Tractable Diversity: Scalable Multiperspective Ontology Management via Standpoint EL
This addresses the challenge of semantic interoperability in comprehensive domains with broad user bases by enabling scalable multiperspective ontology management, though it is incremental as it builds on the lightweight description logic EL.
The paper tackles the problem of managing diverse and conflicting perspectives in large ontologies by introducing Standpoint EL, a multi-modal extension of EL that allows integrated representation of domain knowledge relative to different standpoints while maintaining tractability, with results showing that standard reasoning remains in PTime for the core logic but becomes intractable with added features like rigid roles and nominals.
The tractability of the lightweight description logic EL has allowed for the construction of large and widely used ontologies that support semantic interoperability. However, comprehensive domains with a broad user base are often at odds with strong axiomatisations otherwise useful for inferencing, since these are usually context-dependent and subject to diverging perspectives. In this paper we introduce Standpoint EL, a multi-modal extension of EL that allows for the integrated representation of domain knowledge relative to diverse, possibly conflicting standpoints (or contexts), which can be hierarchically organised and put in relation to each other. We establish that Standpoint EL still exhibits EL's favourable PTime standard reasoning, whereas introducing additional features like empty standpoints, rigid roles, and nominals makes standard reasoning tasks intractable.