The notion of a “query” occurred in legal, medical, theological and scientific writings during the early modern period. Whereas the “questionary” (from c. 1400s) sought replies from within a doctrine (such as Galenic medicine), in the 1600s the query posed open-ended inquiries, seeking empirical information from travellers, explorers and others. During the 1660s in Britain, three versions of the query (and lists of queries) emerged. Distinctions need to be made between queries seeking information via observation and those (...) asking for experimentation, and between those aiming to keep theory to one side and those that framed theoretical conjectures. My examples are drawn from the work of the Royal Society of London (founded 1660) and from some of its leading members, especially Robert Boyle, Robert Hooke and Isaac Newton. (shrink)

Querying the Medieval. Texts and the History of Practices in South Asia. Ronald Inden, Jonathan Walters, Daud Ali. Oxford University Press, New York 2000. 235 pp. £32.50. ISBN 0-19-512430-8.

Robert Brandom’s normative-pragmatic theory is intended to represent the minimal set of practical abilities whose exhibition qualifies creatures as speaking a language. His model of a minimally discursive practice (MDP) is one in which participants, devoid of logical vocabulary, are only capable of making assertions and drawing inferences. This paper argues that Brandom’s purely assertional practices are not MDPs and that speech acts of asking questions (queries) must be included in any practice that counts as an MDP. The upshot of (...) the argument is support for the claim that the normative pragmatic analysis of assertions requires a corresponding analysis of queries and vice versa. (shrink)

Call a set A n-correctable if every set Turing reducible to A via a Turing machine that on any input makes at most n queries is Turing reducible to A via a Turing machine that on any input makes at most n-queries and on any input halts no matter what answers are given to its queries. We show that if a c.e. set A is n-correctable for some n ≥ 2, then it is n-correctable for all n. We show that (...) this is the optimal such result by constructing a c.e. set that is 1-correctable but not 2-correctable. The former result is obtained by examining the logical closure properties of c.e. sets that are 2-correctable. (shrink)

LetA be any nonrecursive set. We define a hierarchy of sets (and a corresponding hierarchy of degrees) that are reducible toA based on bounding the number of queries toA that an oracle machine can make. WhenA is the halting problemK our hierarchy of sets interleaves with the difference hierarchy on the r.e. sets in a logarithmic way; this follows from a tradeoff between the number of parallel queries and the number of serial queries needed to compute a function with oracleK.

As argued above, if we examine each "form of knowledge" within a modern historical context, it seems that we can see a sequentially transformational and coincident historical line that links the material, then the institutional, and then the cultural, while maintaining the sequential development of the linked trends from beginning to end. Even a summary of Lin Yusheng's hypothesis is a continuation of the "mind's" function orientation. This framework, however, must still answer the following question: In the process whereby "forms (...) of knowledge" become intimately connected with transformational events or time sequencing, do they appear in the form of a totalitarian theoretical model, or do they exert their influence in the form of the dispersed role of a discourse? More concretely, in the case of China: When the traditional "forms of knowledge" of modern Chinese intellectuals—for example, the methodology and behavior within the "thought discourses" of the Confucian School—faced the challenge of the West, did they use "a comprehensive theory" to undertake self-adjustment? Michel Foucault raised a query about the role of totalitarian discourse in saying: "At the beginning of any research I expressed a query about these long-established ‘unified’ models. Traditionally, according to these ‘unified’ models we differentiate infinite, repetitive and fecund territories within the discourse. Must we necessarily, on these ‘unities’ which actually are not unities, pile up yet another even more obscure and even more controversial ‘unitary’ model?". (shrink)

_Querying Consent_ examines the ways in which the concept of consent is used to map and regulate sexual desire, gender relationships, global positions, technological interfaces, relationships of production and consumption, and literary and artistic interactions. From philosophy to literature, psychoanalysis to the art world, the contributors to _Querying Consent_ address the most uncomfortable questions about consent today. Grounded in theoretical explorations of the entanglement of consent and subjectivity across a range of textual, visual, multi- and digital media, _Querying Consent_ considers (...) the relationships between consent and agency before moving on to trace the concept’s outcomes through a range of investigations of the mutual implication of personhood and self-ownership. (shrink)

