Exceptional Scope Research Articles

Direct ketone synthesis from primary alcohols and alkenes enabled by a dual photo/cobalt catalysis

Catalytic methods to couple alcohol and alkene feedstocks are highly valuable in synthetic chemistry. The direct oxidative coupling of primary alcohols and alkenes offers a streamlined approach to ketone synthesis. Currently, available methods are based on transition metal-catalyzed alkene hydroacylation, which involves the generation of an electrophilic aldehyde intermediate from primary alcohol dehydrogenation. These methods generally require high reaction temperatures and a high loading of precious metal catalysts and are predominantly effective for branch-selective reactions with electron-rich alkenes. Herein, we designed a dual photo/cobalt-catalytic method to manipulate the reactivity of nucleophilic ketyl radicals for the synthesis of ketones from primary alcohols and alkenes in complementary reactivity and selectivity. This protocol exhibits exceptional scope across both primary alcohols and alkenes with high chemo- and regio-selectivity under mild reaction conditions. Mechanism investigations reveal the essential role of cobalt catalysis in enabling efficient catalysis and broad substrate scope.

Cobalt-catalyzed synthesis of amides from alkenes and amines promoted by light.

Catalytic methods to couple alkene and amine feedstocks are valuable in synthetic chemistry. The direct carbonylative coupling of alkenes and amines holds promise as a perfectly atom-economical approach to amide synthesis, but general methods remain underdeveloped. Herein, we report an alkene hydroaminocarbonylation catalyzed by unmodified, inexpensive cobalt carbonyl under mild conditions and low pressure promoted by light. Silane addition after the reaction enables sequential cobalt-catalyzed amide reduction, constituting a formal alkene hydroaminomethylation. These methods exhibit exceptional scope across both alkene and amine components with high chemo- and regioselectivity and proceed efficiently even in the absence of solvent. The formation of a hydridocobalt through photodissociation of a carbonyl ligand is proposed to enable catalytic activity under mild conditions, which addresses a long-standing challenge in catalysis.

Sanctions, Communication, and Ambigu

I am writing this on the anniversary of Russia’s 24 February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, which the threat of sanctions had failed to deter. Following the invasion, the widest ever multilateral grouping of nations (if we leave to one side the obligation that exists for all UN Member States to implement UN Security Council sanctions), acting jointly and severally, have imposed on Russia economic and non-economic sanctions of exceptional scope and severity, including embargoes and 86Defence Strategic Communications | Volume 12 | Spring 2023DOI 10.30966/2018.RIGA.12.5energy boycotts, systemic financial sanctions, and sanctions targeted against numerous entities and individuals. (Even so, as has frequently been pointed out, although the countries imposing sanctions account for well over 50 per cent of global GDP, countries which have not imposed sanctions account for considerably more than half the world’s population.) The imposition of sanctions, in the face of countersanctions from Russia and high economic and social costs for the sanctioning states, has been an unprecedented demonstration of unity and resolve by Western nations, with some others, in response to Russia’s escalation of a brutal war, its existential threat to the sovereignty of a neighbouring state, and its disregard for the fundamental principles of the UN Charter. The sanctions have undoubtedly imposed significant economic and material costs on Russia, affecting its ability to deploy military equipment and to finance the costs of its war. As Russia continues its war, so sending states continue to impose new sanctions, in a strategy designed to counteract loopholes and to ratchet up pressure.

Copper(I) Photocatalyzed Bromonitroalkylation of Olefins: Evidence for Highly Efficient Inner-Sphere Pathways.

We report the visible light-mediated copper-catalyzed vicinal difunctionalization of olefins utilizing bromonitroalkanes as ATRA reagents. This protocol is characterized by high yields and fast reaction times under environmentally benign reaction conditions with exceptional scope, allowing the rapid functionalization of both activated and unactivated olefins. Moreover, late-stage functionnalization of biologically active molecules and upscaling to gram quantities is demonstrated, which offers manifold possibilities for further transformations, e.g. access to nitro- and aminocyclopropanes. Besides the synthetic utility of the title transformation, this study undergirds the exclusive role of copper in photoredox catalysis showing its ability to stabilize and interact with radical intermediates in its coordination sphere. EPR studies suggest that such interactions can even outperform a highly favorable cyclization of transient to persistent radicals contrasting iridium-based photocatalysts.

