Logic and Computation advanced course:
Ontologies: Structuring, Modularity, and Heterogeneity.
Teachers
- Stefano Borgo ()
- Oliver Kutz ()
The design of formal ontologies is an interdisciplinary area of
research that draws on logic, philosophy, cognitive science,
linguistics, as well as computer science, with major
applications in the Semantic Web. As the scope and relevance of
ontologies grows, both for supporting Semantic Web applications
and for knowledge-rich processing in general, the issue of
re-using/importing developed ontological components takes on an
ever more critical role. The current solutions being pursued
within OWL-oriented Semantic Web approaches have some severe
limitations in this respect. For the next generation of
ontology-based systems, it will be essential to move beyond
this.
To achieve this, we present major methodologies and techniques
to correctly construct, modify, and relate ontologies -
understood in a broad sense as logical theories formulated in
various formal languages - with an emphasis on heterogeneity,
structuring and modularity, as well as foundations of ontology
design. As illustrative examples, we will discuss prominent
ontologies from the spatial, philosophical and linguistic
domains. These will be analysed and structured using the Common
Algebraic Specification Language (CASL), and shown 'at
work' employing the tool HeTS, offering (heterogeneous)
reasoning support for structured ontologies and providing
powerful new mechanisms for reusing ontological components or
modules. A Live-CD for hands-on experimentation with HeTS will
be distributed to all participants.