tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55849002009-12-15T08:38:33.905-05:00MattersA log of ideas about what matters.John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.comBlogger1640125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-78381854012145708222009-12-15T08:38:00.000-05:002009-12-15T08:38:33.913-05:00Management PlanManagement PlanJohn Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-74651141443278360812008-05-25T09:18:00.000-04:002008-05-25T09:18:39.438-04:00Processing 1.0 (BETA)Processing 1.0 (BETA): "Processing is an open source programming language and environment for people who want to program images, animation, and interactions. It is used by students, artists, designers, researchers, and hobbyists for learning, prototyping, and production. It is created to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context and to serve as a software sketchbook and John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-37814110625269848642008-04-20T19:30:00.002-04:002008-04-20T19:33:29.448-04:00The Triumphal Arch and the Large Triumphal Carriage of Maximilian IThe Triumphal Arch and the Large Triumphal Carriage of Maximilian I: "The Triumphal Arch of Maximilian IIntroductionMaximilian I, known as the 'Last Knight', was enormously proud of his ancestry and personal achievements. The ancestors in his envisioned family-tree included Ceasar, Alexander the Great and even Herakles. He counted among his personal achievements the ability to speak seven John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-43436438164393442012008-01-05T05:26:00.000-05:002008-01-05T05:57:55.547-05:003quarksdaily review of The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window into Human Nature, by Steven Pinker3quarksdaily: "In 1879 a man in Germany named Gottlob Frege wrote a paper entitled 'Über Sinn und Bedeutung.' (That means 'On Sense and Meaning.') For more than two thousand years before Frege, the Western world had been worrying about all kinds of philosophical questions: What is the nature of justice? What is the nature of beauty? What is the nature of truth? And, of course: What is the meaningJohn Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-29225658182418312812008-01-03T22:09:00.000-05:002008-01-03T22:09:53.992-05:00Giant Global Graph | Decentralized Information Group (DIG) BreadcrumbsGiant Global Graph | Decentralized Information Group (DIG) Breadcrumbs: "We can use the word Graph, now, to distinguish from Web.I called this graph the Semantic Web, but maybe it should have been Giant Global Graph! Any worse than WWWW? ;-) Not the 'Semantic Web' term has been established for a long time, I'm not proposing to change it. But let's think about the graph which it is. (Footnote:John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-40289818434085062402008-01-03T22:01:00.000-05:002008-01-03T22:01:23.929-05:00Abstractions in Web architecture - Design IssuesAbstractions in Web architecture - Design Issues: "The power of the web was still not totally used to its full potential until the semantic web came along. The Semantic Web's realization is: It is isn't the documents which are actually interesting, it is the things they are about!A person who is interested in a web page on something is usually primarily interested in the thing rather than the John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-72991702503536138022008-01-03T21:51:00.000-05:002008-01-03T21:51:15.724-05:00Tim O'Reilly on Tallis' Twine PlatformWeb2Summit: Radar Networks Unwinds twine.com: "As part of the Semantic Edge panel tomorrow at the Web 2.0 Summit, Nova Spivack of Radar Networks plans to unveil the first application built on their semantic web platform, twine, a new kind of personal and group information manager. I've only seen a demo, and haven't had a chance to play with it hands-on or load in my own documents, but if it John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-7144744164173704592007-12-22T06:16:00.000-05:002007-12-22T06:18:11.709-05:00The Semantic Web begets the Pragmatic WebA group working on the problems of context dependence and the social process of building common knowledge of ontologies. There is a web site here: www.pragmaticweb.info with a manifesto: The Pragmatic Web: a Manifesto By Mareike Schoop, Aldo de Moor, and Jan L.G. Dietz (PDF 2006)"The Web has been extremely successful in enabling information sharing among a seemingly unlimited number of people John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-14131425044643386952007-12-20T12:43:00.000-05:002007-12-20T12:43:51.662-05:00An