At 12:07 AM -0400 3/21/08, Patrick Cassidy wrote:
>John,
> Among the 'reviewers' is there any reason not to have an expert committee
>that can create a binary distinction of, e.g. "well-structured" and "not
>well-structured"? The imprimatur can be an alternative to absolute
>exclusion, and still serve the legitimate concerns that Barry has about
>poorly constructed ontologies. (01)
If these terms could be given any kind of precise
meaning (other than something close to "done the
way I like") then maybe this idea would make
sense. However, I see no such meaning anywhere
even on the horizon at present. We simply do not
yet know what 'well structured' can possibly
mean, as a general category or classification
applying uniformly to all ontologies. The world
has not yet even settled on a single class of
basic logics to write ontologies in, and notions
of 'well-structured' must be hostage to the
underlying language, since the same structure may
easily be an efficient and robust technique in
one language and a syntax error or worse in
another. Most of the criteria given for approval
in the OBO framework are controversial, for
example. (BTW, the reason I keep citing OBO is
that it is the only extant example to cite, not
that I wish it ill.) (02)
The only effect of such a mechanism in actual
practice will be to impose some kind of
essentially arbitrary conformity on ontology
construction. Which may, indeed, for
interoperation purposes within a well-defined
community with shared goals and purposes - that
is, for standardization purposes - be a useful
effect. But then let us not call the result an
'open' repository. (03)
Pat Hayes (04)
>
>Pat
>
>Patrick Cassidy
>MICRA, Inc.
>908-561-3416
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>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: ontology-summit-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:ontology-summit-
>> bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John F. Sowa
>> Sent: Thursday, March 20, 2008 11:56 PM
>> To: Ontology Summit 2008
>> Subject: Re: [ontology-summit] [Quality] What means
>>
>> Pat, Barry, Deborah, and Ed,
>>
>> Barry asked an important question that gets to the heart of
>> the issues we have been discussing:
>>
>> BS> What are scientific journals for? Why do they employ a peer
>> > review process?
>>
>> There are two independent issues here: reviewing and publishing.
>> Everybody would agree that reviewing is important, but ideally,
>> the readers/users should have the option of making their own
>> choices based on the reviews. When publication was expensive,
>> the publishers became gatekeepers because it was economically
>> impractical to publish everything.
>>
>> But with the WWW, new options are available. Publication is
>> almost free, and we have the luxury of decoupling the reviewing
>> process from the gatekeeping process. Metadata enables that
>> decoupling:
>>
>> 1. All submissions to the OOR can be made available as soon
>> as they are submitted.
>>
>> 2. The metadata associated with each submission can indicate
>> what tests were made, what the reviewers said, and what
>> results the users, if any, obtained.
>>
>> 3. Users can choose to see ontologies sorted by any criteria
>> they want: in the order of best reviews, most thorough
>> testing, greatest usage, greatest relevance to a particular
>> domain, or any weighted combination.
>>
>> PH> This is where I part company with Barry, and indeed where I
>> > believe that the very idea of controlling the contents of an OOR
>> > (noting that the first O means 'open') needs to be examined very,
>> > very carefully. Of course we would not argue that majority voting
>> > should be used to choose scientific theories; but ontologies,
>> > even those used by scientists, are not themselves scientific
>> > theories.
>>
>> Ontologies overlap philosophy, engineering, science, and mathematics.
>> The closest model we have is the metadata registry, but new policies
>> can and should be explored.
> >
>> BS>> While refrigerator manufacturers may allow democratic ranking
>> >> to influence e.g. size and color, they would use other strategies
>> >> e.g. in matters of thermodynamics.
>>
>> PH> Perhaps so: but we are here discussing matters of ontology, and
>> > in the current state of the art, this may have more in common
>> > with consumer product choice than with thermodynamics.
>>
>> That is the point I was trying to emphasize. The application
>> developers have deeper understanding of their specific needs and
>> problems than any general gatekeeper or committee of gatekeepers.
>>
>> DM> CSI, the specification writing organization for building
>> > architecture, says quality is "a mirror of the requirements."
>>
>> That's a good point, which implies that different set of
>> requirements might lead to a different ranking of the same
>> ontologies. No gatekeeper can anticipate the requirements
>> of all possible users.
>>
>> DM> Do you think the gatekeepers can help define the OOR requirements
>> > and set up the dynamic tests?
>>
>> I'd prefer to keep the reviewers and replace the gatekeepers with
>> caretakers who have a broader role along the lines you suggested.
>>
>> EB> I'm thinking about bureaucrats. I think that many ontologies
>> > (and more broadly, concept systems including thesauri, taxonomies,
>> > etc.) have been and will be developed for use within the mission
>> > areas of government agencies. There can be a vetting process to
>> > "approve" a concept system/ontology for use within a community
>> > of interest.
>>
>> That suggests a further refinement of the roles of reviewers and
>> gatekeepers/caretakers. At the source, there are individuals and/or
>> organizations, who develop ontologies and make them available.
>> Among the users, there may be organizations, coalitions, or
>> bureaucracies that evaluate the ontologies and determine which
>> of them are best suited to their groups of users.
>>
>> That is another reason for replacing the gatekeepers in the OOR
>> with caretakers. Any gatekeeping that might be useful would be
>> better done by user groups at a level close to the applications
>> than by any gatekeeper that is close to the ontology providers.
>>
>> John
>>
>>
>>
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