Exploring the risks, ambiguities, and unstable conceptual worlds of contemporary thought, Crossover Queries brings together the wide-ranging writings, across twenty years, of one of our most important philosophers.Ranging from twentieth-century European philosophy—the thought of Heidegger, Foucault, Derrida, Levinas, Janicaud, and others—to novels and artworks, music and dance, from traditional Jewish thought to Jain andBuddhist metaphysics, Wyschogrod’s work opens radically new vistas while remaining mindful that the philosopher stands within and is responsible to a philosophical legacy conditioned by the negative.Rather than (...) point to a Hegelian dialectic of overcoming negation or to a postmetaphysical exhaustion, Wyschogrod treats negative moments as opening novel spaces for thought. She probes both the desire for God and an ethics grounded in the interests of the other person, seeing these as moments both of crossing over and of negation. Alert to the catastrophes that have marked our times, she exposes the underlying logical structures of nihilatory forces that have been exerted to exterminate whole peoples. Analyzing the negationsof biological research and cultural images of mechanized and robotic bodies, she shows how they contest the body as lived in ordinary experience.“Crossover Queries brings together important essays on a remarkable range of topics by one of our most insightful cultural critics. Commenting on philosophical and theological issues that have shaped the recent past as well as scientific and technological questions that will preoccupy us in the near future, Wyschogrod consistently alerts us to the urgency of problems whose importance few recognize. To avoid the challenge these essays pose is to avoid responsibility for a future that appears to be increasingly fragile.”—Mark C. Taylor, Columbia University. (shrink)

Large databases of linguistic annotations are used for testing linguistic hypotheses and for training language processing models. These linguistic annotations are often syntactic or prosodic in nature, and have a hierarchical structure. Query languages are used to select particular structures of interest, or to project out large slices of a corpus for external analysis. Existing languages suffer from a variety of problems in the areas of expressiveness, efficiency, and naturalness for linguistic query. We describe the domain of linguistic (...) trees and discuss the expressive requirements for a query language. Then we present a language that can express a wide range of queries over these trees, and show that the language is first-order complete over trees. (shrink)

in evolutionary theorizing,, marilyn fischer carefully unpacks and analyzes the language in Democracy and Social Ethics, looking at both the final published text as well as Addams's earlier essays and talks that were eventually incorporated into the book. By researching authors that Addams either quotes or relied on, Fischer is able to excavate many layers of historical intellectual meaning and, in doing so, gives us a different picture of Addams than the one I'm familiar with. It's not a picture of (...) Addams that is always flattering. Fischer's unpacking of these early texts shines a light on the sometimes-racist evolutionary thinking of that time. She is doing, as she says, a "close textual analysis" within the... (shrink)

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In this essay, I attempt to provide answers to the following four queries concerning the metaphysics of early human embryogenesis. (1) Following its first cellular fission, is it coherent to claim that one and only one of two “blastomeric” twins of a human zygote is identical with that zygote? (2) Following the fusion of two human pre-embryos, is it coherent to claim that one and only one pre-fusion pre-embryo is identical with that postfusion pre-embryo? (3) Does a live human being (...) come into existence only when its brain comes into existence? (4) At implantation, does a pre-embryo become a mere part of its mother? I argue that either if things have quidditative properties or if criterialism is false, then queries (1) and (2) can be answered in the affirmative; that in light of recent developments in theories of human death and in light of a more “functional” theory of brains, query (3) can be answered in the negative; and that plausible mereological principles require a negative answer to query (4). (shrink)

We argue that a conflict between two conceptions of “quantity of matter” employed in a corollary to proposition 6 of Book III of the Principia illustrates a deeper conflict between Newton’s view of the nature of extended bodies and the concept of mass appropriate for the theoretical framework of the Principia. We trace Newton’s failure to recognize the conflict to the fact that he allowed for the justification of natural philosophical claims by two types of a posteriori, empiricist methodologies. Newton's (...) thoughts on these methodologies demonstrate that his natural philosophy continued to develop after the publication of the first edition of Principia and that De Grav should be understood as an early, and not necessarily representative, text. (shrink)

In recent years large amounts of electronic texts have become available. While the first of these corpora had only a low level of annotation, the more recent ones are annotated with refined syntactic information. To make these rich annotations accessible for linguists, the development of query systems has become an important goal. One of the main difficulties in this task consists in the choice of the right query language, a language which at the same time should be powerful (...) enough to let users formulate the queries they want and which should be efficiently evaluable to keep query response times short. There is a widespread belief that such a query language does not exist. It is therefore the aim of this paper to show that there is indeed a powerful query language that can be efficiently evaluated. We propose the use of monadic second-order logic as a query language. We show that a query in this language can be evaluated in linear time in the size of a tree in the corpus. We also provide examples of complicated linguistic queries expressed in monadic second-order logic thereby demonstrating the high expressive power of the language. (shrink)

