

What is knowledge?
==================
knowledge is an identification of a fact of reality,
using words and sentences.

What is a concept?
==================
A concept
is a percept
or an integration of two or more concepts.

A percept is a primitive concept.

There are three ways to define a concept.
integration (ostensive), e.g.
  entity is either animal or plant or object
differentiation (genus-differentia), e.g.
  man is animal with identify
identity (alias), e.g.
  person is man

The algebraic properties of a concept
follow from its definition by integration.
The units of a concept are mutually exclusive
and jointly exhaustive.

The meaning of a concept
is the set of all primitive concepts
integrated by the concept.
The extension of a concept
is the set of all currently known
primitive concepts.

The intension of a concept
is the set of all its 
currently known characteristics.

The differentia of a concept
is the set of essential characteristics
specified in its definition by differentiation.
These may change as more existents
or more characteristics are discovered.

What is an axiomatic concept?
=============================
An axiomatic concept
is the identification of a primary fact of reality,
which is implicit in all facts and all knowledge.

In the most abstract terms, the axiomatic concepts
are existence, identity, consciousness.
For practical applications, I use the following
more specific axiomatic concepts.

existent	everything that exists
entity		primary existent, a thing that exists
characteristic	secondary existent, the identity of a primary existent

attribute	space-time-independent characteristic
action		space-time-dependent characteristic
relationship	relation between concepts

space		where action occurs
time		when action occurs
view		knowledge unit of man1
man1		man that identifies knowledge
identify	action of rational entity
statement1	view := man1 do identify existent

percept		group of sensations automatically retained by man1

What is a nonaxiomatic concept?
===============================
A nonaxiomatic concept
is a concept defined by a man, or a group of men,
for a particular purpose.

purpose
  unit economy
  selective focus

A personal concept
is a nonaxiomatic concept defined by a man.
A common concept
is a nonaxiomatic concept defined by a group of men
using interactive communication.

What is a proposition?
======================
A proposition
is a sequence of concepts
that specifies a relationship between the concepts.

A proposition is a unit of thought.


What is a knowledge unit?
=========================
A knowledge unit (knit)
is a concept-hierarchy that contains all axiomatic concepts
and includes a particular subhierarchy of nonaxiomatic concepts.

A knit identifies all concepts and the relations between them
at a given space and time and view.  The knit changes if an
action occurs at some space-time, or the person changes
his view.

Graphically, a knit looks like this
(boxes enclose nonaxiomatic concepts).

                  existent
                     o
                     |
      ---------------------------------
      |                               |
      o entity                        o characteristic
      |                               |
    -----              ---------------------------------
    |   |              |              |                |
    -----              o attribute    o action         o relationship
      |                |              |                |
 man1 o              -----          -----            -----
                     |   |          |   |            |   |
                     -----          -----            -----
                      |||             |                |
                      ||o space       o identify       o statement1
                      |o  time
                      o   view
                          
                          
What is a change unit?
======================
A change unit (chit)
is an identification of an occurrence of an action.

In my Knowledge Representation language,
a chit is identified as follows.

entity do action=event
event changes eobject from attribute=initial to attribute=final