Base-catalyzed addition of silylacetylenes to ketones: a route to protected tertiary propargyl alcohols

Novel protocol for base-catalyzed addition of silylacetylenes to ketones – exceptional scope, gram scale and derivatization.

A flexible scope theory of intensionality

Extant attempts to incorporate intensionality into the grammar either systematically over-generate, or systematically under-generate. In this paper, building on Keshet (Linguist and Philos 33(4):251–283, 2011), we aim to reconcile a scopal account of de re with the possibility of de re readings out of scope islands. By adapting compositional techniques for dealing with exceptionally scoping indefinites (Charlow, in On the semantics of exceptional scope, PhD thesis, Rutgers University, 2014; The scope of alternatives: indefiniteness and islands. Linguist and Philos 43(4):427–472, 2020), we develop an intensional grammar in which exceptional de re is achieved via cyclic scope. World-sensitive expressions are converted into scope-takers via a constrained inventory of type-flexible operators. Type flexibility explains the possibility of apparently island-violating de re by predicting the possibility of cyclic scope-taking. We argue that the resulting theory—which we dub the flexible scope theory—is sufficiently expressive to address the under-generation issues of current accounts, while still capturing constraints on de re in an explanatory fashion.

One-pot multicomponent synthesis approach for tetrahydropyridines using polyaniline-zirconium oxide composites

Tetrahydropyridines, one-pot five-component green synthesis from aldehydes, anilines, and β-keto esters by cyclo-condensation using polyaniline-zirconium oxide catalyst. It is an efficient protocol due to the simplicity in reaction conditions, simple catalyst generation, and excellent product yield. The catalyst can be effortlessly recovered from the reaction mixture and reused up to the seven catalytic cycles without losing substantial catalytic activity. The present protocol offers prominent advantages over other reaction conditions in terms of a simple workup procedure, exceptional atomic economy, affordability, and wide substrate scope.

Focus particles and negative polarity

In this article I discuss constructions i odin NP and daže odin NP ‘even one NP’ in Russian, which are negative polarity items (NPIs), e.g. Petja *(ne) smog rešit’ i / daže ODNU zadaču ‘Petya didn’t manage to solve even one problem’. Only daže-NPIs are grammatical in non-negative environments of NPI licensing, e.g. Každyj, kto rešil ?daže / ??i ODNU zadaču, polučil začët ‘Everyone who solved even one problem got credit’. The same dependence is observed in several other languages: particles with additive and coordinative functions (like i ‘even, and’) form NPIs with narrower distribution than plain scalar particles (like daže ‘even’). The following question is thus the main topic of the paper: (A) why do i- and daže-NPIs have different distribution? Two auxiliary questions are: (B) what is the semantics of i and daže, and (C) why do they form NPIs when attached to the low endpoint of a scale? I argue that daže triggers only the scalar presupposition and i triggers only the additive presupposition (question B). I show that both scalar and additive presupposition cause ungrammaticality in positive environments (C). Finally, I compare two theories which (aim to) explain why the additive presupposition of i determines a narrower distribution of i-NPIs in comparison to daže-NPIs (A). A simple theory considers ungrammaticality of i-NPIs to be the result of interaction of the additive presupposition with presuppositions of licensing environments. Although it predicts some interpretational differences between i- and daže-NPIs, it fails to explain the confinement of i-NPIs to negative contexts. According to an alternative theory, i-NPIs are subject to standard movement constraints while daže-NPIs take exceptional (i.e. sentential) scope, which explains their different distribution without any additional assumptions. I also show how this theory can explain the weak vs. strong NPIs distinction in other cases.

