SUO: Re: Lifecycle Integration Schema
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LIS. Discussion Note 84
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JA = Jon Awbrey
MP = Mike Pool
Mike,
Continuing from this point:
JA: What is the operational test of the distinction
between abstract things and non-abstract things?
JA: Until I get some reason to believe otherwise, I must
now conclude that the supposed distinction is almost
purely a matter of personal or regional taste, about
which no further dispute can serve any actual purpose.
JA: That was a bit of hyperbole intended to be provocative of thought.
But the possibility that a distinction is more than that is still
a thing to be proved in practice, not taken as immediate doctrine.
JA: I am now beginning to think that it was not so hyperbolic after all.
JA: But the point is that I now intend to shift the burden
of proof onto those who would say that abstractness
is an absolute or non-relative property of things,
whether it's the sort of things that are denoted
by nouns or verbs.
JA: I personally see no further plausibility to the claim that identifiable
things of either sort can be sorted once and for all, for all contexts,
purposes, and seasons under heaven into one or the other bin, Abstract
versus Non-Abstract, no matter what label one uses for the semiotic
underside of this distinction. I think that the evidence against
the absoluteness of that distinction is rather abundant and
evident as soon as one stops taking it for granted and
starts looking around at the weight against it.
MP: Jon, this phenomenon, i.e., disagreement about the extension of
a concept, applies to all sorts of concepts, not just potential
fundamental SUO terms.
JA: The term "abstract_object" came up in the context of discussing the
LIS data model, in the prospects of using that model to some purpose.
Since I believe that terms can have meanings and be put to good use,
when and if they are used in appropriate contexts of discussion and
practice, I have been seeking to find out two interrelated things:
What meaning does the term "abstract_object" have in the context
of the LIS data model, and what meaning might it have in what
larger contexts of discussion and practice to which the LIS
data model might be brought to bear?
MP: Okay, but hasn't Matthew been pretty clear about how he
is using the term and furthermore, hasn't he explained
how his LIS definition applies to the objects you
mention below? What is at issue here?
JA: What is at issue here is this:
PAR: | Description of Target Standard
|
| This standard will specify an upper ontology that will
| enable computers to utilize it for applications such as
| data interoperability, information search and retrieval,
| automated inferencing, and natural language processing.
| An ontology is similar to a dictionary or glossary, but
| with greater detail and structure that enables computers
| to process its content. An ontology consists of a set of
| concepts, axioms, and relationships that describe a domain
| of interest. An upper ontology is limited to concepts that
| are meta, generic, abstract and philosophical, and therefore
| are general enough to address (at a high level) a broad range
| of domain areas. Concepts specific to given domains will not
| be included; however, this standard will provide a structure
| and a set of general concepts upon which domain ontologies
| (e.g., medical, financial, engineering, etc.) could be
| constructed.
JA: Consequently, whether an ontology contains anything that might be called
an "axiom" or a "definition" in any formally recognized sense of the word,
whether conceptual, declarative, formal, logical, mathematical, operational,
or procedueral, for the concepts that comprise its content, is at issue here.
JA: Perhaps it will help you to see what's at issue here if I stress a few terms:
PAR: | DESCRIPTION OF TARGET STANDARD
|
| This STANDARD will specify an upper ontology that will
| enable COMPUTERS to utilize it for APPLICATIONS such as
| data interoperability, information search and retrieval,
| AUTOMATED inferencing, and natural language PROCESSING.
| An ontology is similar to a DICTIONARY or GLOSSARY, but
| with GREATER DETAIL and STRUCTURE that enables COMPUTERS
| to PROCESS its content. An ontology consists of a set of
| concepts, AXIOMS, and relationships that describe a domain
| of interest. An upper ontology is limited to concepts that
| are META, GENERIC, ABSTRACT and PHILOSOPHICAL, and therefore
| are GENERAL enough to address (at a HIGH level) a BROAD range
| of domain areas. Concepts specific to given domains will not
| be included; however, this STANDARD will provide a STRUCTURE
| and a set of GENERAL concepts upon which domain ontologies
| (e.g., medical, financial, engineering, etc.) could be
| CONSTRUCTED.
JA: A collection of associations between words that appeals to the
intuitions of an individual or a special interest group, even
if it satisfies the demands of a domain-specific task, does
not in itself an axiom or a definition for a meta, generic,
abstract, a philosophical concept make.
MP: I never said that it did, see below.
JA: This particular side-trip began when I cited in passing what I,
and several whole armies of inquiry that I have mustered through,
would have considered to be thoroughly non-problematic examples of
"theoretical terms", casting the term "theory" with a fair amount of
slack in the case of the fabled unicorn. I really had no idea at the
time that it would lead to this. And I do not know where it will lead
from here.
JA: But please take a moment to fill out my survey: ...
MP: What's the point? Is it to show that people have
different pretheoretic intuitions regarding what
it is to be an abstract object, if so I readily
cede the point as I did in my initial response.
JA: You have just called Matthew's application of his most
fundamental LIS distinction a "pretheoretic intuition".
That is precisely what I have been saying all along.
MP: That's not what I said at all. Matthew spelled out some specifications
and explanations as to how he was using "possible individual" from what
I recall and using that to answer your survey. All you seem to be
saying is, "well your definition doesn't accord with my pretheoretic
intuitions about what falls under the concept 'abstract object'".
Unless you say a bit more, this invites the response "well, so much
the worse for *your* pretheoretic intuitions". Tell us what's wrong
with Matthew's definition, i.e., Matthew has based his categorization
on something slightly clear than bare pretheoretic intuitions.
All I have done is try to gather data that is relevant
to describing and hopefully to understanding a certain
type of situation, that I'm calling, for the time being,
a "situation of uncertainty" (SOU), otherwise treated as
a "phenomenon of disagreement among interpreters" (PODAI).
As a heuristically if not dogmatically nominal thinker,
it sometimes helps me merely to give the thing a name.
I could of course extend the Table in both horizontal and vertical directions,
in many cases guessing at the entries -- also known as "cooking the data" --
by drawing on a stock of common beliefs as to how various interpreters are
likely to respond, for instance, adding a fifth column for the ideal type
of a driven snow variety of "Nominal Thinker" (NT), who would not permit
the unnecessarily redundant multiplicity of any abstract objects at all,
as opposed to the "necessary redundancies" that others may countenance.
Table ???. Situation Of Uncertainty, And So It Goes ...
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| <thing> | <AO_JA> | <AO_JS> | <AO_MP> | <AO_MW> | <AO_NT> |
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| ego | 1 | ? | ? | 0 | 0 |
| enterprise | 1 | ? | ? | ? | 0 |
| number | 1 | ? | ? | 1 | 0 |
| organization | 1 | ? | ? | ? | 0 |
| quark | 1 | ? | ? | 0 | 0 |
| starship | 1 | ? | ? | ? | 0 |
| unicorn | 1 | ? | ? | 0 | 0 |
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The Table as we come to it is very typical of most real datasets
that I have ever seen, as discouraging as it might look at first
to observers who have never seen a real dataset before. Amusing
but true ancedote: There once was an old woman who was put down
as "incompetent" because she would not, yes, "would not", answer
the protocol question as to who was the current president, as it
turned out on subsequent inquiry, because she positively refused
to mention his name. Nor will I. But that's how real data goes.
Have to break here. The noxious fume detector in the
basement keeps going off, I was two seconds away from
calling the fire department yesterday, but called the
furnace installer back first, and he said that it was
just the thin film of factory oil burning off the new
heat-exchanger that's doing it. I sure hope he knows
his stuff ...
Jon Awbrey
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