[tdwg-content] New terms need resolution: "Individual"

[Richard Pyle]

I have a very slow and tenuous email connection here in the field, so as
much as I would like to comment in my usual verbose fashion, that will need
to wait until my return to Hawaii at the end of July (sighs of relief and
sounds of joy can be heard across the internet....)

Very briefly:

1.  I favor the creation of an "Individual" class (indeed, I had planned to
propose it myself).

2. I believe that the term "BiologicalEntity" is the best term for this
class and its ID attribute.

3. I agree in general with the complete proposal as outlined by John in his
original email, but I will have more detailed comments about the included
attributes when I return.

4. If this proposal is ratified, then the term "IndividualID" in the
Occurrence class should be eliminated. (My first thought was to have it
changed to "BiologicalEntityID"; but no other class has these "foreign key"
equivalents in them, so best to handle it via Resource Relationship; see #6
below).

5. If this proposal is ratified, I do not think there needs to be a separate
class for "Evidence", as outlined in John's other email (at least not at
this time).

6. We need to have a good discussion about the appropriate use of
http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/index.htm#ResourceRelationship within DwC.  It
seems to me that this Class is underutilized.  Indeed, I think that it
should be the most heavily used Class in all of DwC, if indeed its function
is to establish relationships between instances of the same or different
(i.e., among or within) DwC classes.  If we used it more regularly and
consistently, we could eliminate all the "associatedXXX" terms (e.g.,
"associatedBiologicalEntities), and represent these associations via
instances of the resourceRelationship class.
Indeed, if we qualified the definition of this class, we may also be able to
use it to establish relationships with non-DwC Class identifiers as well
(e.g., perhaps negating the need for "
dcterms:references/dcterms:source/etc. terms currently being discussed on a
parallel thread.

OK....by my standards, at least, that was pretty brief.

Aloha,
Rich

P.S. To the BiSciCol'ers (SciColists?): I have CC'd our group because this
conversation is highly relevant to our project.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: tdwg-content-bounces at lists.tdwg.org [mailto:tdwg-content-
> bounces at lists.tdwg.org] On Behalf Of John Wieczorek
> Sent: Monday, July 04, 2011 11:49 PM
> To: TDWG Content Mailing List
> Subject: [tdwg-content] New terms need resolution: "Individual"
> 
> Darwin Core Issues 69 and 80:
> http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/issues/list
> 
> This issue is related to the issue of Evidence (CollectionObject,
> Representation, Token, Unit) covered in a previous posting. In the Darwin
> Core there is currently no separate class to explicitly represent the
biological
> entities involved in an Occurrence. This is problematic when trying to be
> explicit about the attributes of these entities in the semantic world.
Various
> names have been given to this concept, including "Individual",
> "BiologicalIndividual", "BiologicalEntity", "Organism", and
> "DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit" in ABCD.
> 
> Open Issues:
> Determine if there is a general consensus on the need for new class for
this
> concept.
> 
> The best name for this class.
> 
> Create a new Type Vocabulary term referring to this new class.
> 
> Decide which properties currently organized under Occurrence should
> instead be organized under this new class.
> 
> As a seed for further discussion, here is a complete proposal.
> ==============
> Term Name: BiologicalEntity
> Identifier:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/BiologicalEntity
> Namespace:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/
> Label:	BiologicalEntity
> Definition:	The category of information pertaining to an individual
> organism or
> a group of organisms that can reliably be known to represent a single
taxon.
> Comment:	 For discussion see
> http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/wiki/BiologicalEntity
> Type of Term:	http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#Class
> Refines:
> Status:	recommended
> Date Issued:	2011-07-04
> Date Modified:	2011-07-04
> Has Domain:
> Has Range:
> Version:	BiologicalEntity-2011-07-04
> Replaces:
> Is Replaced By:
> Class:
> ABCD 2.06:	{DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/CultureCollectionUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/MycologicalUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/HerbariumUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/BotanicalGardenUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/PlantGeneticResourceUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/ZoologicalUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/PalaeontologicalUnit or
> DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/MultimediaObjects/MultimediaObject}
> 
> Term Name: BiologicalEntity
> Identifier:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/dwctype/BiologicalEntity
> Namespace:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/dwctype/
> Label:	BiologicalEntity
> Definition:	A resource describing an instance of the BiologicalEntity
class.
> Comment:	 For discussion see
> http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/wiki/DwCTypeVocabulary
> Type of Term:	http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#Class
> Refines:
> Status:	recommended
> Date Issued:	2011-07-04
> Date Modified:	2011-07-04
> Member Of:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/DwCType
> Has Domain:
> Has Range:
> Version:	BiologicalEntity-2011-07-04
> Replaces:
> Is Replaced By:
> Class:
> ABCD 2.06:	not in ABCD
> 
> Term Name: biologicalEntityID
> Identifier:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/biologicalEntityID
> Namespace:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/
> Label:	biologicalEntityID
> Definition:	An identifier for the set of information associated with
> an BiologicalEntity. May be a global unique identifier or an identifier
specific
> to the data set.
> Comment:	For discussion see
> http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/wiki/BiologicalEntity
> Type of Term:	http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#Property
> Refines:	http://purl.org/dc/terms/identifier
> Status:	recommended
> Date Issued:	2011-07-04
> Date Modified:	2011-07-04
> Has Domain:
> Has Range:
> Version:	biologicalEntityID-2011-07-04
> Replaces:	individualID-2009-04-24
> Is Replaced By:
> Class:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/BiologicalEntity
> ABCD 2.06:	DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/
> 
> Term Name: biologicalEntityRemarks
> Identifier:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/biologicalEntityRemarks
> Namespace:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/
> Label:	biologicalEntityRemarks
> Definition:	Comments or notes about the BiologicalEntity.
> Comment:	Example: "seen several times in Tilden Park before capture".
> For discussion see
> http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/wiki/CollectionObject
> Type of Term:	http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#Property
> Refines:
> Status:	recommended
> Date Issued:	2011-07-04
> Date Modified:	2009-07-04
> Has Domain:
> Has Range:
> Version:	biologicalEntityRemarks-2011-07-04
> Replaces:
> Is Replaced By:
> Class:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/BiologicalEntity
> ABCD 2.06:	DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/Notes
> 
> Term Name: associatedBiologicalEntities
> Identifier:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/associatedBiologicalEntities
> Namespace:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/
> Label:	associatedBiologicalEntities
> Definition:	A list (concatenated and separated) of identifiers of
> other BiologicalEntity records and their associations to this
BiologicalEntity.
> Comment:	Example: "sibling of MXA-231; sibling of MXA-232". For
> discussion see http://code.google.com/p/darwincore/wiki/BiologicalEntity
> Type of Term:	http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#Property
> Refines:
> Status:	recommended
> Date Issued:	2011-07-04
> Date Modified:	2011-07-04
> Has Domain:
> Has Range:
> Version:	associatedBiologicalEntities-2011-07-04
> Replaces:	associatedOccurrences-2009-04-24
> Is Replaced By:
> Class:	http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/BiologicalEntity
> ABCD 2.06:
> 	DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/Associations/UnitAssociation/Associat
> edUnitSourceInstitutionCode
> + DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/Associations/UnitAssociation/AssociatedUni
> + tSourceName
> + DataSets/DataSet/Units/Unit/Associations/UnitAssociation/AssociatedUni
> + tID
> 
> Terms to be organized under biologicalEntity rather than Occurrence:
> previousIdentifications
> associatedMedia
> associatedReferences
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