Re: SUO: Monolithic ontologies (was ontology as science)
Pat,
At 05:27 PM 7/1/2003 -0400, Patrick Cassidy wrote:
>Adam,
> Concerning your statement:
>
> > That entities do not change their class membership over time,
> > and that classes themselves are reserved for those things which do
> > not change, is an important guideline.
> >
>
> First, a clarification: Do you consider SUMO 3D or 4D or both?
I think Ian commented earlier that he considers SUMO basically 3D. That
sounds right to me, although you're welcome to ask him for elaboration.
> The specific question related to your statement above is
>whether roles (student, dentist) must therefore be treated
>only as relations, or whether they can also be classes.
>The latter would seem to require that membership change
>over time.
Those sorts of roles have been treated as properties. Take a look at
SocialRole
<http://ontology.teknowledge.com:8080/rsigma/SKB.jsp?req=SC&name=SocialRole&skb=SUMO>
> If roles cannot be classes, then do you consider SUMO
>classes like "Food" and "BiologicallyActiveSubstance"
>as *not* being roles which might change for a particular object?
I'm guessing that you're concerned about cases like the same substance
being used as a floor wax or a dessert topping, but as I see it, it would
still be a food, just as a table could be used as a chair, or a TV as a
hammer, but they would still be tables and TVs, respectively.
Adam
> Pat
>
>=============================================
>Patrick Cassidy
>
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