Approach to the Problem of RepresentationRepresentational Content in Humans and Machines by Mark H. Bickhard (PDF 1993)"AbstractThis article focuses on the problem of representational content. Accounting forrepresentational content is the central issue in contemporary naturalism: it is themajor remaining task facing a naturalistic conception of the world.Representational content is also the central barrier to contemporary John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-21736953369020680842007-12-18T21:01:00.000-05:002007-12-18T21:07:57.042-05:00Solving the Symbol Grounding Problem with Neural NetsGROUNDING SYMBOLS IN THE ANALOG WORLD WITH NEURAL NETS by Stevan Harnad"Abstract Searle's Chinese Room Argument (that rule-based symbol manipulation is not enough for symbol-understanding) is based on a symptom of the Symbol Grounding Problem (that rule-based symbol manipulation is circular and ungrounded). Symbols must be grounded directly in the capacity to identify and interact with the John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-34034948349960123942007-12-01T10:57:00.001-05:002007-12-01T17:13:46.165-05:00Tim Berners Lee on the Semantic Web Tim pitches the immense value that could result from the Semantic Web, a web of data bigger than the current web of documents. John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-41140010721384167962007-12-01T08:19:00.001-05:002007-12-01T08:19:12.929-05:00The Semantic Desktop: The Intimate Supplement to MemoryYouTube video: A Google techtalk about a semantic web application.John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-57190732294249054142007-11-29T06:27:00.000-05:002007-11-29T06:27:14.096-05:00Introduction to the IFF-ONTIntroduction to the IFF-ONTThe IFF Ontology (meta) Ontology (IFF-ONT)According to Merriam-Webster, logic is the science that deals with the principles and criteria of validity of inference and demonstration. It is the science of the formal principles of reasoning. A logic consists of a first order language of types, together with an axiomatic system and a model-theoretic semantics.OverviewThe IFFJohn Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-60858775620147091672007-06-25T23:42:00.000-04:002007-06-25T23:43:46.537-04:00Beyond Concepts: Ontology as Reality RepresentationBeyond Concepts: Ontology as Reality Representation (PDF)by Barry Smith"Abstract. There is an assumption commonly embraced by ontological engineers, an assumption which has its roots in the discipline of knowledge representation, to the effect that it is concepts which form the subject-matter of ontology. The term ‘concept’ is hereby rarely precisely defined, and the intended role of concepts John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-3571233661054782142007-06-23T07:01:00.000-04:002007-06-23T07:03:10.562-04:00Thomson Adds ReutersNews Indexed by Topic - AGENTSMay 16, 2007: Thomson Adds Reuters in $17 Billion Bid to Be Giant. By Ian Austen. The New York Times. "In the information age, content may be king. But the real power lies in what you can do with it. That would seem to be the underlying message in the announcement Tuesday of the Thomson Corporation’s approximately $17.2 billion acquisition of the Reuters Group, the John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-11688939232341233792007-05-22T07:40:00.000-04:002007-05-22T07:40:19.388-04:00IKL GuideIKL Guide: "IKL is a logical formalism designed for interchange and archiving of information in a network of logic-based reasoners. IKL is extremely expressive and can represent the same content as a wide variety of formal notations, but it has a simple 'classical' logical semantics and can be processed by conventional first-order logic engines. IKL is a variant of the CLIF dialect of ISO Common John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-33017271791411711282007-05-21T23:55:00.000-04:002007-05-21T23:55:42.884-04:00Breaking Network Logjams -- [ INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ]: Scientific AmericanBreaking Network Logjams -- [ INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY ]: Scientific American: "Bits Are Not CarsAhlswede and his colleagues built their proposal in part on the idea, introduced by Shannon, that transmitting evidence about data can actually be more useful than conveying the data directly. They also realized that a receiver would be able to deduce the original data once enough clues had been John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-57903951156049671342007-05-21T19:44:00.000-04:002007-05-21T19:44:13.852-04:00PatHelland's