Issues in practical space terminologies

Paper number

IAC-08.E7.1.11

Author

Dr. Daniel GALARRETA, Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES), France

Year

2008

Abstract

As a contribution to this symposium on space terminology we will present how space terminologies have been developed and used in CNES and which are the issues we are faced with in a few interesting cases.
The interest for terminology in CNES officially started in 1973. In the preface of the 4th edition of the dictionary of space science, a former president of the CNES reminded us that such a dictionary “contributes by the means of language to give value to the knowledge obtained from this fantastic human adventure that is the conquest of Space, to facilitate mutual understanding within the international industrial relations”
We can emphasize here the fact that from the very beginning the interest for a space terminology encompasses two distinct dimensions: communication and knowledge preservation.
Although distinct these two dimensions are not independent. Indeed (a) as far as we admit that knowledge can be conveyed by means of messages, we willingly admit that knowledge preservation implies that the meaning of the messages themselves is preserved. But it is also natural to accept the idea that (b) the meaning of a message may depend on a prior knowledge we have about the topic the message is about.
(In fact in case (a) the assertion is misleading since a message is not simply a coded message denoting a state of the world and therefore conveying a piece of knowledge about this state. The viewpoints involved either in producing or in grasping of the message, play a key role. In case (b) the corresponding assertion creates confusion between several notions such as knowledge, context and viewpoint).
Nevertheless terminological activities correspond to either to a normative, prescriptive activity or to the inventory of stable linguistic usages. In our contribution we will consider terms as tags of knowledge. The selection of these tags in order to achieve a knowledge representation is akin to knowledge extraction from text. In CNES the extraction of terminological tags of knowledge is devoted to different purposes:
One is to provide indexing means and classifying capabilities in order to implementing a Corporate Memory. The core of this project is a terminological knowledge base (TKB). A key issue here is the organizing this TKB.
Another is using terminological evolution to detect potential knowledge (loss) evolution either in the case of long duration missions or for scientific data preservation. The Issue here is the choice of relevant observables.

Abstract document

IAC-08.E7.1.11.pdf

Manuscript document

IAC-08.E7.1.11.pdf (🔒 authorized access only).

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