Dear All,
This scope note violates CRM principles: Of course E77 must have clear
cut identity criteria. The question is only, how subclasses will refine
those.
The fact that a particular constellation of matter can be regarded to be
instance of different classes, which would extend the identity of the
respective constellation in different ways in time and space, is a
general methodological concern, and not a decision of the observer. The
documentalist has to chose which of these describe the intended form of
continuity correctly for the intended reasoning.
I propose to revise.
E77 Persistent Item
Subclass of: E1 <#_E1_CRM_Entity> CRM Entity
Superclass of: E39 <#_E39_Actor> Actor
E70 <#_E70_Thing> Thing
Scope note: This class comprises items that have a persistent identity,
sometimes known as “endurants” in philosophy.
They can be repeatedly recognized within the duration of their
existence by identity criteria rather than by continuity or observation.
Persistent Items can be either physical entities, such as people,
animals or things, or conceptual entities such as ideas, concepts,
products of the imagination or common names.
The criteria that determine the identity of an item are often difficult
to establish -; the decision depends largely on the judgement of the
observer. For example, a building is regarded as no longer existing if
it is dismantled and the materials reused in a different configuration.
On the other hand, human beings go through radical and profound changes
during their life-span, affecting both material composition and form,
yet preserve their identity by other criteria. Similarly, inanimate
objects may be subject to exchange of parts and matter. The class E77
Persistent Item does not take any position [CSO1] about the nature of
the applicable identity criteria and if actual knowledge about identity
of an instance of this class exists. There may be cases, where the
identity of an instance of E77 Persistent Item is not decidable by a
certain state of knowledge.
The main classes of objects that fall outside the scope the E77
Persistent Item class are temporal objects such as periods, events and
acts, and descriptive properties.
Examples:
§ Leonard da Vinci (Strano, 1953)
§ Stonehenge (Richards, 2005)
§ the hole in the ozone layer (Hufford and Horwitz, 2005)
§ the First Law of Thermodynamics (Craig and Gislason, 2002)
§ the Bermuda Triangle (Dolan, 2005)
In First Order Logic:
E77(x) ⊃ E1(x)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[CSO1] <#_msoanchor_1>Can a class take a position, consider to
reformulate the sentence.
--
------------------------------------
Dr. Martin Doerr
Honorary Head of the
Center for Cultural Informatics
Information Systems Laboratory
Institute of Computer Science
Foundation for Research and Technology - Hellas (FORTH)
N.Plastira 100, Vassilika Vouton,
GR70013 Heraklion,Crete,Greece
Vox:+30(2810)391625
Email: [email protected]
Web-site: http://www.ics.forth.gr/isl
