This is excellent input Pat. I largely agree. I hope these good bits are
being collected by someone... And not getting lost in the heap... (01)
Mike (02)
-----Original Message-----
From: Cassidy, Patrick J. [mailto:pcassidy@xxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 2:26 PM
To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
Subject: RE: [uos-convene] Essential or Not (03)
The difficulty in other approaches to Semantic Interoperability that makes a
Common Upper Ontology the best method (IMO by a very large
margin) is that ontologies developed separately just don't have the
information required for accurate mapping. Using a CUO to specify the
meanings of ontology elements in disparate ontologies makes the process simple
and accurate because all of the basic assumptions and all of the compound
concepts used to build up even more complex concepts are identical. Whatever
nuances of fundamental meaning are merged or omitted in one ontology will be
merged or omitted in the other as well, because the meaning for any ontology
element in a specialized ontology based on a CUO comes from the basic CUO
elements of which it is composed. (04)
Mapping techniques are attractive in the situation where there is no existing
de facto common upper ontology -- so that using some UO as a reference would
seem to be a waste of time, as it provides little interoperability benefit for
the effort expended in using it (it could provide other benefits). That is the
current situation and is the reason that so much effort is being expended on
those mapping tactics. (05)
It is also the problem that we are trying to solve by finding a way to relate
the existing upper ontologies, and thereby develop a de facto (widely used)
CUO. The de facto CUO may emerge as a common subset ontology or as a set of
mappings of ontology elements among the existing UOs. Such a de facto CUO
would optimally provide enough axiomatization to make the meanings of the
elements unambiguous. The linked UOs could provide additional knowledge that
is valuable for reasoning, and would provide additional value for those whose
tasks could use the additional knowledge. (06)
If you think that mapping, alignment or integration techniques that do not use
a CUO are equal to or preferred, consider the possible future (inevitable and
near, I believe) where there is at least one widely used CUO with interface
utilities (e.g. a controlled English knowledge entry and query system) that
make the CUO as easy to use as Java, and several open-source applications that
perform useful tasks beyond just searching the knowledge base itself. Would
anyone then building an ontology and anticipating that it would need to
communicate with several other ontologies, build it in isolation and then try
mapping?
Would any sane businessman fund such an endeavor? (07)
If there are legacy ontology-based applications, or ontologies built in
isolation for whatever reasons their builders may have, then mapping to the CUO
might well be helped by mapping tools. Thus mapping may have a role to play
even when a widely-used CUO is available. But in the absence of such a CUO, it
is disingenuous to try to assign significance to the fact that people are
trying to map without using a CUO. (08)
An approach to integration using an interlingua is discussed by Michael
Gruninger in the extended abstract of his Dagstuhl paper:
http://drops.dagstuhl.de/opus/volltexte/2005/39/pdf/04391.GruningerMich
ael3.Paper.39.pdf
The interlingua serves some of the same functions that a CUO would serve,
though that mapping approach does not demand that the mapped ontologies be
specified using the terms in the interlingua.
As he points out, "automated and correct approaches to semantic integration
will require ontologies with a deeper formal grounding".
The best way to assure that the formal grounding of both ontologies is adequate
is by specifying the meanings of those ontologies using a CUO.
The mapping of domain ontologies to the CUO-interlingua then becomes relatively
simple and highly accurate. (09)
Why settle for less? (010)
A CUO is an engineering artifact. Its value can only be tested by building it
and seeing how well it performs its intended function. The existing upper
ontologies were also built in the hope that they would gain a large user base.
Up to now the complexity of the larger of these ontologies and the diversity of
approaches to UO have made the use of these ontologies difficult and their
utility uncertain to those who don't have time to explore them in depth. If it
proves possible to find useful relations among the existing CUOs, that should
help on both counts - for complexity, by providing a lower barrier to use of
the existing upper ontologies by developing a subset ontology or a set of
mappings for a subset of compatible ontology elements; for uncertainty, by
providing a public consensus of the most expert developers of UOs assuring
potential users that the effort expended in learning to use the UOs will not be
rapidly made futile by the emergence of some other standard UO. (011)
There is ample experience now on hand among the UO builders to create powerful
systems that can encode knowledge and permit sophisticated reasoning with it.
Finding relations among the UOs will help to make that capability more
accessible to a wider user base. A consequence we can anticipate is that there
will be a larger number of applications that can test those ontologies and help
increase their level of "maturity". (012)
Pat (013)
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 (014)
-----Original Message-----
From: uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Uschold, Michael F
Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 2:50 PM
To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
Subject: RE: [uos-convene] Essential or Not (015)
There is a lot of work in the semantic interoperability literature that is
agnostic to the use of UOs. It is about mapping between ontologies, or schema,
or query planning using multiple heterogeneous data stores. (016)
I co-led a week long workshop specifically devoted to "Semantic
Interoperability and Integration" in Dagstuhl recently. The topic of UOs came
up from time to time, but was not a major theme. (017)
See:
http://www.informatik.uni-trier.de/~ley/db/conf/dagstuhl/P4391.html (018)
You might argue that none of the non-UO approaches for semantic
interoperability are affordable and scalable.
