reality, comes to mind.
If we still want concepts (say to talk about someone's personal concepts) some
form of conceptual realism can be employed to relate the
two.
In either case, I don't think any useful work is done whatsoever by
calling the things denoted by linguistic terms in *computational* ontologies
"concepts" with no further comment. We humans (at least those of us who
are not concept theorists) seem to resort to to the use of the term "concept"
for the same reason that we call something we can't remember the name of a
"thingy" or "whatchamacallit" - in this form it's a kind of forgivable
intellectual laziness. That, or we're *really* talking about concepts in
which case we have lots of work to do. Rather, wouldn't it be better -
especially if one doesn't care about (philosophically-motivated) ontology -
simply to use the more neutral terms of "property", "relation", and "object"
that can be taken to correspond to the denotation of relation- (unary and
greater-than-unary) and constant-terms in mathematical logic. Nicola
Guarino, and later with Chris Welty, went this direction. This relates
to Welty's comment of yesterday about there being nothing new in computer
science ontology -- it's almost as if computer scientists engaged in the
"semantic technology" field are afraid to use terms that might make their
enterprise seem less sexy and "semantic", so they stick with
"concept"
On Apr 20, 2007, at 21:27 , Obrst, Leo J. wrote:
[Opinion on]
Everything is a concept: entities, relations among
them, properties, attributes, even many instances/individuals (days of the
week; Joe Montana; etc.) Especially when you think of concept in animal
mental apparatus as a placeholder for something real in the real world (I am
a realist). Sure, I have a concept for 'Joe Montana'. Is that concept a
general notion, i.e., a class of something? No.
The general problem (from my perspective) is that we
are typically always addressing two perspectives: 1) ontology, i.e., what
exists in the world? and 2) semantics, i.e., what is the relationship
between our ways of talking/thinking and those things in the world? To me
it's clear that we are talking about (1) things of the world, but our
language (and our thought, I would say) interposes another layer or two. I
would say there are minimally 3 things: 1) our language (terms and
compositions of terms), 2) the senses of terms (and their compositions)
which we might characterize as concepts, and 3) real world referents that
those senses or concepts somehow point to. In formal semantics, a good
theory of reference (i.e., (3)) is hard to come by.
[Opinion off]
_____________________________________________
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
me-thinks this is a leftover from DL-speak in which
'concept' refers to the classes, not the relationships.
I prefer the
broader use of 'concept' whereby one speaks of the concept of having a
brother, or of being a mentor (which of course are
relationships).
Good to raise this ambiguity.
Mike
==========================
Michael Uschold
M&CT, Phantom Works
425 373-2845
michael.f.uschold@xxxxxxxxxx
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Correction. Second sentence should read:
Are
relations not "conceptual" in the way that "concepts" are?
Sorry 'bout that.
On Apr 20, 2007, at 20:57 , Bill Andersen wrote:
Pat,
How come "relations" are a separate category from "concepts"?
Are relations not "conceptual" in the way that "conceptual" are?
If it is the case that 'concept' is just parlor speak for those things
that we typically represent with nodes in a taxonomy or unary predicates
in a logic, and if 'relation' is used to talk about those things that
are not "concepts" (i.e. the things we like to represent with predicate
terms of arity greater than one), then the distinction seems
artificial. Should there not be just "concepts" divided into the
1-, 2- ... n-ary cases?
.bill
On Apr 20, 2007, at 19:12 , Cassidy, Patrick J. wrote:
In discussions I use:
"A representation of the structure of
concepts and the relations
between them, in a form that a computer can
reason with."
Pat
Patrick Cassidy
CNTR-MITRE
260 Industrial Way West
Eatontown NJ 07724
Eatontown: 732-578-6340
Cell: 908-565-4053
-----Original Message-----
Of Peter F Brown
Sent: Friday, April 20, 2007 7:08 PM
To: Ontology Summit 2007 Forum
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Ontology
Framework Draft
StatementfortheOntology Summit
Too many too's... ;-)
But seriously, are we looking for a Gartner
Group-style 4 word
mission
statement to make it sound good, or do we
want a formulation that
actually does mean something and that we
can agree on?
Brevity does not
always equate with clarity: if I have to
choose to sacrifice one, it
would be brevity.
Peter
-----Original Message-----
Deborah
MacPherson
Sent: 20 April 2007 16:02
To: Ontology Summit 2007 Forum
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Ontology
Framework Draft Statement
fortheOntology Summit
"a formal description of
terms that represent concepts and
relationships in as
chosen subject matter of
interest"
is too long, too much of a mouthful of too
many words.
Debbie
Its almost good enough... But an ontology
is more than just about
terms.
How about:
"a formal description of
terms that represent concepts and
relationships in as
chosen subject matter of interest"
Mike
==========================
Michael Uschold
M&CT, Phantom Works
425 373-2845
==========================
----------------------------------------------------
COOL TIP: to skip the phone menu tree and
get a human on
the phone, go
-----Original Message-----
Sent: Friday, April 20, 2007 3:08
PM
To: Ontology Summit 2007 Forum
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Ontology
Framework Draft
Statement for
theOntology Summit
I agree: we've worked with the definition
"a formal descriptions of
terms and the relationships between them"
[1] as being good
enough to
know what we talking about when we're
talking about what
we're talking
about...and "good enough" should be good
enough.
Peter
[1] From 'OASIS Reference Model for
Service-Oriented Architecture',
p17,
see
-----Original Message-----
Chris
Welty
Sent: 19 April 2007 20:23
To: Ontology Summit 2007 Forum
Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] Ontology
Framework Draft
Statement for
the Ontology Summit
Surely after 15 years we can do better
than "specification of a
conceptualization"? Isn't it time we put
that one to rest?
-Chris
Obrst, Leo J. wrote:
All,
Here is our draft statement about the
Ontology Framework.
We invite
you to consider and discuss this -- now
and in next
week's sessions.
We intend this to be an inclusive
characterization of what an
ontology
is. Inclusive: meaning that we invite
you to consider
where you and
your community is with respect to these
dimensions. If you have
concerns or issues, restatements or
elaborations, please
let us know
now and next week. This will shortly be
posted on the
Framework Wiki
page:
meworksFor
Consideration.
Thanks much,
Tom Gruber, Michael Gruninger, Pat
Hayes, Deborah McGuinness, Leo
Obrst
_____________________________________________
Dr. Leo Obrst The
MITRE Corporation, Information Semantics
Voice: 703-983-6770 7515 Colshire
Drive, M/S H305
Fax: 703-983-1379 McLean, VA 22102-7508,
USA
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