In W. Kuhn, M. F. Worboys, and S. Timpf (eds.)
Spatial Information Theory: Foundations of Geographic Information Science
(Proceedings of International Conference COSIT 2003, Kartause Ittingen, Switzerland, September 2003), Springer Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 2003, pages 1-12.
We survey the manifold variety of kinds of phenomena which come within the purview of geography and GI Science, and identify three key desiderata for a fully spatio-temporal geo-ontology which can do justice to those phenomena. Such a geo-ontology must (a) provide suitable forms of representation and manipulation to do justice to the rich network of interconnections between field-based and object-based views of the world; (b) extend the field-based and object-based views, and the forms of representation developed to handle them, into the temporal domain; and (c) provide a means to develop different views of spatio-temporal extents and the phenomena that inhabit them, especially with reference to those phenomena such as storms, floods, and wildfires which seem to present dual aspects as both object-like and process-like.