Geographic Categories: An Ontological Investigation

本研究的结果将有助于我们对地理对象和相关认知类别的理解。这将通过正式本体论的发展来实现，而正式本体论又将基于使用人类受试者的严格的跨语言实证研究。初步研究表明，地理对象具有与桌面尺度上遇到的对象不同的重要本体论特征，并且这些特征对于分类的目的是显著的。到目前为止，关于认知类别本质的证据主要是基于对类似于人体及其部分的实体的分类研究——小动物和植物、人工制品和工具等。本项目是第一个以系统的方式将这类调查扩展到地理对象领域的项目。因此，它有可能有助于我们对人类认知分类的总体理解，以及地理领域认知的具体特征。平行的研究将在多个语言和地区进行，因此产生的本体将是多语言的。该项目将有助于发展地理信息系统，特别是空间数据传输和地理软件和数据的语义互操作性。目前大多数地理信息系统和空间数据基础设施都是基于地理对象（实体）的，对地理对象及其类别性质的改进理论将提高地理数据关键部分特征编码方案的有效性。该研究的多语言方面将有助于国际地理信息交流，并有助于环境、社会、军事和商业领域的跨国项目的有效性。该研究至少在以下方面具有实际意义：(1)它可以帮助我们理解不同群体是如何交换或不交换地理信息的。(2)通过为具有稳定的分类系统和形式上严格的底层结构的空间数据库提供基础，支持知识交换标准的制定。(3)它可以为地理信息系统（GIS）提供默认特征，从而有助于非专家对其更广泛的可用性。

The results of this study will contribute to our understanding of geographic objects and associated cognitive categories. This will be achieved through the development of a formal ontology, which in turn will be based on rigorous, cross-linguistic empirical research using human subjects. Preliminary studies have indicated that geographic objects have important ontological features distinct from those of objects encountered at table-top scales, and that these features are salient for purposes of categorization. Evidence regarding the nature of cognitive categories has up to now been based primarily on studies of categorization of entities at scales similar to the human body and its parts--small animals and plants, artifacts and tools, etc.. The present project is the first to extend inquiries of this sort in systematic fashion to the domain of geographic objects. It thus has the potential to contribute to our understanding of human cognitive categorization in general, as well as to specific features of cognition in the geographic realm. Parallel studies will be conducted in several languages and regions, so that the resulting ontology will be multilingual.The project will contribute to the development of geographic information systems (GIS), especially to spatial data transfer and semantic interoperability of geographic software and data. Most current GISs, and spatial data infrastructures, are based on geographic objects (entities), and an improved theory of the nature of geographic objects and their categories will improve the effectiveness of feature coding schemes that are a key part of geographic data. The multilingual aspects of the research will contribute to international geographic information exchange, and to the effectiveness of multinational projects in environmental, social, military, and commercial domains. The proposed research can be of practical importance in at least the following ways: (1) It can help us to understand how different groups of people exchange, or fail to exchange, geographic information. (2) It can support the development of knowledge-interchange standards by providing the basis for spatial databases with stable category systems and formally rigorous underlying structure. (3) It can provide default characteristics for geographic information systems (GIS) in ways that may contribute to their broader usability by non-experts.