Areas of Same Cardinal Direction

Cardinal directions, such as North, East, South, and West, are the foundation for qualitative spatial reasoning, a common field of GIS, Artificial Intelligence, and cognitive science. Such cardinal directions capture the relative spatial direction relation between a reference object and a target object, therefore, they are important search criteria in spatial databases. The projection-based model for such direction relations has been well investigated for point-like objects, yielding a relation algebra with strong inference power. The Direction Relation Matrix defines the simple region-to-region direction relations by approximating the reference object to a minimum bounding rectangle. Models that capture the direction between extended objects fall short when the two objects are close to each other. For instance, the forty-eight contiguous states of the US are colloquially considered to be South of Canada, yet they include regions that are to the North of some parts of Canada. This research considers the cardinal direction as a field that is distributed through space and may take on varying values depending on the location within a reference object. Therefore, the fundamental unit of space, the point, is used as a reference to form a point-based cardinal direction model. The model applies to capture the direction relation between point-to-region and region-to-region configurations. As such, the reference object is portioned into areas of same cardinal direction with respect to the target object. This thesis demonstrates there is a set of 106 cardinal point-to-region relations, which can be normalized by considering mirroring and 90° rotations, to a subset of 22 relations. The differentiating factor of the model is that a set of base relations defines the direction relation anywhere in the field, and the conceptual neighborhood graph of the base relations offers the opportunity to exploit the strong inference of point-based direction reasoning for simple regions of arbitrary shape. Considers the tiles and pockets of same cardinal direction, while a coarse model provides a union of all possible qualitative direction values between a reference region and a target region

A Qualitative Representation of Spatial Scenes in R2 with Regions and Lines

Regions and lines are common geographic abstractions for geographic objects. Collections of regions, lines, and other representations of spatial objects form a spatial scene, along with their relations. For instance, the states of Maine and New Hampshire can be represented by a pair of regions and related based on their topological properties. These two states are adjacent (i.e., they meet along their shared boundary), whereas Maine and Florida are not adjacent (i.e., they are disjoint). A detailed model for qualitatively describing spatial scenes should capture the essential properties of a configuration such that a description of the represented objects and their relations can be generated. Such a description should then be able to reproduce a scene in a way that preserves all topological relationships, but without regards to metric details. Coarse approaches to qualitative spatial reasoning may underspecify certain relations. For example, if two objects meet, it is unclear if they meet along an edge, at a single point, or multiple times along their boundaries. Where the boundaries of spatial objects converge, this is called a spatial intersection. This thesis develops a model for spatial scene descriptions primarily through sequences of detailed spatial intersections and object containment, capturing how complex spatial objects relate. With a theory of complex spatial scenes developed, a tool that will automatically generate a formal description of a spatial scene is prototyped, enabling the described objects to be analyzed. The strengths and weaknesses of the provided model will be discussed relative to other models of spatial scene description, along with further refinements

World to Word: Nomenclature Systems of Color and Species

As the digitization of information accelerates, the push to encode our surrounding numerically instead of linguistically increases. The role that language has traditionally played in the nomenclature of an integrative taxonomy is being replaced by the numeric identification of one or few quantitative characteristics. Nineteenth-century scientific systems of color identification divided, grouped, and named colors according to multiple characteristics. Now color identification relies on numeric values applied to spectrographic readings. This means of identification of color lacks the taxonomic rigor of nineteenth century systems. Identifying color by numeric value instead of by grouping and naming them, strips color taxonomy of all but one quantitative aspect of a color. I use the case of color taxonomy to argue against a similar trend of numeric identification in the biological sciences. Unlike historically more integrative approaches to taxonomy in biology, genomic sequencing identifies one or few quantitative characteristics to encode an organism. If genomic sequencing becomes the primary means of identification in the biological sciences, just as in numeric systems of color identification, scientific taxonomy would suffer. Basing my analysis on theories of perception of division and on theories of language, I use the cases of color and species to argue for the advantages of an integrative taxonomic system of naming and categorizing over a method of identification, which encodes limited characteristics numerically. I hold that language is the most sophisticated tool for systematic taxonomy and that taxonomic nomenclature should be retained

