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From: ewc@hplb.hpl.hp.com (Enrico Coiera)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Re: Unified model for knowledge representation? (Impossible)
Message-ID: <1991Jun04.082625.13317@hplb.hpl.hp.com>
Date: 4 Jun 91 08:26:25 GMT
References: <9106040003.AA12879@lilac.berkeley.edu>
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Reply-To: ewc@hplb.hpl.hp.com (Enrico Coiera)
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Steven Smoliar's follow-up contains an interesting suggestion ie that
'there is no such thing as subjective description. Description is highly
subjective to the person doing the subscribing'. A similar view is
shared by Paul Compton (see
P. Compton, R. Jansen, A Philosophical basis for Knowlege Aquisition,
Knowledge Aqusition, (1990), 2, 241-257). He suggests that there is
little point in attempting to structure the knowledge elicited from
experts because each expert 'makes-up' the knowledge as it were in the
context of a particular problem. While each individual has an internal
representation of some form, the way in which it is communicated to
others is highly context dependent - the knowledge elicited in context
only has validity in that context - it makes no sense to attempt to
represent it in a way in which it can be considered context independent. 


Enrico Coiera

Hewlett Packard Labs
Filton Rd
Stoke Gifford, Bristol BS12 6QZ
United Kingdom