|
Hi Dale:
I hope all is well with you.
DL> Do you have anything that explicates your distinction between a "model"
and a "theory"? I've always thought of them as pretty much the same
thing. If they do denote two distinct concepts, what, if any, is the
nature of the relationship between them?
The literature of information flow and the theory of institutions explain the distinction represented in John Sowa's Figure 1 Relating a Theory to the World. Although it takes a careful read, Barwise and Seligman (Information Flow) distinguish theory and model in Information Channels: An Overview. They go on to formally define theories in chapters on regularity in theories and operations on theories. Later chapters on representation discuss idealization and impertfect representations.
Robert Kent (Information Flow Framework) formally differentiates theory and model in the IFF Ontology (meta) Ontology (IFF-ONT).
http://suo.ieee.org/IFF/metalevel/lower/ontology/ontology/version20021205.htm Kent's defintion of model is new and builds on the definition of a classification by adding the notion of a hypergraph. The theory of institutions also differentiates model and theory, which I look forward to discussing in the coming year.
BTW - I still have Trivium on my wish list and there are only a few shopping days left 'til Christmas!
Best wishes,
Rick
office: 202-501-9199
cell: 202-557-1604
"Lichtblau, Dale" <Del@xxxxxxx>
Sent by: ontac-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
12/16/2005 10:43 AMPlease respond to"ONTAC-WG General Discussion"
To "ONTAC-WG General Discussion" <ontac-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
cc "Lichtblau, Dale" <Del@xxxxxxx>
bcc Richard C. Murphy/IAA/CO/GSA/GOV
Subject RE: [ontac-forum] Theories, Models, Reasoning, Language, and Truth
John Sowa:
Your TMRL&T paper is nicely done.
I'm not sure about your account of the Library of Babel, however.
Dennett has a very nice account in his Darwin's Dangerous Idea (but
claiming in a footnote that the Library is finite, while still
containing "all the grammatical sentences of English within its
walls...an infinte set."
Do you have anything that explicates your distinction between a "model"
and a "theory"? I've always thought of them as pretty much the same
thing. If they do denote two distinct concepts, what, if any, is the
nature of the relationship between them?
Interestingly enough, "abduction" does not appear in Sister Joseph's
Trivium [a book, I'm sure you would agree, should be recommended to the
entire forum] but "eduction" does (and the associated discussion of
"conversion" suggests that the converse of your statement about formal
logic and natural language has little to do with three-year olds).
I've always thought of "abduction" as "reasoning to the best
explanation," suggesting that abduction is another technique for
"predicting" (postdiction, retrodiction) what had to have occurred.
I've always thought of "induction" as "generalization (to all S are P)
from specific instances (this S is a P, that S is a P, etc.)" The
generalization is a "theory" (e.g., that all swans are white), from
whence the prediction, this pencil is non-white, therefore, it can't be
a swan.
Figure 7 might be improved by putting everything outside the current
world into the world, in someway. Or is the "world" of figure 7 intenced
to be just the physical (non-abstract) world?
Best regards,
Dale Lichtblau
_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://colab.cim3.net/forum/ontac-forum/
To Post: mailto:ontac-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subscribe/Unsubscribe/Config: http://colab.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontac-forum/
Shared Files: http://colab.cim3.net/file/work/SICoP/ontac/
Community Wiki: http://colab.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?SICoP/OntologyTaxonomyCoordinatingWG
_________________________________________________________________
Message Archives: http://colab.cim3.net/forum/ontac-forum/
To Post: mailto:ontac-forum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subscribe/Unsubscribe/Config:
http://colab.cim3.net/mailman/listinfo/ontac-forum/
Shared Files: http://colab.cim3.net/file/work/SICoP/ontac/
Community Wiki:
http://colab.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?SICoP/OntologyTaxonomyCoordinatingWG (01)
|