Re: [tlug] Effect of AI and data processing rift on the Semantic Web

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

Edward Middleton writes:
 > Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:

 > > I mean, the immediate response of any sane person reading the RDF
 > > Primer provided by the W3C is going to be "God, no!  Not unless my job
 > > depends on it, and even then I'll take a 20% pay cut to avoid it."

 > HTML hahahhahah!  but seriously, it isn't necessary to write RDF for 
 > most applications.

I'm not talking about "most applications", which will have specialized
editors written for them, I suppose, at least if it's really
annoying.  I'm talking about turning a huge variety of "applications"
into a semantic web that can be traversed by a single application.  It
may not be that a single "universal" application (a la the web browser
for the ordinary web) is appropriate, but what I'm looking for is
evidence that apps for the semantic web are coalescing (acquiring each
others' capabilities) rather than proliferating.

 > >  > The views you have expressed seems to be regularly espoused on the 
 > >  > semantic-web mailing list but it seems to be almost universally by 
 > >  > people without even a layman's understanding of knowledge 
 > >  > representation[1] and computer reasoning[2].
 > >
 > > Argumentum ad hominem.
 > 
 > ha, "conceived by a bunch of philosophers who want it to reflect their 
 > theories."

Um, that is an proposed explanation of *why* the defects I perceive
are there; it's not an attempt to support the claim that they *are*
defects.  So even though it mentions people, it's not ad hominem.

 > The point is that if you don't have some background understanding of 
 > knowledge representation and computer reasoning then you aren't in a 
 > position to judge whether it is a pragmatic approach or the musings of 
 > academics.

I *do* have the relevant background.  So why are you classing my
arguments with those hominems over there?

 > Well they state[2] that RDF is based on Model Theory.

Same difference.  Either way, putting the types into the literals is a
bad idea.

 > Which encoded as a url looks like
 > 
 > http://dblp.l3s.de/d2r/sparql?query=PREFIX+foaf%3A+%3Chttp%3A%2F%2Fxmlns.com%2Ffoaf%2F0.1%2F%3E%0D%0APREFIX+dc%3A+%3Chttp%3A%2F%2Fpurl.org%2Fdc%2Felements%2F1.1%2F%3E%0D%0ACONSTRUCT+{%0D%0A++%3Chttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.bizer.de%23chris%3E+foaf%3Amade+%3Fpaper%0D%0A}+%0D%0AWHERE+{%0D%0A++%3Fpaper+a+foaf%3ADocument+.%0D%0A++%3Fpaper+dc%3Acreator+%3Chttp%3A%2F%2Fdblp.l3s.de%2Fd2r%2Fresource%2Fauthors%2FChristian_Bizer%3E%0D%0A}

Hm.  I think I know an absurdum when I see one....

 > Not really, a fairly trivial problem thought up by just about every 
 > academic associated with the semantic web ;)

... I see.  A trivial problem looks like the above.  An interesting
problem would look like, oh, 1MB of the above?

 > An interesting problem would be something like[6]
 > 
 > "takes an .. plan that has been manually developed and looks for 
 > possible problems that a user may have overlooked, such as 
 > inconsistencies or unrealistic use of resources."

That's Just AI, and has nothing to do with a semantic web as such.  As
you've pointed out, the semantic web is about connecting up the items
in a massively distributed database.  My "trivial" problem has that
nature, and your "interesting" one does not (as stated).

 > > Practical solution to what?  The rosy palm problem of semantic web
 > > specialists?
 > 
 > * Referring unambiguously to *You* without placing private information 
 > about you onto the net.
 > * Finding the closest pub that sells X beer
 > * Planning a vacation.

Um, no.  All of those can be done by specialist software and
databases.  Where's the need for a semantic web here?

 > > Where in practice is this solution being used?  For example, does OpenID use it?  Can you give me a similarly important example where FOAF is a solution?
 > 
 > I provided you with an example where FOAF is used with OpenID, you just 
 > didn't bother to read it.

 > http://vannevarvision.wordpress.com/2007/11/02/want-to-comment-on-tim-berners-lees-blog-heres-how/

Again, a special application that works by passing around tokens.
They happen to have internal structure, but they could just as easily
have been PGP keys which also allow chasing a trust graph.  Honestly I
don't see where the semantic web appears.

The semantic web will be a reality when three applications FOAF +
OpenID, FOAF + Dublin Core, and OpenID + PAM can be pasted together to
give login privileges to any author who I have cited in one of my
papers, and this can be done in a syntax as simple as yer average home
page.