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Re: more politics

• To: Tim Bray <tbray@t...>
• Subject: Re: more politics
• From: John Cowan <cowan@m...>
• Date: Thu, 24 Jul 2003 01:18:49 -0400
• Cc: xml-dev@l...
• In-reply-to: <3F1F66D3.1040908@t...>
• References: <r02000000-1026-BC099F40BD6811D7A0870003937A08C2@[192.168.124.11]> <oprssgstsbezizxn@s...> <20030724011058.GB22456@m...> <3F1F66D3.1040908@t...>
• User-agent: Mutt/1.3.28i

Tim Bray scripsit:

> Questions: (a) can software detect the difference?

Not as RDF stands, no.

> (b) does the difference have any effect on the behavior of the system?

Definitely, since "the system" includes human beings and other
inference-drawing machines.  Identifying John Cowan with John Cowan's
mailbox or John Cowan's homepage leads to paradoxes, since the same
properties have different values for these things: I began in 1958,
my mailbox in about 1993, and my homepage not until 1998.  A pretty
drastic distinction!

If we want to assign a URI to everything including digital documents,
then we have the choice that a URI representing something other than a
digital document must return an error when GETted, or that some digital
documents cannot be given RDF properties.

TBL has said that "http://www.w3.org/Consortium/" is the URI for the W3C
consortium.  But he has not said what the URI is for the hyperdocument
which begins "The World Wide Web Consortium was created in October 1994".
It cannot be the same URI on pain of contradiction.

-- 
John Cowan          http://www.ccil.org/~cowan        jcowan@r...
To say that Bilbo's breath was taken away is no description at all.  There are
no words left to express his staggerment, since Men changed the language that
they learned of elves in the days when all the world was wonderful. --The Hobbit

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: more politics
    • From: "Jonathan Borden" <jonathan@o...>
  • Re: more politics
    • From: "Simon St.Laurent" <simonstl@s...>

• References:
  • more politics
    • From: "Simon St.Laurent" <simonstl@s...>
  • Re: more politics
    • From: Mike Champion <mc@x...>
  • Re: more politics
    • From: John Cowan <cowan@m...>
  • Re: more politics
    • From: Tim Bray <tbray@t...>

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