That's a good link. It addresses the problems when trying to relay meaning through any medium, and the impossibility of recording it.
What I propose is recording context rather than meaning. The closer you get to the context, the closer you get to the meaning. Too much of language is focused on trying to explain what happened rather than in what context it happened.
You're right english doesn't work, but that doesn't mean meaning cannot be encoded. The English language lacks context. Provide a language based on context and you can encode meaning. Context is nonlinear ans so should the language be.
Making a semantic web that is based on English or even Latin languages would be a useless addition to the chaotic structure of the current web. The problem is not the way computers use our language, rather it is the language that we are trying to use. The assumptions that are beneath English are difficult to work with, and in reality wrong. When I say "I am a baseball player" the meaing is quite different than that sentence protrays. As mentioned by another commentor, context is the most important element of language. That doesn't mean we can't record meaning through computers, it just means we have to change the lanuage we use. A better attempt at the above sentence would be:
"I am part of a system in which I play a game with others. This game occurrs 2-4 times a month." In English hypertext each word in this statement would need an explaination: I=author part=player(pitcher, catcher, etc...) system=logic(baseball rules, game length, etc...) play=act game=system with others=people participating in the same instance of this system
Clearly this method of transcribing context is very difficult, not only because of the language's assumptions but also because of the linear thought process. Contexts are nonlinear overlapping structures and a linear language does not do them justice. I propose intead of trying to make a web of meaing based on current day languages, a new visual nonlinear language should be created.
Slashdot Mirror
That's a good link. It addresses the problems when trying to relay meaning through any medium, and the impossibility of recording it. What I propose is recording context rather than meaning. The closer you get to the context, the closer you get to the meaning. Too much of language is focused on trying to explain what happened rather than in what context it happened.
You're right english doesn't work, but that doesn't mean meaning cannot be encoded. The English language lacks context. Provide a language based on context and you can encode meaning. Context is nonlinear ans so should the language be.
Making a semantic web that is based on English or even Latin languages would be a useless addition to the chaotic structure of the current web. The problem is not the way computers use our language, rather it is the language that we are trying to use.
The assumptions that are beneath English are difficult to work with, and in reality wrong. When I say "I am a baseball player" the meaing is quite different than that sentence protrays.
As mentioned by another commentor, context is the most important element of language. That doesn't mean we can't record meaning through computers, it just means we have to change the lanuage we use. A better attempt at the above sentence would be:
"I am part of a system in which I play a game with others. This game occurrs 2-4 times a month."
In English hypertext each word in this statement would need an explaination:
I=author
part=player(pitcher, catcher, etc...)
system=logic(baseball rules, game length, etc...)
play=act
game=system
with others=people participating in the same instance of this system
Clearly this method of transcribing context is very difficult, not only because of the language's assumptions but also because of the linear thought process. Contexts are nonlinear overlapping structures and a linear language does not do them justice.
I propose intead of trying to make a web of meaing based on current day languages, a new visual nonlinear language should be created.
Who's down?