Subclass of:

• crm:E13 Attribute Assignment

Superclass of:

• crmsci:S19 Encounter Event
• crmsci:S21 Measurement
• crmsci:S23 Position Determination

Scope note:

This class comprises the activity of gaining scientific knowledge about particular states of physical reality through empirical evidence, experiments and measurements.

We define observation in the sense of natural sciences, as a kind of human activity: at some place and within some time-span, certain physical things and their behavior and interactions are observed by human sensory impression, and often enhanced by tools and measurement devices.

Observed situations or dimensions may pertain to properties confined to a single instance of S15 Observable Entity or pertain to constellations of multiple instances and relations between them, in particular distances between them.

The output of the internal processes of measurement devices that do not require additional human interaction are in general regarded as part of the observation and not as additional inference. Primary data from measurement devices are regarded in this model to be results of observation and can be interpreted as propositions believed to be true within the (known) tolerances and degree of reliability of the device.

Measurements and witnessing of events are special cases of observations. Observations result in a belief that certain propositions held at a time within the time-span of the observation. In this model, the degree of confidence in the observed properties is regarded to be “true” by default, but could be described differently by adding a property P3 has note to an instance of S4 Observation

Examples:

• the excavation of unit XI by the Archaeological Institute of Crete in 2004 (S4).
• the excavation (S4) in the NE section of the central court of the Knossos palace by the Ephorate of Antiquities of Heraklion in 1997 (S4) (Επιστημονική Επιτροπή Κνωσού, 2008).
• the observation of the density of the X-Ray image of cupid's head from the painting ‘Cupid complaining to Venus’ as ‘high density’, on the 19th of March 1963 (S4) (The National Gallery, London, 1963).
• the observation of visible light absorption of the painting ‘Cupid complaining to Venus’ as ‘having red pigment’, in 2015 (S4) (Foister, 2015).

In First Order Logic:

• S4(x) ⇒ E13(x)

Outgoing properties:

• crmsci:O8 observed (was observed by) (0,n:1,1) → crmsci:S15 Observable Entity
• crmsci:O9 observed property type (property type was observed by) (0,n:1,1) → crmsci:S9 Property Type
• crmsci:O16 observed value (value was observed by) (0,n:1,1) → crm:E1 CRM Entity