Proposal:Key Concepts

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The key concepts are the concepts at the root of the ontology. They are a lot of methods to create this basic hierarchy : linguistic, scientific, cognitive, pragmatic,...

The Wiktionary need linguistic key concepts like WordNet, Wikipedia need more domain oriented key concepts like Cyc, some cognitive and few pragmatic ones. This knowledge variations indicate a requirement on the mediawiki system : offering the possibility of the creation of key concepts hierarchy.

Presently, this key concepts hierarchy exists in all Wiki systems. For example, in Wikimedia you have :

  • General reference
  • Culture and the arts
  • Geography and places
  • Health and fitness
  • History and events
  • Mathematics and logic
  • Natural and physical sciences
  • People and self
  • Philosophy and thinking
  • Religion and belief systems
  • Society and social sciences
  • Technology and applied sciences

But is not possible to associate automatically the appurtenance of a concept (an article) in a category with the appropriate knowledge template. A knowledge template can be simply a form with predetermined fields, for example, for People and self/Biography you have at minimum :

  • born_on : date
  • die_on : date
  • born_at : place
  • die_at : place

This kind of structured meta-data support validation constraints and integrity rules like:

  • born_on < die_on
  • exists born_at in Geography_and_places
  • etc.

This example is inspired by frames ontology editors like Promété and project a possible use of semantic forms of the semantic media wiki.


The rigidity problem

Key Concepts needs do be stable because a lot of computer programs use this rigidity as logical basis ; how this requirement can be compatible with the wiki philosophy ?


Annex

Key concepts in WordNet

Physical entity

An entity that has physical existence.

  • thing (a separate and self-contained entity)
  • object, physical object (a tangible and visible entity; an entity that can cast a shadow) "it was full of rackets, balls and other objects"
  • causal agent, cause, causal agency (any entity that produces an effect or is responsible for events or results)
  • matter (that which has mass and occupies space) "physicists study both the nature of matter and the forces which govern it"
  • process, physical process (a sustained phenomenon or one marked by gradual changes through a series of states) "events now in process"; "the process of calcification begins later for boys than for girls"
  • substance (material of a particular kind or constitution) "the immune response recognizes invading substances"

Abstraction, abstract entity

A general concept formed by extracting common features from specific examples.

  • psychological feature (a feature of the mental life of a living organism)
  • attribute (an abstraction belonging to or characteristic of an entity)
  • group, grouping (any number of entities (members) considered as a unit)
  • relation (an abstraction belonging to or characteristic of two entities or parts together)
  • communication (something that is communicated by or to or between people or groups)
  • measure, quantity, amount (how much there is or how many there are of something that you can quantify)
  • otherworld (an abstract spiritual world beyond earthly reality)
  • set ((mathematics) an abstract collection of numbers or symbols) "the set of prime numbers is infinite"

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