[CODE4LIB] rdf serialization

[Eric Lease Morgan]

How can I write an RDF serialization enabling me to express the fact that the 
United States Declaration Of Independence was written by Thomas Jefferson and 
Thomas Jefferson was a male? (And thus asserting that the Declaration of 
Independence was written by a male.)

Suppose I have the following assertion:

  <rdf:RDF
    xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#";
    xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"; >

    <!-- the Declaration Of Independence was authored by Thomas Jefferson -->
    <rdf:Description
    
rdf:about="http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html";>
          
<dc:creator>http://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n79-89957</dc:creator>
    </rdf:Description>

  </rdf:RDF>

Suppose I have a second assertion:

  <rdf:RDF
    xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#";
    xmlns:foaf="http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/";>

    <!-- Thomas Jefferson was a male -->
    <rdf:Description 
rdf:about="http://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n79-89957";>
      <foaf:gender>male</foaf:gender>
    </rdf:Description>

  </rdf:RDF>

Now suppose a cool Linked Data robot came along and harvested my RDF/XML. 
Moreover lets assume the robot could make the logical conclusion that the 
Declaration was written by a male. How might the robot express this fact in 
RDF/XML? The following is my first attempt at such an expression, but the 
resulting graph (attached) doesn't seem to visually express what I really want:

<rdf:RDF
  xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#”
  xmlns:foaf="http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/“
  xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/“>

  <rdf:Description 
rdf:about="http://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n79-89957";>
    <foaf:gender>male</foaf:gender>
  </rdf:Description>

  <rdf:Description
  
rdf:about="http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration_transcript.html";>
    <dc:creator>http://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n79-89957</dc:creator>
  </rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>

Am I doing something wrong? How might you encode such the following expression 
— The Declaration Of Independence was authored by Thomas Jefferson, and Thomas 
Jefferson was a male. And therefore, the Declaration Of Independence was 
authored by a male named Thomas Jefferson? Maybe RDF can not express this fact 
because it requires two predicates in a single expression, and this the 
expression would not be a triple but rather a “quadrile" — object, predicate 
#1, subject/object, predicate #2, and subject?


—
Eric Morgan

[cid:2A12C96F-E5C4-4C77-999C-B7FF5C2FA171@att.net]

<<inline: graph.png>>