Mindscapes: Laura Riding's poetry and poetics /

Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Centro de Comunicação e Expressão.Esta tese propõe uma leitura revisionista da poesia contemporânea através do exame do caso de um dos mais esquecidos escritores norte-americanos do século XX: Laura (Riding) Jackson (1901-1991). O objetivo é demonstrar que Riding não apenas possuía uma poética definida e singular, mas que ela permanece uma das instâncias mais extremas e paradoxais do modernismo anglo-americano, a ponto de Riding abandonar a escrita da poesia em 1938. Recorrendo a conceitos de "formação do cânone" bem como às noções de "discurso" e "função do autor", em Foucault, investigo a construção do cânone da poesia moderna anglo-americana, recuperando o contexto e as circunstâncias da ocultação de Riding. Enquanto cubro os "discursos" poéticos em circulação na primeira metade do século XX-o "imagismo" de Pound, a "dissociação da sensibilidade", "impersonalidade" e "tradição" de Eliot, a "unidade orgância" e "ambigüidade" da Nova Crítica-ofereço um panorama crítico de modernismos alternativos sendo articulados à época. Minha intenção é demonstrar que os poemas de Riding são expressões vigorosas de um escritor para quem "a mente pensando se torna a força ativa do poema", para usar a apta formulação de Charles Bernstein. Entre minhas descobertas sobre as várias e complexas razões que levaram à não-canonização de Riding estão a hegemonia da Nova Crítica, o exílio voluntário de Riding da cena literária (onde são feitas ou desfeitas as reputações), sua recusa em ser antologiada, bem como em ser explicada em termos críticos que não os dela. Todos esses fatores, mais a "dificuldade" de sua poesia, contribuíram para fazer de Riding "a maior poeta esquecida da poesia norte-americana", como escreveu Kenneth Rexroth. Ajudado pelos insights de dois importantes críticos de poesia norte-americana, Charles Bernstein e Marjorie Perloff, defendo que a "poesia da mente" de Riding-onde o que está em jogo é que o que pensamos ser a nossa realidade-representa uma mudança radical no paradigma da poética modernista: de uma poesia centrada na imagem para uma poesia centrada na linguagem. Focalizando a experiência consciente e o tempo duracional do pensamento presente em seus poemas, concluo que as "pensagens" de Riding têm o objetivo preciso de constatar um fato universal: enquanto seres humanos e pensantes, estamos numa condição permanente chamada linguagem

Cities Made of Boundaries: Mapping Social Life in Urban Form

Cities Made of Boundaries presents the theoretical foundation and concepts for a new social scientific urban morphological mapping method, Boundary Line Type (BLT) Mapping. Its vantage is a plea to establish a frame of reference for radically comparative urban studies positioned between geography and archaeology. Based in multidisciplinary social and spatial theory, a critical realist understanding of the boundaries that compose built space is operationalised by a mapping practice utilising Geographical Information Systems (GIS). Benjamin N. Vis gives a precise account of how BLT Mapping can be applied to detailed historical, reconstructed, contemporary, and archaeological urban plans, exemplified by sixteenth to twenty-first century Winchester (UK) and Classic Maya Chunchucmil (Mexico). This account demonstrates how the functional and experiential difference between compact western and tropical dispersed cities can be explored. The methodological development of Cities Made of Boundaries will appeal to readers interested in the comparative social analysis of built environments, and those seeking to expand the evidence-base of design options to structure urban life and development

Cities Made of Boundaries

Cities Made of Boundaries presents the theoretical foundation and concepts for a new social scientific urban morphological mapping method, Boundary Line Type (BLT) Mapping. Its vantage is a plea to establish a frame of reference for radically comparative urban studies positioned between geography and archaeology. Based in multidisciplinary social and spatial theory, a critical realist understanding of the boundaries that compose built space is operationalised by a mapping practice utilising Geographical Information Systems (GIS). Benjamin N. Vis gives a precise account of how BLT Mapping can be applied to detailed historical, reconstructed, contemporary, and archaeological urban plans, exemplified by sixteenth- to twenty-first century Winchester (UK) and Classic Maya Chunchucmil (Mexico). This account demonstrates how the functional and experiential difference between compact western and tropical dispersed cities can be explored. The methodological development of Cities Made of Boundaries will appeal to readers interested in the comparative social analysis of built environments, and those seeking to expand the evidence-base of design options to structure urban life and development

