Date: Tue, 3 Nov 1998 23:05:53 -0200 (EDT) From: "416720" To: MCG Subject: [MCG] What is identification, that we can identify it?, Part II [This document was edited after posting, to comply with newest discussions.] List: This essay continues to revisit the concept of identification and presents Part II. The first part is available at http://mcwg.org/mcg-mirror/coherence.txt The first part presented the identification levels I-1 and I-2. Identification was defined as a connection. Essentially, to identify is to look for connections -- i.e., to look for coherence (since coherence is a "natural or logical connection"). We also dealt with the concept of "nexus", where a nexus is a linked collective of elments. Using only the idea of coherence to start with, it was possible to define "identification levels" -- where each higher level refines what the other level allows one to express. The first 2 identification levels have the following number of types: I-1 1 (Identified) I-2 4 (Distinguished, Ambiguous, Obscure, Formless) But, before proceeding to I-3, I make one important comparison. In our interactions with the world, we can perceive the distinctive views: Objective Reality: money, market, companies, governments, law, etc. Intersubjective Reality: medical diagnosis, bank-client relationship, majority of e-commerce, hacker organizations, criminal gangs, etc. Subjective Reality: my thoughts, my dreams, personal world, each person, lone miscreants, lone hackers, etc. which cannot be harmonized except to some extent. However, the Internet must not only deal with all three views but must, oftentimes, endure the clash between the "hierarchists" and the "anarchists" as expressions of various shades of the three groupings above. The solution, for Internet protocols with wide scope, is perhaps to identify a fourth level, the Abstract Reality. Which could afford safer interoperation with all three levels -- by abstracting both the observer and the stance. The goal is to try to use the Abstract view to perceive a nexus within diversity, according to one's goals. Concretely speaking, such should be the goal of all Internet protocols. To be as abstract as possible in order to serve all. This is the purpose of the current effort in our studies of identification. I can make the following equivalence (see the definition of trust and description of trust types in [5]): Identification-2 Realm Trust is defined by: Distinguished subjective what you know you know you know Ambiguous intersubjective skewed bilateral agreements Obscure objective coherent collective agreements Formless abstract [5] Thus, the most accurate and reliable identification is based on the subjective view, as we can intuitively see -- I know with qualification, hence I am sure. And, the most insecure identification is one that depends on the objective view -- since it can be always repudiated. In my opinion, there is an important general lesson to the security of all Internet protocols in this statement. I note that it is also possible to express a sublevel in I-2, called Ambiguous-Obscure and represented by Ao. It corresponds to the case where Accuracy is YES-NO and Reliability is likewise YES-NO. It represents a transition state between objective and intersubjective. But, what are each of the four coherence predicates we have in I-2? I explained that they represent "modes of understanding", called sbin for "semiotic bin". We will now take an inside look into these sbins and define the next identification level, I-3. Here, as already commented in the first part, "understanding" must be seen not as a set of isolated elements but as a nexus itself -- a linked collective of elements -- because it must include links to everything I need. It cannot be only Shannon's information, it cannot be only what I do not expect. There must be communicable content that can be comprehended, there must be denotation of physical objects that can be touched. It is much closer to the concept of biological information, such as encoded in DNA and transported in RNA to a different location in space-time -- where it can be exactly *understood* in all its functional aspects. Exactly because "biological information" contains all needed links. It does not need to consult a third-party or an extrinsic hierarchy. Now, how can each of the four modes of understanding be further subdivided? How can the "understanding nexus" be split? The "understanding nexus" is like an "atom of understanding" -- the least amount of understanding that is still "understanding" in each of the four modes of understanding. If we split it, what do we expect to see? We expect to see the different parts of understanding -- in separation and without the nexus cover. I posit that the "atom of understanding" is made out of three parts, where I am naturally guided by Semiotics, defining it to be a "semiotic bin" or sbin: / | - Reference: the truth-value, the literal value | sbin: | - Sense: the truth-conditions, the meaning | | - Entity: the dennoted physical entity, the cause \ where I use "Entity" instead of "Referent" (as usual in semiotics) because I want to stress that the Entity exists by itself and independently of its reference. These three parts are the the three predicates of understanding we were seeking. They are similar to three "sub-atomic" parts of the "atom of understanding" -- the sbin. To exemplify the three "sub-atomic" predicates of an sbin, I take a classical example from Frege but in the above terminology: ENTITY SENSE REFERENCE - Morning Star / Planet-Venus --- Venus --- \ - Evening Star Now, I ask the converse question. What is the connection (i.e., the coherence) between Reference, Sense and Entity? In other words, what makes them a nexus, an "atom of understanding"? To answer that I posit that Reference, Sense and Entity are fully independent variables and their connection is accomplished by trust [5] -- either objective, intersubjective or subjective trust, in homogeneous or heterogeneous combinations. The picture we behold is of an "atom of understanding" made by three parts, which are glued together by possibly different modes of trust. I now enquire into all the possible combinations I can have for all four coherence predicates (Distinguished, Ambiguous, Obscure, Formless) and all three understanding predicates (Reference, Sense, Entity). They are 4^3 = 64 in number and one of them is given by (for example): predicates understanding c R S E o h D e D A r ------- e D A O n ------- c A O F e O F F where the first column stands for Reference, the second for Sense and the third for Entity. The "selectors" are showing the combination DAO, for R=D, S=A and E=O. These 64 types define Identification-3 or, I-3. They are in same number as the 64 types used in the genetic code of all living beings, which are also a combination of 4^3. Going further, these 64 types can provide billions of identification types, in combination. A full spectrum of nuances opens up. As an example of combination, the Ambiguous and Obscure types of I-2 when taken together (i.e., a nexus which is both Ambiguous and Obscure) can provide (5^3 - 4^3) additional cases in I-3, or 61 added cases. The total number of types and such combinations in I-3 is thus 125. However, to make matters clearer to current uses for Internet identification and certification, it is possible that (in order to capture the *most* interesting cases) no more than 26 types would be needed in a first approximation -- as commented in the first part. Future work will deal with these types and possible reduction or expansion, as they are being discussed on the mcg-talk list. The present work leads thus to a "sub-atomic" theory of understanding -- where we can now deal with Reference, Sense and Entity as derived predicates of identification and not as "ad hoc" attributes of an "identity" we could not previously define. Identity then becomes a measurable quantity and not simply an assigned or assumed quality. Cheers, Ed Gerck PS. Two MCG participants, Einar Stefferud (USA, NMA Inc) and Pedro Rezende (Brasil, University of Brasilia), visited here on occasion of a Seminar on e-commerce and I am indebted to them for useful criticism and suggestions into some of the above text. All errors are mine. ============================================ References (from the first part): [1] Merriam-Webster Dictionary [2] http://mcwg.org/mcg-mirror/auth_b1.htm [3] http://mcwg.org/mcg-mirror/certover.pdf [4] http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/texts/dialecticatrans.html [5] http://mcwg.org/mcg-mirror/trustdef.htm ______________________________________________________________________ Dr.rer.nat. E. Gerck egerck@mcwg http://mcwg