"Algún" indefinite is not bound by adverbs of quantification

Some indefinites cannot be bound by adverbs of quantification or the generic operator. I argue that this datum follows from the internal syntax of indefinites: only those indefinites consisting of a minimal structure can be bound, bigger indefinites cannot. I present evidence from Spanish, Russian and English to support this claim. Two theoretical consequences follow. The first one is about wh-dependencies: I argue that wh-phrases cannot be regarded as noun phrases with an extra [wh] feature, but rather as very small indefinites without additional features. The second one involves exceptional scope: choice function approaches seem to run into a paradox that alternative approaches, such as Schwarszchild’s Singleton Indefinite approach, avoid. I also argue that an alternative semantic approach to binding resistance yields no fruit. Finally, I show that only small indefinites can be used as predicates, thus bolstering the approach taken in these pages.

Parliamentary Prorogation in Comparative Context

AbstractThis paper examines the power to prorogue (or suspend) Parliament following the 2019 prorogation controversy in the UK. We outline the legal basis of prerogative‐based prorogation, survey its uses in the UK and other Westminster systems, and compare it with equivalent rules in other European parliamentary democracies. The comparative perspective highlights the outlier status of the UK among comparable European democracies. In the UK, the absence of explicit legal limits on the use of prorogation gives the executive exceptional scope to employ the power for political purposes to sidestep Parliament. We conclude by discussing the implications of these findings for current discussions about the desirability of reforming the UK’s prorogation rules and placing express legal limits on the executive’s power.

The scope of alternatives: indefiniteness and islands

I argue that alternative-denoting expressions interact with their semantic context by taking scope. With an empirical focus on indefinites in English, I show how this approach improves on standard alternative-semantic architectures that use point-wise composition to subvert islands, as well as on in situ approaches to indefinites more generally. Unlike grammars based on point-wise composition, scope-based alternative management is thoroughly categorematic, doesn’t under-generate readings when multiple sources of alternatives occur on an island, and is compatible with standard treatments of binding. Unlike all in situ (pseudo-scope) treatments of indefinites, relying on a true scope mechanism prevents over-generation when an operator binds into an indefinite. My account relies only on function application, some mechanism for scope-taking, and two freely-applying type-shifters: the first is Karttunen’s (Linguist Philos 1(1):3–44, 1977. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00351935 ) proto-question operator, aka Partee’s (in: Groenendijk, de Jongh, Stokhof (eds) Studies in discourse representation theory and the theory of generalized quantifiers, Foris, Dordrecht, 1986) IDENT, and the second can be factored out of extant approaches to the semantics of questions in the tradition of Karttunen (1977). These type-shifters form a decomposition of LIFT, the familiar function mapping values into scope-takers. Exceptional scope of alternative-generating expressions arises via (snowballing) scopal pied-piping: indefinites take scope over their island, which then itself takes scope.

Indefinite Donkeys on Islands

In this paper I present a theory of indefinites which captures two of their natural properties: indefinites license donkey anaphora (Geach 1962) and they exhibit ‘specific’ readings in which they appear to scope out of scope islands. In various flavours of dynamic semantics (Kamp 1981, Heim 1982, Dekker (2004)), these properties can be captured to the detriment of compositionally. Other theories have employed more involved technical machinery like choice functions (Kratzer 1998, von Heusinger 2002), Hamblin-semantics (Kratzer & Shimoyama 2002) or independence friendly logics (Brasoveanu & Farkas 2011) to derive exceptional scope readings, but ignored donkey anaphora. Theories of E-type anaphora, on the other hand, generally do not consider exceptional scope readings (Heim 1990, Elbourne 2001). My own analysis combines insights from dynamic semantics with referential indexing in LF-semantics, resulting in a fully compositional, static system.

Comparative perspectives on transnational party-building in new democracies: The case of Central and Eastern Europe

The activity of the Europarties in promoting party development in post-Communist Europe has been viewed as their most impressive achievement to date. This article sets out and applies a comparative framework for analysing this activity, looking at both the general scope for party-building in new democracies and their actual record in Central and Eastern Europe. It concludes that the Europarties enjoyed exceptional scope there, benefitting from the EU’s general leverage over accession states and that their effects were not really marginal but nevertheless rather specific and could not be easily summarised as systemic.