L'atomisme, le holisme et la quête d'une tierce alternative viable

Selon John McDowell, l'atomisme et le holisme sont chacun incapables de porter fruit. Plutôt que d'osciller futilement entre ces deux pôles, il croit que nous devrions repenser notre façon de concevoir la relation liant l'esprit et le monde. Inspiré par certains passages de Kant, il nous invite donc à reconsidérer l'expérience de telle sorte qu'on y admette d'entrée de jeu l'exercice d'une liberté distinctement humaine-l'étendue de l'esprit devenant ainsi dénuée de toute contrainte externe. À notre avis, McDowell a plus de succès lorsqu'il dépeint le va-et-vient entre l'atomisme et le holisme que lorsqu'il propose une façon d'échapper à ce mouvement. Nous croyons que la fusion qu'il cherche à développer ne tient pas la route dans la mesure où, d'un point de vue naturaliste, il y a bel et bien lieu de distinguer la réceptivité empirique et la spontaneité conceptuelle. À l'encontre de McDowell, nous soutenons qu'il n'y a oscillation entre ces facultés que si l'on endosse une inférence allant du statut non-atomique des représentations au holisme, saut inductif qui repose sur une approche spéculative que nous rejetons. Le premier chapitre cherche à démontrer comment les théories holistes de filière quinéenne se fondent sur des présupposés spéculatifs et comment les éléments plus louables de la philosophie de McDowell à cet égard sont rendus impuissants par son assentiment à la critique que fait W. Sellars du "mythe du Donné". Le second chapitre reconstruit méticuleusement l'argument fort complexe qu'étale McDowell dans Mind and World, pour ensuite critiquer sa suggestion que la culture et l'éducation induisent chez l'être humain une attitude critique pouvant remplacer la friction produite par l'expérience. Le troisième chapitre soutient que la thèse de Sellars voulant que l'expérience peut causer mais non justifier nos représentations détruirait non seulement la connaissance empirique mais aussi la capacité de tirer des inférences. Enfin, le quatrième chapitre présente une nouvelle vision "constrictive" qui, par l'entremise des notions de coercition et de complexité, reconnait que la représentation du monde met en jeu une échelle plus large que l'atome mais plus petite que le tout. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Atomisme, Holisme, Représentation, John McDowell

Cities Made of Boundaries

Cities Made of Boundaries presents the theoretical foundation and concepts for a new social scientific urban morphological mapping method, Boundary Line Type (BLT) Mapping. Its vantage is a plea to establish a frame of reference for radically comparative urban studies positioned between geography and archaeology. Based in multidisciplinary social and spatial theory, a critical realist understanding of the boundaries that compose built space is operationalised by a mapping practice utilising Geographical Information Systems (GIS). Benjamin N. Vis gives a precise account of how BLT Mapping can be applied to detailed historical, reconstructed, contemporary, and archaeological urban plans, exemplified by sixteenth- to twenty-first century Winchester (UK) and Classic Maya Chunchucmil (Mexico). This account demonstrates how the functional and experiential difference between compact western and tropical dispersed cities can be explored. The methodological development of Cities Made of Boundaries will appeal to readers interested in the comparative social analysis of built environments, and those seeking to expand the evidence-base of design options to structure urban life and development

How to do things with speeches: a critical discourse analysis of military coup texts in Nigeria

