Dr. Gaurav Sinha
The Geological Sciences Colloquium Series presents Dr. Gaurav Sinha on “Making the case for Ontology and Naïve Geography in Digital Terrain Modeling” on Feb. 23 at 2 p.m. in Clippinger 205.
Sinha is an Associate Professor of Geography at Ohio University.
Abstract: Contrary to general assumption, the physical landscape is conceptualized with great diversity across geographies, languages and cultures. People’s naïve conceptualizations of the landscape are deeply rooted in their common sense experiences of the world, and mediated by culture, language and social experiences. Formal geoscientific knowledge of landscape elements must be complemented with new knowledge from the perspective of human cognition, language and culture. In this talk, I will focus on the philosophical and technical issues related to the scientific and common-sense conceptualizations of topographic features (a subtset of landscape elements), and the representation of such multifaceted topographic knowledge within geospatial ontologies. I will also discuss how and why this overall research paradigm will usher in the era of intuitive, semantically enabled, and socially equitable computational systems for topographic information search, retrieval and display.
Upcoming Colloquia
Dave Hunt of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency on March 2 at 2 p.m. in Clippinger 205.
Derek Sawyer of Ohio State University on “Earthquakes and Submarine Landslides on Continental Margins” on March 30 at 2 p.m. in Clippinger 205.
Tom Darrah of Ohio State University on April 13 at 2 p.m. in Clippinger 205.
James Lamsdell of West Virginia University on “Exploring environmental drivers of morphological change in horseshoe crabs and sea scorpions” April 20 at 2 p.m. in Clippinger 205.
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