Dear Pat, (01)
If we mean "the technology is ready for commercial deployment and
exploitation" then lets say that. (02)
Regards (03)
Matthew (04)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Cassidy,
> Patrick J.
> Sent: 04 March 2006 14:43
> To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
> Subject: [uos-convene] Maturity?
>
>
> Let us once again debate the meanings of a word (sigh!):
> this time "maturity"
>
> > >
> > > BA: First, let me say that, being a representative of a company
> > > that is selling ontology-based products, I can't believe
> that our
> > > technology is too immature to sell. I may be a lot of things, but
>
> > > I'm not dishonest. We do sell what we do because it works.
>
> MW: I would not equate maturity with commerciality. 16th century maps
> were pretty poor (immature) by current standards, but were a
> whole heap
> better than no map at all. So I would judge maturity by the potential
> for further improvement, rather than the ability to deliver value
> today. So I would say that ontology in general is immature, but
> already capable of delivering significant benefits.
>
>
> OK. A person at 16 is typically sexually "mature"
> A person at 18 is "mature" enough to vote (in the USA)
> A person at 21 is "mature" enough (in the USA) to have all the
> legal rights that an adult at any age has (except become president, in
> the USA)
> A person at 35 is "mature" enough to become President of the USA
> John Kennedy at 45 was considered too "immature" to be president
> by many people.
>
> "Mature" is often used in a sense relative to a particular purpose.
> When a person can't grow anymore, "fully grown" is a better
> adjective than "mature".
>
> If taken in the sense of "ripe, ready to eat" as used for fruit,
> then being ready to deploy in practical applications would be a
> reasonable characterization of ontology technology. If taken in the
> sense of "no longer capable of growth" then that would not
> characterize
> ontology technology.
>
> In the sense of "developed enough to be fit for a purpose" it fits the
> current situation. But if that word seems likely to convey the
> impression that the technology can no longer advance, it is a poor
> choice and should be replaced by a word or phrase that conveys the
> proper meaning.
>
> Make a suggestion.
>
> Pat
>
>
>
> Patrick Cassidy
> MITRE Corporation
> 260 Industrial Way
> Eatontown, NJ 07724
> Mail Stop: MNJE
> Phone: 732-578-6340
> Cell: 908-565-4053
> Fax: 732-578-6012
> Email: pcassidy@xxxxxxxxx
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of West,
> Matthew R SIPC-DFD/321
> Sent: Saturday, March 04, 2006 5:35 AM
> To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
> Subject: RE: [uos-convene] Essential or Not
>
> Dear Mike and Bill,
>
> Some comments/reactions below.
>
> Regards
>
> Matthew
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> > [mailto:uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of
> > Bill Andersen
> > Sent: 04 March 2006 06:27
> > To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
> > Subject: Fwd: [uos-convene] Essential or Not
> >
> >
> > Dear UOS-ers,
> >
> > At the risk of sending something that may seem out of context, the
> > following is an abridged (offline) exchange I had with Mike
> Uschold
> > about my take on the subject of maturity of ontology technology in
> > general and integration in particular, based on our actual
> > experience
> > at Ontology Works in our work with customers. Mike urged me to send
>
> > this and I agreed, so here it is.... Editorial comments in brackets
>
> > to separate them from what was said at the time. Comments welcome.
> >
> > .bill
> >
> > Begin forwarded message:
> >
> > > From: "Uschold, Michael F" <michael.f.uschold@xxxxxxxxxx>
> > > Date: March 2, 2006 2:39:43 PM EST
> > > To: "Bill Andersen" <andersen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > > Cc: <lobrst@xxxxxxxxx>
> > > Subject: RE: [uos-convene] Essential or Not
> > >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Bill Andersen [mailto:andersen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> > > Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 11:14 PM
> > > To: Uschold, Michael F
> > > Cc: lobrst@xxxxxxxxx
> > > Subject: Re: [uos-convene] Essential or Not
> > >
> > > Right....
> > >
> > > BA: [...] Let me toss out some my admittedly incomplete
> ramblings
> > > on the subject of maturity, based on my experience building and
> > > applying ontology-based products. I would seriously enjoy hearing
>
> > > both of your perspectives on this, since you've both been around
> > > the block a lot.
> > >
> > > BA: First, let me say that, being a representative of a company
> > > that is selling ontology-based products, I can't believe
> that our
> > > technology is too immature to sell. I may be a lot of things, but
>
> > > I'm not dishonest. We do sell what we do because it works.
>
> MW: I would not equate maturity with commerciality. 16th century maps
> were pretty poor (imature) by current standards, but were a whole heap
> better than no map at all. So I would judge maturity by the potential
> for further improvement, rather than the ability to deliver value
> today. So I would say that ontology in general is immature, but
> already capable of delivering signficant benefits.
>
> > >
> > > MU: I'm talking about semantic interoperability technology
> > > specifically, not ontology technology more generally. The grand
> > > vision of seamless semantic interoperability across all
> > > applications at all times in the way that .html works for the web,
>
> > > is way way far away. Todays technology is only adequate
> for point
> > > solutions under limited sets of circumstances and
> > assumptions. Like
> > > small scale, or manual mapping, or incomplete/inaccurate
> mappings
> > > and translations, etc.
> > > --
> > > BA: [Agreed]
> > >
> > > BA: Ok, that said, what I meant with that rather flip comment in
> > > agreement with Mike [about immaturity] is that I believe
> > that we're
> > > all still a pretty long way from the visions that many of
> us have
> > > for the potential of ontology for integration.
> > >
> > > MU: OK so we are on the same track here, more or less.
