EnvironmentOntology
Scope of 'astronomical body part'
We are considering importing the ENVO term 'dental clinic' into a dental ontology we are working (the Oral Health and Disease Ontology). A 'dental clinic' is amazingly considered an 'astronomical body part'.
Our usage of 'dental clinic' includes mobile dental clinics that are busses, vans, or trucks whose interior space is outfitted with dental equipment and which are used to provide dental services in underserved or remote locations.
So does 'astronomical body part' include the possibility that vehicles are considered material parts of astronomical bodies, as it is unclear from the definition and intention of this term? (I note that 'subway train' is already a subtype, as is public transit system).
If the answer is yes, I suggest you clarify the definition to be more inclusive.
If the answer is no, I think you may have to break the linkage between 'human construction' and 'astronomical body part'. I think there is a good argument to make that the built environment is not properly considered an 'astronomical body part'.
If you do nothing, we will create our own competing term for 'dental clinic' that is not encumbered by the requirement for being an 'astronomical body part'.
Thanks, Alex @wdduncan
PS, a simpler definition of 'astronomical body part' might be "Any material entity that contributes to the overall gravitational field of an astronomical body, regardless of whether that material entity is defined by natural or fiat boundaries."
The idea of extracting human constructions from the ABP hierarchy may be metaphysically useful, especially as significant space-borne constructions arent far off. While many (most) HCs are ABPs, not all are or will be.
I don't know if orbital constructions are considered part of the astronomical body they orbit. Satellites sent off into space could be considered constructions rather than manufactured products (they are often larger than smaller constructions). Those differentia should be examined in the PR seeded here.
There's an argument to handle ABP status for constructed / manufactured entities at the instance level, if needed.
I think the separation of HC from ABP is procedurally useful, especially so that importing ontologies don't need to bring in ABPs (regardless of whether the metaphysics hold - all instances of dental clinics are currently ABPs).
Our usage of 'dental clinic' includes mobile dental clinics that are busses, vans, or trucks whose interior space is outfitted with dental equipment and which are used to provide dental services in underserved or remote locations.
Note to examine using role semantics for this and other facilities.
So does 'astronomical body part' include the possibility that vehicles are considered material parts of astronomical bodies..
Yes, as parts of the technosphere
The problem (I think) is that in these cases is that the semantics of part of isn't clear. Saying that a mobile clinic is an ABP is like that dandruff on an elephant is part of the elephant or that bacteria in a person's blood stream is part of the person.
Until such things get worked out, we will either not use the envo's dental clinic term or remove the axiom material entity and part of some astronomical body.
Let's try and separate some of these strands. Here is the current structure:
@addiehl's original request:
I think you may have to break the linkage between 'human construction' and 'astronomical body part'. I think there is a good argument to make that the built environment is not properly considered an 'astronomical body part'.
I interpret this as removing the is-a link between "human construction" and "ABP". I support this for the reasons stated. I don't think you are explicitly against this @pbuttigieg?
I think the utility of the term "technosphere" and any "part of" links are a separate issue - would you agree @wdduncan? (I am on a call with @wdduncan and he says "I agree"). I encourage making a separate issue in this repo for this.
But for this issue, I think we have agreement to remove the is-a between human construction and ABP?
There are indeed several strands here. I've started this PR to resolve this issue
The technosphere strand
The problem (I think) is that in these cases is that the semantics of part of isn't clear. Saying that a mobile clinic is an ABP is like that dandruff on an elephant is part of the elephant or that bacteria in a person's blood stream is part of the person.
All instances of dental clinics (that I know of) are parts of Earth's technosphere (a term in general use, e.g. here). A technosphere is part of an astronomical body. Naturally, users of ontologies that are narrower in scope than ENVO likely don't really need this for their typical uses.
Consider biospheres, which are also parts of astronomical bodies. They have critters that run around and microbial entities, but which are still parts of the biosphere. Thus the elephant dandruff case doesn't quite work (new sentence for me, thanks @wdduncan).
Until such things get worked out, we will either not use the envo's dental clinic term or remove the axiom material entity and part of some astronomical body.
As @cmungall stated, It looks like none of those links are asserted. The only asserted path is that a dental clinic > medical clinic > health care facility > human construction > construction > material entity, which is quite vanilla.
The semantics of "facility" bother me more than saying dental clinics are parts of our technosphere, which they are. But you can certainly remove those axioms while keeping the main asserted is_a hierarchy: your ontology doesn't really need them, while ENVO can make use of them.
I interpret this as removing the is-a link between "human construction" and "ABP". I support this for the reasons stated. I don't think you are explicitly against this @pbuttigieg?
I'm not against this, as I would consider the Voyager probes human constructions and they're way out there, out of our astronomical body's (Earth's) boundary. Due to that counterexample, we can indeed remove the human construction > technosphere link.
The mobile clinic strand
Note that we also have motor vehicle in the manufactured product hierarchy.
I feel that mobile dental clinics can be modelled, there, but this means we need to be smarter about "facilities" in general.
If we (as in OBO, rather than ENVO) have a "dental care provisioning role" that can be realised by a construction or manufactured product such as a motor vehicle (resulting in subclasses "brick-and-mortar dental clinic" and "mobile dental clinic" or similar, then we can move "facility" under "material entity", defined as "anything material entity that realises some [facility-esque role]".
Thus a brick-and-mortar and a mobile dental clinic will both be facilities, which makes sense.
The distinction between construction and manufactured product doesn't sit well, anymore, however. Are not all constructions manufactured, and all manufactured items constructed? There's probably some industrial / technical lingo that can help us clean that up. [EDIT: adding refs for this 1, 2, 3]
Proposed pattern for OHD (and other ontologies) x ENVO
If ENVO represents things down to the buildings and vehicle types in general, but leaves the role-based definitions (e.g. dental stuff and facilities) to ontologies like OHD, ENVO can then import subclasses like "dental care clinic" from the specialist ontologies (like OHD).
This creates some overhead, but if we stick to a pattern this could be a good SOP for ENVO to hand over sub-branches to specialists.
Thanks Pier for your attention and suggestions for this issue.
We need to consider which ontology would be the best home for healthcare facility and its children. Perhaps OGMS, but there may be other choices.
I've moved facility out of construction, under material entity, with a new definition of:
A material entity which has been designed to promote the accomplishment of one or more defined tasks.
and an axiom to a new process class, facilitation:
'material entity' and ('capable of' some facilitation)
There's a new class, mobile dental clinic under dental clinic defined as:
A dental clinic which is capable of transporting equipment and personnel to render dental care.
With a comment:
Mobile clinics are typically contained in motor vehicles.
and equivalence axiom:
'dental clinic' and ('capable of' some transportation)
I think this can be a general pattern for other facilities.
I've also moved some classes out of the facility branch under building where appropriate. More clean up to follow.