Dear Barry, (01)
See below. (02)
Regards (03)
Matthew West
Reference Data Architecture and Standards Manager
Shell International Petroleum Company Limited
Shell Centre, London SE1 7NA, United Kingdom (04)
Tel: +44 20 7934 4490 Mobile: +44 7796 336538
Email: matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx
http://www.shell.com
http://www.matthew-west.org.uk/ (05)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ontac-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:ontac-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Smith, Barry
> Sent: 21 January 2006 22:05
> To: ONTAC Taxonomy-Ontology Development Discussion
> Subject: RE: [ontac-dev] Representation of attributes
>
>
>
> > >
> > > The bio-ontologists currently developing the phenotype and other
> > > ontologies have addressed this question in detail. Their earlier
> > > attempts led to what I propose calling the 'Peanut Butter
> Sandwich'
> > > problem. If you have Attributes (Color) and Values (Red), then for
> > > some attributes (e.g. Height) you will infinitely many values, and
> > > for other attributes (e.g. Eats) you will have uncontrollably many
> > > made-up values (e.g. Peanut Butter Sandwich with
> McDonald's Chicken
> > > Fajita Sauce and a Pickle).
> >
> >MW: This looks a lot like a Bill of Materials to me.
>
> When biologists study the eating habbits of, say, bacteria, they do
> not first check the Bill of Materials printed by Bacteria Central
> Administration that morning. (06)
MW: And there was me thinking we were talking about ontology and not what
biologists look up. How silly.
>
>
> > >
> > > The solution they are working on is to drop the whole notion of
> > > Values. Rather, there are determinable attributes (Color) and
> > > determinate attributes (Red). Attributes are not relations between
> > > bearers and values. Rather, every single attribute instance, for
> > > instance the color of Rudolf's nose, instantiates a series of
> > > attribute types at greater and lesser levels of granularity.
> >
> >MW: Do you mean here that (your) redness of Rudolphs nose is
> an instance
> >of a set of varying and usually widening spectrum ranges?
> i.e. you are
> >dealing with the issue of accuracy/precision?
>
> Sets do not have instances. (07)
MW: Then what please is the name of the relation you use to relate a
set to one of its members? How does its nature differ from that between
a type and one of its instances? (08)
> Types have instances.
> We represent these instances using various means, e.g. English words
> ('red', 'bright red') or hexadecimal numbers, or what you will.
> Sometimes our representations are more precise, sometimes less. They
> may still all be correct (as it may be equally correct to say:
> 'animal over there', or 'cat at fifty paces'). (09)
MW: I think I have mostly grasped what you mean by a type, surprising
as it has been to me. Just one last clarification here. I presume you
agree there are some types whose membership does not change, i.e. your
type and set have the same members, e.g. integers and real numbers. (010)
MW: Do you still insist that the type and the set are different objects
in this case? (It would seem somewhat redundant to me to do so, but I
suspect that you do insist). (011)
MW: If we are to find any commonality it seems to me we need to follow
Chris Menzels approach where he was saying that class/type/sort/category
is not extensionally defined unless you have the axioms to make it so. (012)
MW: So I suggest a structure as follows: (013)
1. Class/type-that-may-or-may-not-be-defined-extensionally. (014)
Some subtypes of this would be: (015)
2. class/type-defined-extensionally. (016)
3. class/type-defined-intensionally. (017)
Since this could include people with 374 hairs on their arm. A subtype
of this that would be: (018)
4. Class/type/sort-defined-intensionally. (019)
This should at least allow us to identify the very different things we
seem to be interested in. We can then start trying to understand the
relationship between them. (020)
> > >
> > > This still leaves open the problem of Height. Here the solution is
> > > along the lines of accepting Height as a determinable
> attribute, with
> > >
> > > Height-of-2-Meters
> > > Height-of-1.9-Meters
> > >
> > > etc.
> > >
> > > as determinates. In any given domain of biological
> inquiry, there is
> > > a finite number of such relevant determinates.
> >
> >MW: Are there not an infinite number of heights between
> Height-of-1.9-Meters
> >and Height-of-1.9-Meters? Or are you saying that we are only
> interested in
> >the values at 1mm distances between these?
> >
> >MW: This still seems somewhat simplistic for engineering purposes.
> There is infinite complexity everywhere. I am sure your Oil ontology
> can capture it all. (021)
MW: I find it is much more about not preventing it being captured.
> BS
>
>
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Message Archives: http://colab.cim3.net/forum/ontac-dev/
> To Post: mailto:ontac-dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subscribe/Unsubscribe/Config:
http://colab.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontac-dev/
Shared Files: http://colab.cim3.net/file/work/SICoP/ontac/
Community Wiki:
http://colab.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?SICoP/OntologyTaxonomyCoordinatingWG (022)
_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://colab.cim3.net/forum/ontac-dev/
To Post: mailto:ontac-dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subscribe/Unsubscribe/Config: http://colab.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontac-dev/
Shared Files: http://colab.cim3.net/file/work/SICoP/ontac/
Community Wiki:
http://colab.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?SICoP/OntologyTaxonomyCoordinatingWG (023)
|