> > > --
> > > BA: Let me stress that last part. I mean for *integration*. This
>
> > > is one reason we (OWI) have focused only on building better
> > > database systems. That is an application area where
> users have a
> > > concrete need because conventionally-based database
> projects with
> > > complex data and queries often fail under the dual stresses of
> > > design and implementation complexity and complexity = cost. Thus,
>
> > > when I say that ontology (and in our experience, the
> > application of
> > > our ULO) saves money for customers, this is what I mean.
>
> MW: This is mostly where our efforts have focussed too.
> > >
> > > BA: Now, on to integration. I think we're a long way from doing
> > > that, or even knowing how to do that, assuming we can first figure
>
> > > out what it means or even what "ontology" means. First a
> sidebar
> > > about logic and OWL.
> > >
> > > BA: Even though I love to work with logic, I do believe
> that many
> > > are too bent out of shape over it and religious issues surrounding
>
> > > it. We're bombarded daily with the "Why don't you use OWL?"
> > > question. We use a logic programming semantics at
> Ontology Works
> > > because it's the only way we (or anyone else) knows of to do the
> > > things we do fast enough to satisfy our customers -- database
> > > product customers with LOTS of data. Period. Dot. No OWL except
>
> > > in an import/export mode because it just won't (even with the
> > > proposed extensions in 1.1) do what we need [in terms of
> > > expressiveness and query speed]. Maybe SWRL or some other rule
> > > extension will help, but we're not holding our breath and
> > meanwhile
> > > we'll just keep on working.
>
> MW: I agree. Frankly I don't ever see XML in any flavour being more
> than an exchange or web publication syntax. I don't see it competing
> with SQL for large scale (gigabytes to terabytes) data management.
> > >
> > > BA: What does all that have to do with integration? Well, I think
>
> > > it's going to depend on what notion of integration you're
> after.
> > > For our [near-term] purposes, integration will mean being
> able to
> > > query 20 databases as if they were one and moreover, being able to
>
> > > extend the 20-database installation to a 30-database one without
> > > paying a non-linear marginal cost for the addition of the extra
> > > databases. If we do that, it will be a HUGE win for
> ontology and
> > > we think that a principled ULO is the only way to get there.
>
> MW: Well you can still do this using the spaghetti approach, but I
> would agree that a principled ULO has a better ROI and is more
> scaleable.
> > >
> > > MU: you may be right. We could and maybe shuold pose this as
> > > something that the group could agree on or not, and what the
> > > arguments are pro and con. Namely, that a principled ULO is the
> > > only way to get there. Some may prefer a weakened version:
> > there is
> > > nothing else out there that is as promising.
> > > --
> > > BA: [Agreed. Experience has a way of settling these kinds of
> > > arguments]
> > >
> > > BA: As for loftier goals of effecting integration between
> > > independently constructed logical theories (ULOs if you will but
> > > that makes no difference [as Menzel stresses]), sure, there are
> > > lots of theoretical accounts for how that could be done.
> > From a CL
> > > perspective, just take theory A and theory B (with disjoint
> > > languages) and link them via bridge axioms between their
> > > constituent relations (the simplest being equalities to
> arbitrary
> > > complex formulas). Then check the thing for consistency.
> > > Undecidable, but we may be able to get close enough to, with
> > > empirical testing to fill the gaps, judge this as a workable
> > > integration of A and B. Another route is to force A and
> B into a
> > > decidable logic, like OWL-DL. That's a non-starter as
> any notion
> > > of ULO as I understand it will thumb its nose at being
> > limited to a
> > > dyadic logic. You can do it, but you've probably tossed
> the baby
> > > out with the bath water in doing so. Or we can all chuck our
> > > favorite ULOs and agree on one über-ULO. Also unlikely.
> > >
> > > BA: Where does that leave the UOS effort? I think we need to gain
>
> > > *experience* using these things *individually* to see what they do
>
> > > well, and where they break, and for what applications they do well
>
> > > and break. That will cut through a lot of the philosophical
> > > arguments [because all that matters at the end of the day are
> > > results]. Once the field has been narrowed and the candidates
> > > refined through actual use and actual failure in actual
> > > applications (as opposed to academic posturing), then we can
> > > decide what's worth the effort to integrate and the best way to do
>
> > > it. Meanwhile, having discussions as to scope, structure, and
> > > content and doing some experiments with logic and theorem
> proving
> > > to see how these things line up [as Menzel and Gruninger
> > suggest in
> > > recent posts] is valuable work well worth funding. But I
> > certainly
> > > see no great urgency in this - for this reason the big push for an
>
> > > "upper ontology summit" has been a mystery to me. I'm wondering
> > > who really wants this, why *now*, and for what [real-world]
> purpose.
> > >
> > > MU: I'm pretty much in agreement with all this.
>
> MW: I think that doing comparisons between the different upper
> ontologies is valuable. Noting the differences is likely to raise
> questions about why they are there, which in turn is likely to
> lead to improvement.
> > >
> > > So: the only disagreement we [may] have is you wish to make a
> > > stronger statement about whether there are any viable non-ULO
> > > approaches to solving 'the semantic interoperability problem'.
> > > This is getting more into quibble territory.
> > > --
> > > BA: Agrees that other approaches may work. The ULO
> > approach is way
> > > too far from being adequately explored to rule it out in
> favor of
> > > other less well explored approaches (e.g. category theory).
>
> MW: I only see category theory as an alternative to FOL for "doing"
> ontology.
>
> > Again,
> > > experience with actual information systems will be the deciding
> > > factor.
> >
> > Bill Andersen (andersen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
> > Chief Scientist
> > Ontology Works, Inc. (www.ontologyworks.com)
> > 3600 O'Donnell Street, Suite 600
> > Baltimore, MD 21224
> > Office: 410-675-1201
> > Cell: 443-858-6444
> >
> >
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