This paper concerns the paraconsistent logic LPQ⊃,F and an application of it in the area of relational database theory. The notions of a relational database, a query applicable to a relational database, and a consistent answer to a query with respect to a possibly inconsistent relational database are considered from the perspective of this logic. This perspective enables among other things the definition of a consistent answer to a query with respect to a possibly inconsistent database without (...) resort to database repairs. In an earlier paper, LPQ⊃,F is presented with a sequent-style natural deduction proof system. In this paper, a sequent calculus proof system is presented instead because such proof systems are generally considered more suitable as the basis of proof search procedures than natural deduction proof systems and proof search procedures can serve as the core of algorithms for computing consistent answers to queries. (shrink)

In this paper I ask whether either theology or religious practice actually contribute to ethical theory or ethical practice. I rehearse well-known Humean arguments that they do not. I then reflect on the idea from Professor O’Donovan’s paper that it is virtuous for us to entertain hopes for redemption or for fulfilment and suggest that a careful weighing of these words may indicate otherwise.

To solve the highly counterintuitive paradox of confirmation represented by the statement, “A pair of red shoes confirms that all ravens are black,” Hempel employed a strategy that retained the equivalence condition but abandoned Nicod’s irrelevance condition. However, his use of the equivalence condition is fairly ad hoc, raising doubts about its applicability to this problem. Furthermore, applying the irrelevance condition from Nicod’s criterion does not necessarily lead to paradoxes, nor does discarding it prevent the emergence of paradoxes. Hempel’s approach (...) fails to adequately resolve the paradox. (shrink)

In this article, we query binaries of mobility and immobility in language studies via an empirical focus on language/social practices in a site that bridges the global North and global South. To do so, we work from a Southern praxis perspective to analyze discourses/knowledges informing the performance of accounts from Cambodian men, interviewed about transactional same-sex relationship practices between (ostensibly immobile) local men and (ostensibly mobile) male tourists to Cambodia from the global North. The analysis focuses on a process (...) in which participants’ chronotopic awareness of language shapes a negotiation of power, knowledge, and action with respect to these relationships. Encompassing the discursive positioning of selves and others through the deployment of relevant and affective chronotopes, the talk from these Cambodian men allows us to challenge assumptions about (im)mobility, awareness, agency, sexuality, and power, and demonstrate how these are accessed in multiple ways at this site of North/South contact. (shrink)

This paper addresses the problem of querying several databases considered as a whole. Assuming that the different databases share a common data description language, the problem that arises is to consistently answer queries even if the database contents are contradictory. The main contribution of this paper is the specification of a query-evaluator for answering closed and open general queries addressed to several databases and for providing explanations about the results. For doing so, we first specify a query-evaluator, in (...) logic, which assumes that the databases are propositional ones and do not contain disjunctions. Then we extend it to first-order databases defined by an extensional part and an intensional part. We also show that the query-evaluator corresponds to a majority merging of the databases. (shrink)

We consider relational databases organized over an ordered domain with some additional relations — a typical example is the ordered domain of rational numbers together with the operation of addition. In the focus of our study are the first-order queries that are invariant under order-preserving “permutations” — such queries are called order-generic. It has recently been discovered that for some domains order-generic FO queries fail to express more than pure order queries. For example, every order-generic FO query over rational (...) numbers with + can be rewritten without +. For some other domains, however, this is not the case.We provide very general conditions on the FO theory of the domain that ensure the collapse of order-generic extended FO queries to pure order queries over this domain: the Pseudo-finite Homogeneity Property and a stronger Isolation Property. We further distinguish one broad class of domains satisfying the Isolation Property, the so-called quasi-o-minimal domains. This class includes all the o-minimal domains, but also the ordered group of integer numbers and the ordered semigroup of natural numbers, and some other domains.An important difference of this paper from the recent series of related papers is that we generalize all the notions to the case of finitely representable database states — as opposed to finite states — and develop a general lifting technique that, essentially, allows us to extend any result of the kind we are interested in, from finite to finitely representable states. We show, however, that these results cannot be transfered to arbitrary infinite states. (shrink)