Coup speeches that usher the military into political power in Nigeria are the central focus of this thesis. There are seven coup speeches that are notable in the changing of the political course in Nigeria and in enabling the military to rule Nigeria for 30 years, establishing another alternative political construct and party (Bangura 1991). The seven coup speeches along with two others, one a colonial proclamation of conquest and the other a counter coup speech (altogether making nine) constitute the data of this thesis. The analysis done here uses Critical Discourse Analysis, based on a combination of Fairclough (1989, 2001), Fairclough and Fairclough (2012), Thompson’s (1984, 1988 and 1990) works with complementary insights by Chilton (2004), to analyze the speeches in order to understand the ideologies, perceptions and arguments of the coup makers enshrined in the texts. I also employ a concordance analytic system in corpus linguistics to sort uses of important terms and lexical items. The analysis is divided into three broad parts, namely: an analysis of representation of social actors and their action, an analysis of the processes of interpellation and then an analysis of the premises of the arguments contained in the speeches. In the concluding part, there is a discussion of the dialectical nature of the coup speeches especially in the areas of mutual influences which aids in the gradual sedimentation of the political ideology of the military. In particular, there is a longitudinal intertextual analysis across all the speeches, from the earliest to the latest, to see how a coup speech genre is created. The contribution of this work to knowledge is in terms of combining discourse analysis and social theory to illuminate some aspects of Nigeria’s socio- political crises in depth and multifariously. This work helps in understanding the nature of Nigerian autocratic democracy, subservient followership by the citizenry and the supremacy of the military elite. The work employs a novel combination of representation, argumentation, interpellation and constitutive intertextuality in understanding military discourse. It looks at speaker intention, the exploitation of interpretation or reception and the formation of subjects in general and each with its importance and social context. The work as a whole reveals that the military try to build legitimacy by way of establishing authority through rhetorical arguments in varying degrees. These arguments are laid bare, and what they discern is that charges are decidedly trumped up by the military against their opponents and constructed to suit the spin of their moments. The coup makers in some instances construct strawmen of opponents and then go ahead to attack their constructed assumptions or they charge without substance using nominalizations, metaphorical constructions and presuppositions. They apply stipulative definitions and emotionally loaded words in evaluating their actions favourably and also in the negative evaluation of the actions of the opponents. At the level of interpellational analysis, the data reveals the use of language in gradually hailing the citizens as military subjects. The role of the audience changes here i.e. from those to be convinced in rhetorical evaluation of opponents to those to be firmly controlled. The persistent hailing and positioning of the citizens as military subjects help in concretizing their subjecthood. The reaction of the people in affirmation of support to the rule of the military is crucial and it completes the interpellation process. As observed by Clark (2007, 141) “many African societies are so inured to military intervention as not to regard it as aberrant”. This inuring of the societies has to do with hegemonic ideological practices in military discourses claiming legitimacy and the right to rule. At the reception level, this shows that most of the citizens have bought into the dominant ideology and are as such interpellated by it or have adopted what Hall (2015, 125) would call the ‘dominant-hegemonic position’. Aspects of argumentation, speech acts, and deontic modals used by the coup makers help in gradually solidifying the subservient nature of the citizens to the military junta. The diachronic and intertextual nature of the analysis also reveals that the colonial proclamation of conquest in Nigeria by Lord Fredrick Lugard possibly influenced the first coup speech in 1966 in terms of structure and genre. There are traces of the colonial proclamations found in the 1966 coup speech. In substance, the military appear to copy their colonial progenitors. Historically, the military were formed as an army of colonial conquest. There is a dialectical interplay between colonial discourse and military coup speeches. The first coup speech, for its part, influences other coup speeches and they in general impact on civilian political language. The work analyzes from the minute to the global and in this bid unties the layers of assumptions, constructions and points of views that underpin an otherwise objective presentation of reality. The study also engages social theory in illuminating aspects of discourse, social practice and political action. The works of post-structuralists like Foucault, Althusser, Bourdieu, Habermas, Laclau and Mouffe, Derrida etc. are employed in shedding light on the processes of social formation in the interpellation of subjects and in the construction of a new political authority by the military regimes

Schelling\u27s Naturalism: Motion, Space, and the Volition of Thought

This dissertation examines F.W.J. von Schelling\u27s Philosophy of Nature (or Naturphilosophie) as a form of early, and transcendentally expansive, naturalism that is, simultaneously, a naturalized transcendentalism. By focusing on space and motion, this dissertation argues that thought should be viewed as a natural activity through and through. This view is made possible by German Idealism historically, and yet, is complicated and obscured by contemporary philosophy\u27s treatment of German Idealism in both analytic and continental circles. The text engages with the foundations of Schelling\u27s theory of nature as well as geometry, field theory, inter-theory relations, epistemology, and pragmatism