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The issue is that system has nodes and edges, but no concept of distinct graphs. That leaves you trying to fit all notable human knowledge onto a single graph,
by travisjungroth 4y ago
The issue is that system has nodes and edges, but no concept of distinct graphs. That leaves you trying to fit all notable human knowledge onto a single graph, which is non-optimal. Whether it’s also a DAG, tree, or something else doesn’t even matter.
Ontologies are like languages. There is no correct one. What matters is how good a fit it is for the problem at hand and that you’re all using the same one! If half the people are using Italian and half Spanish, it’s going to be a disaster. I wouldn’t use APL to write a UI and I wouldn’t architect a computer system in Shipibo.
Similarly, if I’m bird watching, “Birds of Northern California” is very useful. Organizing them by genus is less useful to me in that moment, but it’s not wrong.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- moonchild 4y agoI don't think you necessarily need multiple graphs; just labeled edges.
- travisjungroth 4y agoYou just need some way to interact with it as multiple graphs. Some variation of labeled edges is probably the best.
- redbar0n 4y agoIn your examples, would the edges be like: tagged_with_italian_tag vs. tagged_with_spanish_tag ? tagged_with_genus_tag vs. tagged_with_geo_tag ? Would that afford such multiple graphs?
- travisjungroth 4y agoThere are a bunch of ways to do it. You could use the Entity-Attribute-Value[0]. Then it's (California Quail, Region, California), (California Quail, Genus, Callipepla). You could do relational tables, with a through table for each taxonomy. Or, one through table with tags. That's like your comment. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entity%E2%80%93attribute%E2%80%93value_model https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entity%E2%80%93attribute%E2%80...
- ok_dad 4y agoIsn't this literally just saying we need another layer of categorization on top of the categorization layer?
- all2 4y agoPerhaps "adjacent to" rather than "on top of"? I've started looking at this kind of problem in terms of DB queries or set relations. Even "organization" can be a set relation if there are the right bits of metadata in place.
- travisjungroth 4y agoIt’s saying you need support for multiple types of categories. You could use the same system to organize itself. No need for a meta layer.