add term 'State'

[GoogleCodeExporter]

There have been several discussions on 'State' both on these wiki pages as well 
as in the google 
group emails. It is time we have some consensus on this. To kick start this, 
here is a link to an 
earlier discussion in OGMS:
http://code.google.com/p/ogms/issues/detail?id=3&q=state#c27      to     
http://code.google.com/p/ogms/issues/detail?id=3&q=state#c33

Discussions earlier try to emphasize the point that there is no difference 
between 'state' and 
'process'. However, this is very counter-intuitive to our view of 'reality' - 
in real life we have a 
very strong notion of what is a 'state' and what is a 'process'.  At a very 
simple level,

     a 'process' has a beginning and an end and has a series of steps
     a 'state' has no beginning or end and no steps are involved. 

E.g.1.: a 'cup' with water in it can be described using different states:
               - 'half-filled' state if half the cup is filled with water
               - 'full' state if the cup is completely filled with water

            a process, such as 'filling cup' will be involved in changing the state. 

E.g.2.: a sleeping person can be described as being in a 'state' of 'asleep'. 
Underlying this so 
called state of sleep are complex processes - 'wakefulness process', 'non-REM 
sleep process' and 
'REM sleep process'. It is a balance between these three processes along with 
the influence of the 
circadian rhythm (yet another process) that determines if a person is in a 
'state' of 'sleepy', 
'asleep', 'waking-up' or 'awake'.

E.g. 3. there was a discussion on 'tired' some time back in July '09 (Email 
thread 'what is tired') - 
not sure what the conclusion was. Tiredness (or 'rested' or 'energetic') is 
probably something 
even more complex than 'sleep' with multiple 'processes' involved. I think that 
if someone says 'I 
am tired', we are referring to the 'state' of the person as opposed to all the 
'processes' that are 
going on within. 

The other issue was how to differentiate 'state' from 'quality'. If a car has 
red color, is that a 
'state' or a 'quality'? The way I think about this is that if something is 
capable of changing then it 
can have states. Therefore, if the car is red during the day and blue in the 
night then the 'state of 
the car color' at any given time is either 'red' or blue'.    'color' would be 
a 'quality' of the car 
(inheres in). In example 2 with sleep, we need to differentiate between 'Sleep 
quality' that inheres 
in a person from the 'sleep state' that a person can be in.  

Original issue reported on code.google.com by sivaram....@gmail.com on 11 Jan 2010 at 11:08

[GoogleCodeExporter]

I think we have a good understanding of when the use of the word 'state' in 
science
is appropriate and when it is not (certainly, being asleep may be a paradigm 
case of
a state), AND it may be extremely useful for constructing models, but neither of
these imply 'state' corresponds to something in reality.  

If the intent is to use 'state' for a portion of a process, why not use
bfo:fiat_process_part?  

If the the intent is to use 'state' for a quality, why not use bfo:quality?

'State' is heavily overloaded (it means different things in different
disciplines)...and it is not clear that it belongs in OGMS (it probably belongs
directly in BFO if anywhere).

Also, as you correctly point out, the use of 'states' commits us to a certain 
view of
time...I know for a fact that there is active work to axiomatize the BFO 
ontological
view of time...so I would at least wait until that is complete to see if the 
result
is "state-friendly".

Original comment by albertgo...@gmail.com on 12 Jan 2010 at 5:43

[GoogleCodeExporter]

"If the intent is to use 'state' for a portion of a process, why not use 
bfo:fiat_process_part?"  
    From the examples I was trying to explain the exact opposite i.e. biologically it is the interplay of  many 
processes that result in different states an organism can be in. 

"If the the intent is to use 'state' for a quality, why not use bfo:quality?" 
I don't think that was my intent. But to make this clear, first we need to be 
clear of what 'quality' is. BFO 
defines it as something that 'inheres in an entity' and gives an example of 
'color' of a tomato, 'weight' of a 
chimpanzee, etc. So 'color', 'weight', 'circumference', 'shape' all are 
examples of 'quality'. What about the 
tomato that has a green color and a few days later turns red? 

Original comment by sivaram....@gmail.com on 13 Jan 2010 at 1:35

[GoogleCodeExporter]

It was determined that 'state' is too high-level for OGMS, and probably should 
be
added to an upper ontology.

Original comment by albertgo...@gmail.com on 31 Mar 2010 at 4:29

• Changed state: WontFix