Artificial Intelligence Machine Learning Ontology Engineering Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Decision Analysis Optimization
The high number of ontologies available on the web to date makes it increasingly difficult to select appropriate ontologies for reuse. Many studies have attempted to provide support for ontology selection and ranking; however, the existing studies provide support for ontology ranking from an objective perspective as opposed to a subjective perspective. They do not take into account the qualitative aspects of ontologies. Furthermore, the existing methods have a limited focus on group environments. In this paper, a multi-criteria decision-making approach is presented for ontology ranking with the development of an enhanced model combining the ELECTRE II model with the Z-Probabilistic Linguistic Term Set (ZPLTS). The ZPLTS-ELECTRE II model enables decision-makers to model ontology ranking problems using both numerical and linguistic data. Furthermore, the newly proposed model provides support for ontology ranking in group settings, with an emphasis on modeling the differing levels of credibility of decision-makers using the ZPLTS, which allows decision-makers to not only specify their opinion but also specify their level of credibility. The model was applied to rank a set of mental health ontologies obtained from the BioPortal repository. The results showed that the method was able to rank the ontologies successfully. The results were further compared with the traditional ELECTRE II and the PLTS ELECTRE II methods, displaying superior modeling capabilities. This paper demonstrated the effectiveness of the newly proposed ZPLTS-ELECTRE II model for ontology ranking in a real-world context, but the method is not constrained to the ontology ranking domain; rather, it may be applied to other real-world decision problems as well.
The field of big data and artificial intelligence is growing at a tremendous rate, generating massive amounts of data and information in the process. It is of utmost importance that methods of managing these large amounts of data and knowledge be developed, such as ontology engineering. Ontologies, however, are highly complex and accordingly ontology engineers emphasize the reuse of existing ontologies as opposed to developing ontologies de novo. Unfortunately, given the vast range of ontologies available online, users are faced with the arduous problem of deciding which ontologies to select for reuse. This study attempts to solve the ontology selection problem by employing a multi-criteria decision-making approach. The ELECTRE II and IV methods are implemented and applied to rank a set of 200 biomedical ontologies obtained from the BioPortal repository. The statistical correlation between the methods is quantified with the use of the Spearman's Rho and Kendall's Tau correlation coefficients. All methods of analysis illustrated that the ELECTRE II and IV methods are suitable for ranking ontologies and depicts comparable results.
The field of artificial intelligence (AI) is expanding at a rapid pace. Ontology and the field of ontological engineering is an invaluable component of AI, as it provides AI the ability to capture and express complex knowledge and data in a form that encourages computation, inference, reasoning, and dissemination. Accordingly, the research and applications of ontology is becoming increasingly widespread in recent years. However, due to the complexity involved with ontological engineering, it is encouraged that users reuse existing ontologies as opposed to creating ontologies de novo. This in itself has a huge disadvantage as the task of selecting appropriate ontologies for reuse is complex as engineers and users may find it difficult to analyse and comprehend ontologies. It is therefore crucial that techniques and methods be developed in order to reduce the complexity of ontology selection for reuse. Essentially, ontology selection is a Multi-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) problem, as there are multiple ontologies to choose from whilst considering multiple criteria. However, there has been little usage of MCDM methods in solving the problem of selecting ontologies for reuse. Therefore, in order to tackle this problem, this study looks to a prominent branch of MCDM, known as the ELimination Et. Choix Traduisant la RÉalite (ELECTRE). ELECTRE is a family of decision-making algorithms that model and provide decision support for complex decisions comprising many alternatives with many characteristics or attributes. The ELECTRE algorithms are extremely powerful and they have been applied successfully in a myriad of domains, however, they have only been studied to a minimal degree with regards to ontology ranking and selection. In this study the ELECTRE algorithms were applied to aid in the selection of ontologies for reuse, particularly, three applications of ELECTRE were studied. The first application focused on ranking ontologies according to their complexity metrics. The ELECTRE I, II, III, and IV models were applied to rank a dataset of 200 ontologies from the BioPortal Repository, with 13 complexity metrics used as attributes. Secondly, the ELECTRE Tri model was applied to classify the 200 ontologies into three classes according to their complexity metrics. A preference-disaggregation approach was taken, and a genetic algorithm was designed to infer the thresholds and parameters for the ELECTRE Tri model. In the third application a novel ELECTRE model was developed, named ZPLTS-ELECTRE II, where the concept of Z-Probabilistic Linguistic Term Set (ZPLTS) was combined with the traditional ELECTRE II algorithm. The ZPLTS-ELECTRE II model enables multiple decision-makers to evaluate ontologies (group decision-making), as well as the ability to use natural language to provide their evaluations. The model was applied to rank 9 ontologies according to five complexity metrics and five qualitative usability metrics. The results of all three applications were analysed, compared, and contrasted, in order to understand the applicability and effectiveness of the ELECTRE algorithms for the task of selecting ontologies for reuse. These results constitute interesting perspectives and insights for the selection and reuse of ontologies.
In recent years, interest in the application of ontologies in various domains of knowledge has grown significantly. Ontologies are widely used in a myriad of areas, such as artificial intelligence, data integration, knowledge management, and the semantic web, to name but a few. However, despite the widespread adoption, there exist a range of problems associated with ontologies, such as the complexity and cognitive challenges associated with ontology engineering, design, and development. One of the solutions to these challenges is to reuse existing ontologies rather than developing new ontologies afresh for new applications. The reuse of ontologies that describe a knowledge domain is a complex task consisting of many aspects. One of the key aspects involves ranking ontologies to aid in their selection. Various techniques have been proposed for this task, but many of them fall short in their expressiveness and ability to capture the cognitive aspects of human-like decision-making processes. Furthermore, much of the existing research focuses on an objective approach to ontology ranking, but it is unquestionable that a wide range of aspects pertaining to the quality of an ontology simply cannot be captured in a quantitative manner. Existing ranking models fail to provide a robust and flexible canvas for facilitating qualitative ontology ranking and selection for reuse. To address the aforementioned shortcomings of existing ontology ranking approaches, this study proposes a novel algorithm for ranking ontologies that extends the Elimination and Choice Translating Reality (ELECTRE) multi-criteria decision-making method with the Linguistic q-Rung Orthopair Fuzzy Set (Lq-ROFS-ELECTRE II), allowing the expression of uncertainty in a more robust and precise manner. The new Lq-ROFS-ELECTRE II algorithm was applied to rank a set of 19 ontologies of the machine learning (ML) domain. The ML ontologies were evaluated using a set of seven qualitative criteria extracted from the Ontometric framework. The proposed Lq-ROFS-ELECTRE II algorithm was then applied to rank the 19 ontologies in light of the seven criteria. The ranking results obtained were compared against the quantitative rankings of the same 19 ontologies using the traditional ELECTRE II algorithm, and confirmed the validity of the ranking performed by the proposed Lq-ROFS-ELECTRE II algorithm and its effectiveness in the task of ontology ranking. Furthermore, a comparative analysis of the proposed Lq-ROFS-ELECTRE II against existing MCDM methods and other existing fuzzy ELECTRE II methods displayed its superior modeling capabilities that allow for more natural decision evaluation from subject experts in real-world applications and allow the decision-maker to have much flexibility in expressing their preferences. These capabilities of the Lq-ROFS-ELECTRE II algorithm make it applicable not only in ontology ranking, but in any domain where there exist decision-making scenarios that comprise multiple conflicting criteria under uncertainty.
