[tdwg-content] Treatise on Occurrence, tokens, and basisOfRecord [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

Wed Nov 3 05:49:21 CET 2010

Good point -- I agree.

  _____  

From: gtuco.btuco at gmail.com [mailto:gtuco.btuco at gmail.com] On Behalf Of John
Wieczorek
Sent: Tuesday, November 02, 2010 6:31 PM
To: Richard Pyle
Cc: Steve Baskauf; tdwg-content at lists.tdwg.org
Subject: Re: [tdwg-content] Treatise on Occurrence, tokens, and
basisOfRecord [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

I like Organism, but I don't like the inconsistency it would make with
individualID and individualCount on the one hand, or extra work to change
these to organismID and organismCount on the other. Individual doesn't carry
these extra burdens, and could be added without breaking any existing
applications.

On Tue, Nov 2, 2010 at 8:30 PM, Richard Pyle <deepreef at bishopmuseum.org>
wrote:

I think the only alternative to "Individual" that has been floated, and
might be more appropriate, is "Organism".  In my mind, at least, the word
"Organism" can apply equally to a single cell, or a single multicellular
organism, or a group of individuals, or a colony, or a population, or even a
taxon.  The advantage it has over "Individual" is that is more clearly
related to the biology domain (not to be confused with other things called
"Individual" in other domains), and also "Individual" might lead people to
assume that gorups and populations and such are not within scope.

I don't feel strongly about it either way -- it's just a suggestion.

Rich

  _____  

From: tdwg-content-bounces at lists.tdwg.org
[mailto:tdwg-content-bounces at lists.tdwg.org] On Behalf Of Steve Baskauf
Sent: Tuesday, November 02, 2010 5:21 PM
To: tuco at berkeley.edu 

Cc: tdwg-content at lists.tdwg.org
Subject: Re: [tdwg-content] Treatise on Occurrence, tokens, and
basisOfRecord [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

John,
Thanks for the suggestion.  It is appropriate given the clarification that
has been made through the course of the discussion on this list.  I have
created a revised term definition and comments at
http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/issues/detail?id=69 .

With regards to the actual term name, I don't have any better idea.  If
someone has a suggestion, perhaps they can post it to the list for comment.
Steve

John Wieczorek wrote: 

Steve, 

Can you add a comment to Issue 69 in which you state the updated term
recommendation for the following?

Definition:
Comment:
Refines:

It might also be a good time to decide if Individual as a term name is
equally offensive to all. Sure, it doesn't capture exactly all of the things
an Individual might be, but the same is true of almost every term name -
people should always consult the definitions, comments, and secondary
documentation.

On Tue, Nov 2, 2010 at 7:03 AM, Steve Baskauf <steve.baskauf at vanderbilt.edu>
wrote:

OK, I'm going to respectfully disagree here.  dwc:Individual is not
"overloaded" any more than dwc:class is overloaded.  We know that dwc:class
does not mean the same thing as "class" in RDF or Java because the term name
is http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/class, not "class".  We know that the
proposed dwc:Individual has a specific meaning because it would be
http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/Individual and not "individual" in the sense of
OWL or RDF or anything else.  

The problem here is not lack of a clear definition for the proposed DwC
class dwc:Individual .  That thing has been defined to death, having been
the subject of an entire published paper (Biodiversity Informatics 7:17-44),
and having its definition restated at least three times in this thread.  The
problem is people entering the thread without being aware that it's been
defined or having not read any of the definitions (I'm not trying to be rude
here, I'm just observing that this has happened several times in the
thread).  So one last time, I'll define what I intend for dwc:Individual to
mean ("taxon" here means terminal taxon, species, ssp., or var.):

Layman's definition:  a representative of a single taxon that serves to
connect one or more dwc:Occurrences to one or more dwc:Identifications.

More technical definition: a resource representing a single taxon that
serves as a node (sensu RDF) connecting one or more instances of the class
dwc:Occurrence to one or instances of the class dwc:Identification .  

These are functional definitions - they define what dwc:Individual "does"
not what dwc:Individual "is".  What dwc:Individual "is" is anything that
fits the definition.  Thus a biological individual can be a dwc:Individual,
as can a clump of moss.  The mixed-species content of a pitfall trap cannot
be an individual because it does not represent a single taxon.  Groups of
biological individuals that are too large to know for sure that they are a
single taxon probably shouldn't be considered a dwc:Individual.  

I would be perfectly happy with changing the term name from "Individual" to
something else as long as the definition of its purpose doesn't change and
as long as dwc:individualID and the proposed dwc:individualRemarks are
changed to match.  

Leaving the term undefined and axiomatic is not an option.  We have a
proposal for a term addition to DwC
(http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/issues/detail?id=69) that's been on the
table for nine months and I've essentially "called for the question" on the
proposal.  So unless somebody has something to add that's different from
what has already been discussed at great length, let's move on.

Steve 

Paul Murray wrote: 

What exactly is an individual? A flock? A herd? A breading pair? A  

colony? A clonal stand?

One or more members of a class, for example, the class defined as all  

members of a taxon.

We'll have to add "individual" to the list of overloaded terms.

In the world of taxonomy and specimen curation, it apparently possibly means
various things (perhaps "living things you can count"? "Living things that
are identifiably the same thing from one day to another"? The boundaries of
individuals are sometimes wobbly.).

In the world of OWL and RDF, an individual is an unspecified something that
can be the subject or object of a (object) property. Individuals can be
named with URIs.

Perhaps, then, an individual is simply "A living thing that we are
sufficiently interested in to identify as an individual". That is:
essentially to leave the term undefined and axiomatic.

------

If you have received this transmission in error please notify us immediately
by return e-mail and delete all copies. If this e-mail or any attachments
have been sent to you in error, that error does not constitute waiver of any
confidentiality, privilege or copyright in respect of information in the
e-mail or attachments. 

Please consider the environment before printing this email.

------

_______________________________________________

tdwg-content mailing list

tdwg-content at lists.tdwg.org

http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-content

-- 

Steven J. Baskauf, Ph.D., Senior Lecturer

Vanderbilt University Dept. of Biological Sciences

postal mail address:

VU Station B 351634

Nashville, TN  37235-1634,  U.S.A.

delivery address:

2125 Stevenson Center

1161 21st Ave., S.

Nashville, TN 37235

office: 2128 Stevenson Center

phone: (615) 343-4582,  fax: (615) 343-6707

http://bioimages.vanderbilt.edu

_______________________________________________
tdwg-content mailing list
tdwg-content at lists.tdwg.org
http://lists.tdwg.org/mailman/listinfo/tdwg-content

-- 

Steven J. Baskauf, Ph.D., Senior Lecturer

Vanderbilt University Dept. of Biological Sciences

postal mail address:

VU Station B 351634

Nashville, TN  37235-1634,  U.S.A.

delivery address:

2125 Stevenson Center

1161 21st Ave., S.

Nashville, TN 37235

office: 2128 Stevenson Center

phone: (615) 343-4582,  fax: (615) 343-6707

http://bioimages.vanderbilt.edu

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.tdwg.org/pipermail/tdwg-content/attachments/20101102/6eddd5c0/attachment-0001.html 