Indefinite Donkeys on Islands

In this paper I present a theory of indefinites which captures two of their natural properties: indefinites license donkey anaphora (Geach 1962) and they exhibit ‘specific’ readings in which they appear to scope out of scope islands. In various flavours of dynamic semantics (Kamp 1981, Heim 1982, Dekker (2004)), these properties can be captured to the detriment of compositionally. Other theories have employed more involved technical machinery like choice functions (Kratzer 1998, von Heusinger 2002), Hamblin-semantics (Kratzer & Shimoyama 2002) or independence friendly logics (Brasoveanu & Farkas 2011) to derive exceptional scope readings, but ignored donkey anaphora. Theories of E-type anaphora, on the other hand, generally do not consider exceptional scope readings (Heim 1990, Elbourne 2001). My own analysis combines insights from dynamic semantics with referential indexing in LF-semantics, resulting in a fully compositional, static system.

Femmes et genre en contexte colonial, XIXe-XXe siecle (Women and gender in colonial context, 19th-20th centuries), Centre d'histoire de Science Po, Paris, 19-21 January 2012

This international conference was organized by three French historians with over fifteen years research experience: Pascale Barthelemy, Lecturer at the Ecole Normale Superieure de Lyon, who works on education and training of women in French West Africa; Anne Hugon, Lecturer at the University of Paris 1, who is researching the history of childbirth and child-rearing in the colonial period in Ghana; and Christelle Taraud, Professor at New York University in France, whose research concerns sexuality in the colonial Maghreb. After two years preparation, they organized a conference of exceptional scope. Over three days at two different venues, the symposium welcomed sixty-five scholars from five continents and several generations. Special emphasis was placed on young researchers (doctoral students and new PhDs), who made up a third of the speakers. The fact that women were in the majority at this event reveals nevertheless a segmentation difficult to escape in this field – at least in France. And this was precisely one of the main challenges raised by this conference. If the primary objective was to provide ‘a long-term overview’ of research on women and gender in various colonial contexts (Africa, Asia, Oceania), challenges specific to the inclusion of these studies in French research were not forgotten. To address this, the organizers initiated several spin-offs from the conference: publications in academic and public history journals, lectures, and radio broadcasts.1 It is indeed no longer possible to consider this area a new current of historiography. For nearly thirty years now, researchers throughout the world have been writing the history of women and of relations between the sexes under colonialism. Yet while departments of colonial and postcolonial history in Anglophone countries very often integrate gender issues, this perspective remains tentative in France.

Ainu spirits singing: the living world of Chiri Yukie's Ainu shin'yoshu

Indigenous peoples throughout the globe are custodians of a unique, priceless, and increasingly imperiled legacy of oral lore. Among them the Ainu, a people native to northeastern Asia, stand out for the exceptional scope and richness of their oral performance traditions. Yet despite this cultural wealth, nothing has appeared in English on the subject in over thirty years. Sarah Strong's Ainu Spirits Singing breaks this decades-long silence with a nuanced study and English translation of Chiri Yukie's Ainu Shin'yoshu, the first written transcription of Ainu oral narratives by an ethnic Ainu. The thirteen narratives in Chiri's collection belong to the genre known as kamui yukar, said to be the most ancient performance form in the vast Ainu repertoire. In it, animals (and sometimes plants or other natural phenomena)--all regarded as spiritual beings (kamui) within the animate Ainu world--assume the role of narrator and tell stories about themselves. The first-person speakers include imposing animals such as the revered orca, the Hokkaido wolf, and Blakiston's fish owl, as well as the more humble Hokkaido brown frog, snowshoe hare, and pearl mussel. Each has its own story and own signature refrain. Strong provides readers with an intimate and perceptive view of this extraordinary text. Along with critical contextual information about traditional Ainu society and its cultural assumptions, she brings forward pertinent information on the geography and natural history of the coastal southwestern Hokkaido region where the stories were originally performed. The result is a rich fusion of knowledge that allows the reader to feel at home within the animistic frame of reference of the narratives. Strong's study also offers the first extended biography of Chiri Yukie (1903-1922) in English. The story of her life, and her untimely death at age nineteen, makes clear the harsh consequences for Chiri and her fellow Ainu of the Japanese colonization of Hokkaido and the Meiji and Taisho governments' policies of assimilation. Chiri's receipt of the narratives in the Horobetsu dialect from her grandmother and aunt (both traditional performers) and the fact that no native speakers of that dialect survive today make her work all the more significant. The book concludes with a full, integral translation of the text.

