Problems of hierarchical taxonomies
note
Structured hierarchies and taxonomies are a useful and straightforward way of processing and organizing information. However, they are have limitations:
- Boundaries between concepts are often unclear or undefined.
- Concepts can belong to multiple taxonomies that are not part of the same subtree.
- The effort required to decide how to categorize a new concept while still not having a deep understanding of it causes decision fatigue.
Examples:
- You just found an awesome resource on the web explaining ML, and how to implement a simple SVM classifier. Is this a guide? A tutorial? A blog post? All of these?
- Should “eigenvalue sensitivity” be put under Mathematics, Computer Science, or Civil Engineering?
Links to this note
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