WebLog : SOA and Newton's UniversePatHelland's WebLog : SOA and Newton's Universe: "Classic database/transaction approaches to Consistency choose to emphasize read-write semantics. To preserve Read-Write-Consistency, you lock the data. We've been at this for over 30 years. What I see happening in loosely-coupled systems is identical to how businesses operated 150-200 years ago when messages were sent with couriers running John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-41551755047222072692007-03-31T07:12:00.000-04:002007-03-31T07:12:55.568-04:00Internet Identity Workshop (IIW) 2006BInternet Identity Workshop (IIW) 2006BWhat is User-Centric Identity?User-centric identity starts with the individual, and his or her needs. It is about working relationships and services between individuals and retailers, employers, membership bodies, and organizations of any kind. It is not about a centralized solution, or anybody's silo. As such it solves different problems than the familiar John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-1169415746596262702007-01-21T16:42:00.000-05:002007-01-21T16:47:28.266-05:00Last CfP: Third Workshop on Context Awareness for Proactive Systems (CAPS'07) CAPS 2007 Last Call for Papers ~~~ Paper submission deadline is extended to 31 JANUARY 2007. ~~~ Third Workshop on Context Awareness for Proactive Systems, Guildford, United Kingdom, 18-19 June 2007 http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/CCSR/CAPS2007/ Following CAPS 2005 and 2006, the third Workshop on Context Awareness for Proactive Systems will be held in June John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-1169120642514352302007-01-18T06:44:00.000-05:002007-01-18T10:57:45.353-05:00A New Google?PortalsMag.com: Hakia: A New Google?"The Hakia premise, summed up in a company blog entry by software developer Chris Gates, is that "We are just now entering the phase of search with engines that understand 'what you mean' not just what or how you say it." Gates is referring to search engines with semantic (context) over and above syntactic (contextless keywords) capabilities."John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-1168117846769310202007-01-06T16:10:00.000-05:002007-01-06T16:22:18.330-05:00Cognitive Edge: Social atomism, Identity & natural numbersCognitive Edge: Social atomism, Identity & natural numbers: "In philosophy the discussion about identity arose early and is associated with the idea of change. The ontological question is What makes this thing the same thing as it was before? and the epistemological question is How do I tell if it is, or is not? One of the best illustrations of this is the paradox of the Ship of Theseus (or LockeJohn Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-1168103755455415282007-01-06T12:15:00.000-05:002007-01-06T12:15:55.496-05:00Neither Brain nor Ghost: A Non-Dualist Alternative to the Mind-Brain Identity Theory.Neither Brain nor Ghost: A Non-Dualist Alternative to the Mind-Brain Identity Theory.: "Chapter Seven: 'The Frame Problem' and 'The Background'For Dewey knowledge always exists within a background of experience, which is why any attempt to “solve” the hard problem by completely comprehending experience as knowledge was doomed to failure. In this chapter, we see that the failure of symbolic AI John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-1167234854322430432006-12-27T10:54:00.000-05:002006-12-27T10:56:14.950-05:00Keeping track of Context in Life and on the WebThe Sun BabelFish Blog : Weblog: "Decontextualised information is useful, and on the web more so that in other places, but it is not without drawbacks.Decontextualising information makes it a lot longer. I can say 'This house is big', but if I wanted to decontexualise it properly I would have to give information as to where the house is located, at what time of the house's existence this was the John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5584900.post-1166979544382173642006-12-24T11:59:00.000-05:002006-12-24T12:03:31.866-05:00Situation Theory and Situation SemanticsSituation Theory and Situation Semantics (PDF file)by Keith Devlinfrom the Introduction:"In their 1980 paper The Situation Underground, the first published workon situation semantics, Barwise and Perry wrote of situations: 'The world consists not just of objects, or of objects, properties andrelations, but of objects having properties and standing in relationsto one another. And there are parts John Blackhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16703690030515299171noreply@blogger.com0