[tcs-lc] difference between IsParentOf/IsChildOf; and Includes/IsIncludedIn RelationshipTypes?

[Kennedy, Jessie]

Hi Rich,

> > > 1) Does this mean that parent/child relationships should only be
used
> > when
> > > Relationship/ToTaxonConcept points to a Concept with the *same*
> > > AccordingTo
> > > as the current TaxonConcept, and includes/excludes relationships
> > should
> > > only
> > > be used when Relationship/ToTaxonConcept points to a Concept with
a
> > > *different* AccordingTo?  Are there any exceptions to either of
these?
> >
> > Ok remembering there are 2 types of relationships - those defining
the
> > concept and those made either by the same author or by other authors
> > regarding 2 concepts but not made at the main point of definition of
the
> > concept as published.
> 
> ...the former being stored in TaxonConcept/Relationships, and the
latter
> in
> RelationshipAssertions -- right?  

Yes

> My intention for referencing
> "Relationship/ToTaxonConcept" was to restrict it to the former (i.e.,
> definitive relationships).  I probably should have been more explicit
> about
> that.

Yes

> 
> > So for those that are defining - the AccordingTo by definition is
the
> > same - i.e. only those relationships stated in the AccordingTo which
> > scopes the concept being defined.
> 
> Wait -- can't I define my concept by refering to concepts of other
> "AccordingTo" sources? For example, suppose I want to define:
> 
> Thisgenus thisspecies Smith 2000 SEC Pyle 2005
> 
> Suppose I consider Thisgenus thisspecies Smith 2000 to be a senior
synonym
> of Thisgenus thatspecies Jones 2002.  Suppose further that Brown 2003
> treated "thatspecies" of Jones to be a subspecies of "thisspecies".
> 
> TaxonConcepts:
> A1. Thisgenus SEC Smith 2000
> A2. Thisgenus SEC Jones 2002
> A3. Thisgenus SEC Brown 2003
> A4. Thisgenus SEC Pyle 2005
> A5. T. thisspecies Smith 2000 SEC Smith 2000
> A6. T. thisspecies Smith 2000 SEC Jones 2002
> A7. T. thisspecies Smith 2000 SEC Brown 2003
> A8. T. thisspecies Smith 2000 SEC Pyle 2005
> A9. T. thatspecies Jones 2002 SEC Jones 2002
> A10.T. thisspecies subsp. thatspecies Jones 2002 SEC Brown 2003
> 
> When I define my concept of T. thisspecies, can't I include
*definitive*
> relationships such as:
> 
> "includes T. thisspecies Smith 2000 SEC Jones 2002"
> "includes T. thatspecies Jones 2002 SEC Jones 2002"
> 
> i.e., Relationships to concepts that have a different "AccordingTo"?
> 
> I already know the answer is "yes"**, so I am assuming we are
suffering
> miscommunication.  

Yes of course you can state these kinds of relationships. I wasn't clear
enough - my comment referred to the parent/child relationship within a
definition.

> But the reason I spelled out the above examples is to
> re-ask my original question in a different way. When I am defining
> TaxonConcept A8 (T. thisspecies SEC me), would I only create an "is
child
> of" relationship to TaxonConcept A4 (Thisgenus SEC me)?  Or might I
> specify
> a "is child of" definitive relationship to TaxonConcepts A1, A2, or
A3?
> This is what I meant by restricting Parent/Child type definitive
> relationships to within-AccordingTo TaxonConcept instances.
> 
I would only create the child of from your own genus i.e A8 - A4
If you wanted to make a statement about A1,A2,A3 I would specify an
includes/excludes or whatever between A4 and A1, A2, A3

> As noted above, my definition of TaxonConcept A8 might also include
> relationships such as:
> "includes A6"
> "includes A9"
> 
Yes

> But I also assume that I might further define my concept with:
> "includes A10"
Yes

> 
> This is an example of a "Horizontal" relationship that crosses ranks
--
> right? (i.e., "diagonal")

Yes

> 
> Footnote:
> [**User Guide,p.11: "Earlier, external concepts may be used as well to
> nail
> down the meaning of a newly published concept."]
> 
> 
> > For the relationship assertions, I guess people might want to assert
> > parent/child relationships but what this really means is possibly
> > questionable - perhaps for sparse of poorly documented concepts,
someone
> > might want to assert that they believe a concept is the parent or
child
> > of another concept - we've never said people can't do this - as from
> > experience every time we tried to restrict what could be said
someone
> > would say they wanted to be able to do it - so we've left that up to
the
> > taxonomists to decide if it's something meaningful to them.
> 
> Understood.  This answers my later question on that. It's a delicate
line
> to
> walk between being restrictive and liberal in what is allowed.  Too
> restrictive, we can't encode all of our data properly.  Too liberal,
and
> different people are expressing the same information in different ways
> (defeating the purpose of an exchange schema).
> 
> > The latter - simply within and between (my simplistic mind then
relates
> > this to vertical and horizontal when talking with other computing
folks
> > - the vertical being within hierarchy and the horizontal relating
two
> > hierarchies via some node)
> 
> O.K., thanks -- so "vertical" and "horizontal" are not defined in
terms of
> taxonomic Rank.  Got it.
> 
> > > I don't necesarily agree we need both (pending the answer to my
> > question
> > > #1
> > > above), except as a performance enhancement device to save the
> > processing
> > > time required to compare "AccordingTo"s of two TaxonConcet
instances
> > > linked
> > > by a Relationship of Type "includes/included in".  This is
complicated
> > > further by the "has synonym" RelationshipType.  In any case,
clearly a
> > > point
> > > of discussion that exceeds the definition of "minor".
> >
> > Well I don't know now whether you think we need both or not
> 
> I'm still not sure, because I don't yet know the answer to my question
#1.
> But generally, my feeling about Concept-Concept relationships is that
they
> should be completely independent of taxonomic Rank -- i.e., they
should
> only
> relate to set-theory relationships, and not confound things by using
> taxonomic hierarchy to artificially create a relationship type that
> doesn't
> convey any different logical information from another relationship
type.
> As
> far as I can see, "A1 Is Parent of A2" doesn't tell us anything
different
> from "A1 Includes A2", except that the the TaxonNames attached to each
of
> these two concepts are at different ranks (and, perhaps, also that
they
> share an AccordingTo --depending on the answer to my Question #1).
This is
> something that is already self-evident from data already associated
with
> these two TaxonConcept, so the only advantage (as far as I can see) of
> allowing both types of Relationships is to save the trouble of looking
up
> the Rank and AccordingTo associated with two related TaxonConcepts.  A
> very
> small advantage, by my estimate.
> 
> > - just
> > depends on the level of semantics to be captured - I still think we
need
> > both - but no-one is forcing you to use both if you don't want to or
if
> > you believe there will be no loss of semantics by using only one.
> 
> Understood.  I guess it's something we can test with real-world data
sets.
> But again, if we allow too much "personal preference" in how data are
> represented, we may start losing the value of having a universally
adopted
> exchange schema in the first place.
> 

Yes - I hope so...

Jessie

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