Meronomy
Hierarchy that deals with part-whole relationships
A meronomy is a hierarchical taxonomy that deals with part-whole relationships. For example, a car has parts that include engine, body and wheels; and the body has parts that include doors and windows.
These conceptual structures are used in linguistics and computer science, with applications in biology. The part-whole relationship is sometimes referred to as HAS-A, and corresponds to object composition in object-oriented programming.
The study of meronomy is known as mereology, and in linguistics a meronym is the name given to a constituent part of, a substance of, or a member of something. "X" is a meronym of "Y" if an X is a part of a Y. The unit of organisation that corresponds to the taxonomical taxon is the meron.
01Example
- Cars have parts: engine, headlight, wheel
- Engines have parts: crankcase, carburetor
- Headlights have parts: headlight bulb, reflector
- Wheels have parts: rim, spokes, tires
02In knowledge representation
In formal terms, in the context of knowledge representation and ontologies, a meronomy is a partial order of concept types by the part-whole relation.
In the classic study of parts and wholes, mereology, the three defining properties of a partial order serve as axioms. They are, respectively, that the part-of relation is:
- Transitive, "Parts of parts are parts of the whole" (If A is part of B and B is part of C, then A is part of C);
- Reflexive, "Everything is part of itself" (A is part of A); and
- Antisymmetric, "Nothing is a part of its parts" (If A is part of B and A ≠ B, then B is not part of A).
Meronomies may be represented in semantic web languages such as OWL and SKOS. In natural languages they are represented by meronyms and holonyms.
Sources and credits
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