ontology-summit
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: [ontology-summit] [Quality] What means

To: Barry Smith <phismith@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Ontology Summit 2008 <ontology-summit@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
From: Pat Hayes <phayes@xxxxxxx>
Date: Sun, 23 Mar 2008 11:44:07 -0500
Message-id: <p0623090bc40c363cdf97@[192.168.1.2]>
At 4:45 AM -0400 3/20/08, Barry Smith wrote:
>At 12:57 PM 3/20/2008, Pat Hayes wrote:
>>At 9:03 AM -0400 3/20/08, <phismith@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>On Thu Mar 20  2:34 , "John F. Sowa"  sent:
>>>
>>>>For any product, including an ontology, the best recommendations are
>>>>the reviews and reports from users that are recorded in the metadata.
>>>>As the reviews accumulate, prospective users can decide for themselves
>>>>which ontologies are best suited for their purpose(s).
>>>
>>>I think democratic ranking (the wisdom of crowds) is indeed valuable for
>>>refrigerators and other similar products. Hence the success of 
>>>ranking systems on
>>>eBay and amazon.com. But it is surely of less importance in 
>>>scientific contexts
>>>-- we would not decide on which interpretation of the equations of quantum
>>>physics to accept by taking a vote of users. Since the OBO Foundry 
>>>ontologies are
>>>built by scientists, to support scientific research, it is not 
>>>clear that they
>>>are to be treated as products.
>>
>>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. The OBO 
>>Foundry is quite clear, in its own documentation, that the basic 
>>ontological assumptions on which it is based are ultimately 
>>philosophical decisions, not scientific ones.
>
>The actual work of the Foundry in maintaining its ontologies is 50% 
>of the time focused on getting the science right. I think this 
>percentage will rise, as the ontologies themselves become more 
>mature.    (01)

Fair enough. I do however see a lot of email traffic devoted to 
questions of which things have to be put into which philosophical 
categories. I don't accept that calling something a continuant is 
doing science.    (02)

>>  Such assumptions most emphatically do not have the force of a 
>>scientific theory, even when the ontologies constructed according 
>>to them are being used by scientists.
>
>So anything goes, eh?    (03)

Not necessarily. (It is revealing, I think, that you seem to think 
that anything other than kosher science is anarchy.)    (04)

>>And any such implication of 'scientific' authority must be examined 
>>especially carefully when the, er, foundry is controlled by the 
>>philosophers themselves
>
>One philosopher, one computer scientist, two computer 
>scientist-biologists, one immunologist, one world-class geneticist.
>
>>, and its gatekeepers are mandated to only allow ontologies which 
>>conform to the somewhat arbitrary philosophical views of its 
>>founders (for example, by requiring consistency with a single 
>>'base' ontology).
>
>Actually not -- the single base ontology we started with has already 
>been modified because it did not fit the science.    (05)

I applaud that kind of a move, but it does not really counter my 
point. Would you allow an ontology which explicitly denied the 
continuant/occurrent distinction?    (06)

>>  I do not mean this to be a criticism of OBO itself, but I do claim 
>>that OBO hardly qualifies as anything like an "open" ontology 
>>repository. In the contrary, in fact: it is quite firmly closed to 
>>an entire approach to ontology construction which, while 
>>successfully deployed elsewhere, happens to not conform to the 
>>philosophical views that Barry has so nobly defended in so many 
>>publications.
>
>No one, I think, is suggesting that all the criteria applied for 
>admission to OBO should be applied also to OOR -- just some of them; 
>the obvious ones (see earlier emails).    (07)

I think many of them are far from obvious.    (08)

>If, as you say, you will in any case put your ontologies on the web, 
>then I suppose for you the criteria to be applied are: correct html 
>(perhaps not even that).    (09)

Hardly html. Correct RDF/OWL, yes. BUt I take your implied 
meta-point: if we have the Semantic Web to publish openly in, why do 
we need an 'open' repository (in the sense of being unrestricted) at 
all? Yes, a good point. I think we draw opposite conclusions from 
this as a rhetorical point, however.    (010)

>>>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.
>>
>>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.
>
>This thing:
>http://www.gnowsis.org/ont/kissology.html
>was admitted into the http://www.schemaweb.info/ repository of RDF schemas.
>Do we want its OWL brother to be admitted to OOR?    (011)

I see no reason why not. Ignore the poetry, and all it does it 
provide a simple way to annotate an image to indicate that it shows 
two persons kissing (on a certain date), a tiny extension to the foaf 
ontology (which is widely and successfully deployed). There are real 
uses for such annotations, even if you aren't interested in them.    (012)

Pat    (013)


-- 
---------------------------------------------------------------------
IHMC            (850)434 8903 or (650)494 3973   home
40 South Alcaniz St.    (850)202 4416   office
Pensacola                       (850)202 4440   fax
FL 32502                        (850)291 0667    cell
http://www.ihmc.us/users/phayes      phayesAT-SIGNihmc.us
http://www.flickr.com/pathayes/collections    (014)



_________________________________________________________________
Msg Archives: http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontology-summit/ 
Subscribe/Config: http://ontolog.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontology-summit/  
Unsubscribe: mailto:ontology-summit-leave@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Community Files: http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/work/OntologySummit2008/
Community Wiki: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?OntologySummit2008 
Community Portal: http://ontolog.cim3.net/    (015)
<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>