Chris,
Please see below,
[snip]
>
> "that is designed to characterize the entities of interest in some
> domain for the purpose of representing, storing, and communicating
> information about them and performing deductions and computations with
> that information." (01)
I'm afraid I have to disagree if you want to include this in the
*definition* of an ontology, as it turns a notion that is clear and
precise into one that is fuzzy and indeterminate. On my proposed
definition, there is always a definite answer, at least in principle, to
the question: Is this an ontology? With your proposed emendation,
before we can determine whether something is an ontology, we need to
figure out what it was designed for, and the hopelessly intentional
"designed for" relation is inherently neither precise nor determinate.
Hence, with your emendation, it will often be the case that there is no
definite answer to the question of whether something counts as an
ontology. (02)
[[CBC] ] This is the reason I am questioning the wisdom of "an ontology" or
even a static lattice of same in the COSMO hub. That group of axioms has no
meaning other than it is a group of axioms. We do want to understand the
"subject", but doing that as "documentation" violates the very principles of
this discipline. (03)
[snip]
> generalizations, specializations, siblings, or distant cousins in the
> lattice. For more info about those issues, see
>
> http://www.jfsowa.com/logic/theories.htm (04)
Right, but theories are deductively closed on this approach, and I don't
think we should identify ontologies with theories in that sense, as, for
one thing, you can't distinguish between equivalent ontologies that use
different axioms. (05)
Frankly John, I don't see the point of talking about the "lattice of
theories" for a given language anyway. I think sometimes your talk of
the lattice suggests that it is itself something might be usefully
apprehended and studied. In general, however, there are uncountably
many theories in such a lattice, so we will never be able even to
apprehend one as an object of study except for the most technical and
abstract purposes. Typically, all that's *really* useful to us are the
possible logical relations that can hold between two *given* theories:
equivalence, subsumption, compatibility, inconsistency, inconsistent but
containing equivalent subtheories, etc. These relations of course would
all be "pictured" by the lattice, but, again, typically, we'll never
study the lattice per se, only specific nodes of interest and the
particular logical relations they bear to one another. (06)
So I guess my point is that, for the most part, I don't think anything
particularly useful is to be gained by talking about the lattice of
theories for a given language in the context of ontological engineering,
and that indeed it might engender more confusion than clarity. (07)
[[CBC] ] I would strongly disagree - the set of COSMO ontologies (the hub)
can well be a lattice and can well be a subject of study and architecture.
Since Cyc already has micro-theories this is not new at all, but we do need
to understand how our hub will be organized. This is a necessary change in
perspective from isolated semantic islands to semantically related knowledge
in the large - exactly what ONTAC can facilitate. (08)
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