FROLIO – Formalizable Relationship-Oriented Language-Insensitive Ontology

© Roger M Tagg 2008, revised January 2010, links fixed December 2010

Welcome to FROLIO – a new attempt to merge philosophy and the "semantic web". This website is continually under construction - please send suggestions for improvements to the author.

Relationship Major Category  - "Partitioning" (alias "part-of")

General Meaning

Partitioning or part of means that one thing is part of another, more compound or complex thing of a broadly similar category. Composition is a similar relationship, but is read in the opposite direction. If A is part of B, then B is composed of A (and presumably other things). As with Classification, one can have structures (usually hierarchies) of composition, with intermediate "assemblies", e.g. the gearbox assembly is part of a car, but is itself composed of several parts.

A part of relationship can apply in 2 ways, namely Particular Instance and Any member of a Class. "Particular Instance" implies that one particular component is part of a particular compound thing or assembly. "Any member of a Class" implies a common pattern of assembly, which applies to any part or assembly in the class. For example, my left femur is part of my body, but left femurs as a class are part of animal bodies as a class.

Partitioning is the foundation of much of human endeavour - we take things apart in order to understand them, and we bring things together to make something of value. We also analyse the natural world using the is part of paradigm, although this gets tricky at the extremes, e.g. sub-atomic and astronomical.

Things may change (or "metamorphose") in a natural process, so part-of structures may be transient. Parts may also be exchanged (i.e. pulled out and plugged in). Even some living creatures may survive transplants. This sometimes leads to an issue with whether the composed structure retains the same identity or not - as for example with a machine which has had more parts replaced than have stayed put.

As well as physical things, is part of can be applied to abstract concepts and activities (i.e. tasks, work steps, processes, policies, motivations).

The very wide range of what "is part of" means has been addressed by many philosophers under the name Mereology.

Category Icon

The icon represents a cook putting some thing A into a mix B. The material could be bounded (e.g. whole chicken pieces) or not bounded (e.g. water). The mix may or may not be undo-able, but this really belongs to the Transformation category. Composition of mechanical or electrical parts in a certain way can generate an Assembly. Composition of individual bounded objects of the same or similar Classes generates a Collection; collections may be finite and countable - or not.

Relationship Role Diagram (for key to the letter codes click here)

A thing or collection A (2 top left icons) may be part of a more complex or compound thing or collection B (2 top right icons). There may or may not be a C role (glue, middle top) representing the means by which the part is joined to the compound thing (e.g. glue, sticky tape, staples, a file, a dish or other container. Composition can involve part-of hierarchies - sub-components can be part of larger components. There may be a composition process M - in cooking, in English it is called the "method". For example, a cocktail can be shaken or stirred. Processes themselves can form a composition hierarchy - major processes can contain sub-processes. Tools I may be necessary to form the composition - a wooden spoon for the cook, a real spanner for the mechanic, a robot in a car factory. Roles P, T, X, Y, and Z are as usual.

	A	C	B
A				B
I			M
P				Z
	T	X	Y

Relationship Types in this Category

This category contains a number of relationship types, the difference really being limited to the sort of things that are being composed. These are all placed in a single relationship category, except for those concerned with membership and collections.

The main group, code “Pc”, therefore represents the idea of A (possibly with a number of other things of different type) being a component of  B. Multiple levels of composition are normally assumed possible, as are both "particular instance" and "any instance of class" variations.

• is a component of – applies to compound physical structures, such as a living organism, machine, car or aeroplane. However any structural pattern or arrangement (e.g. the leg bone connected to the hip bone) would be expressed as an As or Ab relationship
• is an ingredient of - applies to mixtures, often involving bulk quantities of unbounded materials (e.g. water, flour, sugar). Typically the quantity of the ingredient used in the mixture is significant
• is a part description of - applies to the attributes that describe something; A is a single (or group) attribute, while B is a full description
• is a part issue within, is a factor in - applies to issues, crises, problems, states of affairs etc. It could be paraphrased as “one thing to think about when considering B is ...”
• is a part study within - applies to fields of study
• is a sub-organization of - applies to company organisations; A would be a subsidiary of B. A parameter might be the % of A owned by B
• is a sub-concept of, is an aspect of - applies to any other class of abstract concept which can have a compound structure
• is a sub-activity of - applies to compound activities; the implication is that one has to do activity A as part of doing the whole process B. Activity A could itself be broken down into further tasks, or it could be "atomic"

Note: FROLIO avoids simple part of relationships between one class and another, since such a relationship would be effectively the same as is subclass of.

In the next group, code “Pm”, the role A is one instance of a set of similar things that make up the whole, e.g. one card in a pack, one member in a society, one player in a team.

• is member of - a collection of similar objects. No order is implied – if one existed, that would be covered by an “Ab” relationship
• is sub-collection of - a smaller collection A is part of a larger collection B

Note: Is a member of may sound similar to is instance of in Classification, but something could satisfy the condition to be an instance of the class, but not be an actual member at a specific time (they may have lapsed, or not been officially inducted). Human societies attempt to make rules as to who actually counts as a member, so there may be no difference in practice. There is always an implicit class of "those who are actually members".

Examples

These are arranged differently from other relationship categories. For the main group there are two columns of examples, one for particular instances and one for any instance of a class.

For the Membership/Collection group Pm:
I am a member of the retired teachers walking group. The 8 of diamonds is a member of a standard pack of playing cards. A $1.10 stamp showing an Eastern Grey Kangaroo is a member of my Australian stamp collection.  My Australian stamp collection is a sub-collection of my worldwide stamp collection.

Links to other Categories (these cross-links now fixed!)

Other Links

• Explanation of roles in relationships
• Top level of the FROLIO relationships
• Top level of the FROLIO ontology

• FROLIO home page

This version updated on 3rd December 2010

If you have constructive suggestions or comments, please contact the author at rogertag@tpg.com.au .