Ontolog invited Speaker Presentation - Dr. Leo Obrst - Thu 2006-01-12 & Thu 2006-01-19    (IRW)

Conference Call Details    (IRX)

Part-1 session - Attendees    (ISD)

Part-2 session - Attendees    (JAA)

Agenda & Proceedings    (ISK)

http://ontolog.cim3.net/file/resource/presentation/LeoObrst_20060112/LeoObrst_20060112.png [picture of Dr. Leo Obrst]    (ISM)

Abstract: (by LeoObrst)    (ISN)

The Ontology Spectrum describes a range of semantic models of increasing expressiveness and complexity: taxonomy, thesaurus, conceptual model, and logical theory.    (ISO)

This presentation initially describes the Ontology Spectrum and important distinctions related to semantic models, e.g., the distinction among term, concept, and real world referent; the distinction among syntax, semantics, and pragmatics; the distinction between intension and extension; and de facto distinctions that the ISO 11179 standard makes (as do many others): data objects, classification objects, terminology objects, meaning objects, and the relationships among these.    (ISP)

The individual semantic model types are then discussed: weak and strong taxonomies, thesauri, and weak and strong ontologies (conceptual model and logical theory, respectively). Each of these are defined, exemplified, and discussed with respect to when a more expressive model is needed.    (ISQ)

If time permits, semantic integration and interoperability are discussed with respect to the models.    (ISR)

Finally, a pointer to an expansion of the logical theory portion of the Ontology Spectrum is given: the Logic Spectrum, which describes the range of less to more expressive logics used for ontology and knowledge representation.    (ISS)

Leo Obrst is a principal artificial intelligence scientist at MITRE’s (http://www.mitre.org) Center for Innovative Computing and Informatics, where he leads the Information Semantics group (semantics, ontological engineering, knowledge representation and management), and has been involved in projects on Semantic Web rule/ontology interaction, context-based semantic interoperability, ontology-based knowledge management, conceptual information retrieval, metadata and thesaurus construction for community knowledge sharing, intelligent agent technology, and ontology-based modeling of complex decision-making, He was recently Director of Ontological Engineering at VerticalNet.com, a department he formed to create ontologies in the product and service space to support Business-to-Business e-commerce. Leo's PhD is in theoretical linguistics with a concentration in formal semantics from the University of Texas-Austin. He has worked over 20 years in computational linguistics, knowledge representation, and in the past nine years in ontological engineering. Leo is a member of the Executive Committee of the National Center for Ontological Research (NCOR, http://ncor.us/), and the chair of the NCOR Technical Committee. He was a member of the W3C Web Ontology Working Group (http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/WebOnt/) that developed the Web Ontology Language OWL. He is a member of the IEEE Standard Upper Ontology working group (http://suo.ieee.org/), the Semantic Web Services Initiative (http://www.swsi.org/), the Ontolog community (http://ontolog.cim3.net, which he co-founded and which focuses on the promotion of ontological engineering and semantic technologies), and the W3C Rule Interoperability group. He is a member of AAAI, ACL, LSA, and ACM. His research interests include semantic interoperability/integration, formalization of context for ontology mapping and merging, and formal upper ontologies, Semantic Web rules, and the application of formal ontology and formal semantics to ontological engineering.    (IT0)

Session Recording of the LeoObrst Talk    (ITC)

 (Thanks to KurtConrad, BobSmith and PeterYim for their help with getting the session recorded.  -ppy)    (ITD)