Indefinite Determiners and the Pragmatics of Referential Anchoring

In this paper we propose a unified framework for the representation of different types of indefinite pronouns and determiners in terms of referential anchoring. Referential anchoring is a pragmatic operation that establishes a functional dependency between the referent of an indefinite DP and some other discourse item. As such, the idea of referential anchoring is not new (cf. Kratzer, 1998; von Heusinger, 2002; Kamp and Bende-Farkas, 2010, etc.), however there is some confusion in the discussion of referential anchoring regarding exceptional scope readings. We claim that referential anchoring is independent of scope, even though referentially anchored functional readings often entail exceptional scope readings. We make a transparent formal proposal for referential anchoring that draws on the idea of domain narrowing in the sense of Schwarzschild (2002). Finally, we present the advantage of our analysis by applying it to the Russian indefinite determiners kakoj-to, koe-kakoj and kakoj-nibud'.

Structured anaphora to quantifier domains

The paper proposes a novel analysis of quantificational subordination, e.g., Harvey courts a woman at every convention.She is very pretty. vs. She always comes to the banquet with him. — in particular of the fact that the indefinite in the initial sentence can have wide or narrow scope, but the first discourse as a whole allows only for the wide scope reading, while the second discourse allows for both readings. The cross-sentential interaction between scope and anaphora is captured in terms of structured anaphora to quantifier domains, formalized in a new dynamic system couched in classical type logic that builds on the Dynamic Plural Logic of van den Berg [9]. Given the underlying type logic, compositionality at sub-clausal level follows automatically. Modal subordination is analyzed in a parallel way, thereby capturing the parallels between the individual and modal domains repeatedly argued for in the literature. We also outline the analysis of several other phenomena in terms of structured anaphora: exceptional scope, weak/strong donkey readings, anaphoric/uniqueness-implying definite descriptions and interactions between same / different and quantifier scope.

Perceptual organization and neural computation

Our present understanding of perceptual organization has its roots in the observations and qualitative principles of the Gestalt psychologists. Gestaltists and their associates identified and classified phenomena that reflect how perceptual systems derive representations of the environment based on fragmentary information and stimulus context. A broad range of phenomena was explored in this early work. The perceptual organization of visual motion was a major focus, involving both simple (Korte, 1915; Ternus, 1926; von Schiller, 1933; Wertheimer, 1912) and complex (Duncker, 1929; Musatti, 1924; Rubin, 1927; Wallach, 1935) motion patterns. The perceptual organization of static form was explored in studies of part-whole relationships in simple planar figures (Rubin, 1915; Wertheimer, 1923), and later in studies of illusory contours and amodal completion (Kanizsa, 1955; Michotte, 1964). Additional topics included lightness and color phenomena (Benary, 1924; Gelb, 1929; Katz, 1935; Wallach, 1948), and the perception of events (Michotte, 1941). In brief, the research areas addressed by the first generations of Gestalt psychologists spanned much of what is now vision science. The broad impact of Gestalt ideas is reflected in the exceptional scope of this special issue. This early work provides a rich source of observations and intuitions about mechanisms underlying various aspects of perceptual organization. Building on this foundation, current work is revolutionizing our understanding of perceptual organization in two major respects. First, the qualitative observations and descriptions generated by early work are now replaced by rigorous computational theories. This advance can be traced through a

Clinical focus and patient management in the XXI century within the context of the advances in medicine

As the works presented by Drs. Aida Falcón de Vargas, Oscar Solı́s, Alexis Bello and José Félix Oletta pointed out in the present Symposium “Medicine of the XXI Century” [1–4], scientific and technological advances in medicine are by all means extremely relevant these times. All considerations predict that investigations shall increase much more in the century we are just initiating, a fact that will provide us with greater insight and an exceptional scope in the diagnose and treatment of diseases as well as in the systems of prevention and rehabilitation.