Some reflections on the Semantic web
Bertil Ekdahl · Lund University Publications (Lund University) · 2007
The World Wide Web is undoubtedly very successful. Despite that, limitations have been recognized. The basic limiting factor is that the Web handles document for humans to read but not data and information for computers to read. The remedy of this is to provide the Web with semantics: the Semantic Web. While I agree that there is a need for another organization in which it is easier to find the information asked for and in which irrelevant results are diminished, I disagree on the feasibility of the semantic idea. In this paper I will discuss the realism in the prospect of the Semantic Web. I will take up some questions about ontology, which is intertwined with the new Web, and particularly some misconceptions about semantics. Recently, Peter Norvig, a Google Director, challenge the Web on competence reasons, I challenge it for formal reasons. I argue that the vision of adding semantics to the Web is futile.