I would add that the same is true for all current UO-approaches too. (019)
Everything is still too immature. (020)
Mike (021)
-----Original Message-----
From: Schoening, James R C-E LCMC CIO/G6 [mailto:James.Schoening@xxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 9:20 AM
To: 'Upper Ontology Summit convention'
Subject: [uos-convene] Essential or Not (022)
All, (023)
If a CUO isn't essential for semantic interoperability, can anyone
explain how it can be done without it? (024)
But first some clarification: (025)
1. We know it can be done with a person in the loop, with P2P interfaces, and
inside stovepipes, but they are too expensive to scale. (026)
2. One possible answer is to interrelate multiple UOs, which we will explore. (027)
3. 'Essential' does not mean 'sufficient.' Nobody is saying a CUO in inself is
all you need for semantic interoperability. We know no single ontology could
cover all concepts, so we'd need domain and sub-domain ontologies. I don't
think we know how much semantic
interoperability we'll lose and keep when crossing domains. (028)
Jim Schoening (029)
-----Original Message-----
From: uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Uschold, Michael F
Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 11:56 AM
To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
Subject: RE: [uos-convene] Other Approaches Too. (030)
Here here, err on the side of saying things that are easy to argue or
demonstrate from actual experience. The ROI remarks fit this bill exactly. (031)
M. (032)
-----Original Message-----
From: West, Matthew R SIPC-DFD/321 [mailto:matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Wednesday, March 01, 2006 1:14 AM
To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
Subject: RE: [uos-convene] Other Approaches Too. (033)
Dear Bill, (034)
You say: (035)
> The point here is that the ROI from using ULO for both domain
ontology
> construction and for integration is higher than similar attempts
> undertaken without ULO. (036)
I agree. (037)
I think this is what we really want to say, rather than whether it is essential
or indeispensible. It is a simple economic argument that ought to be listened
to by potential funders. (038)
Regards (039)
Matthew West
Reference Data Architecture and Standards Manager Shell International Petroleum
Company Limited Shell Centre, London SE1 7NA, United Kingdom (040)
Tel: +44 20 7934 4490 Mobile: +44 7796 336538
Email: matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx
http://www.shell.com
http://www.matthew-west.org.uk/ (041)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:uos-convene-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Bill
> Andersen
> Sent: 28 February 2006 23:47
> To: Upper Ontology Summit convention
> Subject: Re: [uos-convene] Other Approaches Too.
>
>
> Hey Mike,
>
> See below.
>
> On Feb 28, 2006, at 18:31 , Uschold, Michael F wrote:
>
> > To the extent that 'Indispensable' is a semantic dead-ringer for
> > 'essential', this suggestion amounts to changing 'essential' to
> > 'increasingly essential'.
> >
> > Also, indispensable and essential are pretty black and white
> > concepts, Either it is or it is not.
> >
> > It is not clear what 'increasingly essential's means. Nearer to a
> > state of being essential, crossing that b/w divide?
> >
> > The more I think about it, the more I'm ok with the other wording,
> > by I forget who.
> >
> > Something like "essential for affordable and ... semantic
> > interoperability"
> >
> > This is less controversial.
>
> I'm not certain that "less controversial" is something we ought to be (042)
> shooting for. The very position that ULO brings something
> qualitatively different to building and successfully employing
> ontologies is what's being assumed in this forum by its participants.
> I don't know about the other "public" participants, but we at
Ontology
> Works have had much success applying our ULO and Barry Smith
documents
> similar success:
>
> Jonathan Simon, James Matthew Fielding and Barry Smith, "Using
> Philosophy to Improve the Coherence and Interoperability of
> Applications Ontologies: A Field Report on the Collaboration of
IFOMIS
> and L&C", in Gregor Büchel, Bertin Klein and Thomas Roth- Berghofer
> (eds.), Proceedings of the First Workshop on Philosophy and
> Informatics. Deutsches Forschungszentrum für künstliche Intelligenz,
> Cologne: 2004, 65-72.
> http://ontology.buffalo.edu/medo/FOBKSI.pdf
>
> The point here is that the ROI from using ULO for both domain
ontology
> construction and for integration is higher than similar attempts
> undertaken without ULO. Thus, I don't think Barry's wording is too
> strong at all. I would dare say that the onus is on those who
> advocate some other path to show that ULO does not have these
> differential ROI benefits. To do that, they would have to say how
> they, without ULO, would have reproduced all the same results - and
at
> less cost. Such trade studies are sadly lacking.
>
> .bill
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> (043)
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