[topicmapmail] PSIs - alternatives

[Deschuyteneer, Tanguy]

Gruss Got,

Speaking of universal name is always interesting. Gemakkelijker vanuit Australië of de Verenigde Staten.
La tour de Babel européenne et mondiale doit elle laisser la place à une tour unilingue anglaise?

The creation of a centralised repository is certainly not easy. Even if you only consider the American English, the English from Trinidad, from India and all territories linked in one way or another to the UK (mainly the Commonwealth).
But the complexity is even higher if you consider translating concepts that may not perfectly fit, or overlapping others. However, the creation of repositories of PSIs could help people creating common understanding of each other. While people are discussing about words, they start understanding the other.
The diversity must remain, while avoiding a juxtaposition of uncorrelated islands that would means multiplication of ghettos. Having everybody speaking at least two languages (including each French, Chinese and US citizen) is probably the best way to ensure the (communication of the) future.

By the way, imagine a www existing in Roma in 50 BC. Would the web still speak Latin at the present time? In 2900, will the English remains "The" language of exchange and research it is now?


Best regards - Bien à vous - Met vriendelijke groeten
 
Tanguy Deschuyteneer
_________________________________________
 
E:  tanguy.deschuyteneer at logicacmg.com
www.logicacmg.com


Live more simply so that others may simply live.
-- Mahatma Gandhi


-----Original Message-----
From: topicmapmail-bounces at infoloom.com [mailto:topicmapmail-bounces at infoloom.com] On Behalf Of Alexander Johannesen
Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 2:37 AM
To: patrick at durusau.net
Cc: Simon Grant; TopicMapMail
Subject: Re: [topicmapmail] PSIs - alternatives

Hiya,

On 6/20/06, Patrick Durusau <patrick at durusau.net> wrote:
> Reinventing the notion of a universal name set that everyone will use, 
> with or without repositories, is simply a non-starter. Even if it is 
> prefaced with the "sacred" prefix http://.

The library world has three very different mammoth naming conventions, and neither of them work except on a rather high level, as with anything else. The only reason people jump on the URL wagon is that it has been a successful resolver on the web, and they confuse the web with something solid; doing KR needs things to be a bit more solid than that, or else it will turn into the SemWeb. :)

> Rather than chasing the chimera of a universal language or naming 
> convention, why not simply embrace the fact that for all sorts of 
> reasons, some good, some less so, depending on where you stand, people 
> want to identify their subjects differently?

I agree; I'm not sure that even if we *could* do the centralised repository thing, we *should*.

> PSI's have a vital role to play even in a diversity senario because 
> they are a public notice that here is how I identify subject X. So if 
> you use some other identifier and merge it with mine, then you can 
> find that subject in either your materials or mine.

I guess the thing is how to merge PSI's together. The mechanism is there, but it still needs human intervention to do so, and that's the trick.

> Hope you are having a great day!

It's quite excelent, actually; better than in a long time ... even here in Canberra. Hope yours is equally good!


Alex
--
"Ultimately, all things are known because you want to believe you know."
                                                         - Frank Herbert __ http://shelter.nu/ __________________________________________________
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