Re: Propositions

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Date: Wed, 16 Feb 94 06:17:12 EST
From: sowa <sowa@turing.pacss.binghamton.edu>
Message-id: <9402161117.AA15498@turing.pacss.binghamton.edu>
To: cg@cs.umn.edu, interlingua@ISI.EDU, schubert@cs.rochester.edu,
        sowa@turing.pacss.binghamton.edu
Subject: Re:  Propositions

Len,

Yes, the problem with variable names is indeed vexing.  In fact,
that is one of the main reasons why I prefer to dispense with
variable names completely.  The issue simply does not arise with
existential graphs or conceptual graphs.  But then you have other
issues, such as defining a lexicographic sorting of subgraphs whose
nodes are unnamed.

That is where the Levinson-Ellis algorithms for maintaining
generalization hierarchies may be important -- they sort the
graphs in a hierarchy that is determined by structure alone,
without considering the names of the variables that link them.

For the kinds of structures that arise in a typed logic, the
type names are very important for reducing the amount of testing
in comparing graphs.  But types are a semantically significant
category, unlike names, which are purely connective.

John