Local Arguments Research Articles

Accounting for Plays in the Long Eighteenth Century

Accounting for Plays in the Long Eighteenth Century Amanda Weldy Boyd (bio) Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume The Publication of Plays in London, 1660–1800: Playwrights, Publishers, and the Market london: british library, 2015 xxvi + 483 pages; isbn: 9780712357739 expanding upon a series of Panizzi Lectures given by Judith Milhous and Robert D. Hume at the British Library in 2011, The Publication of Plays in London, 1660–1800 promises to shed light on the roles of “playwrights, publishers, and readers” (xii). In addressing the relation between the first two, the authors have excelled; however, the third term should really be “market” (as it is in the book’s title), since readers’ interests are represented by their purchasing practices rather than their reactions to what they purchased. Organized in three broad parts addressing (1) the basic mechanics of publishing new plays in the period between 1660 and 1800, (2) the financial realities that influenced the publication of plays, and (3) the generally neglected variations or additions to texts as initially printed (such as collections, reprints, and illustrations), the organizational schema of Milhous and Hume’s book positions it as a resource for those interested in bibliographic history. Clearly, its emphasis is economic, and thus the text is richly supported by quantitative data generated by the authors and other scholars. Richly illustrated by materials drawn predominantly from the British Library and replete with visual representations of data, including easy-to-consult footnotes, this work represents the first systematic effort to catalogue all aspects of publishing a play in this period. Those readers who seek to undertake the book as a whole will be rewarded with an extensive panoramic view of the interplay between playwrights and publishers that shaped publication practices. At times, the material may seem overly [End Page 179] general or repetitive as a result of its ambition to offer a wide survey to the novice student; the work, however, with its detailed table of contents and penchants for lists and—at least in the beginning section—question-and-answer format, enables the selective reading of sections or subsections by scholars with more focused interests. As befits a survey-style work, the book is not governed by one main argument or style of argumentation: in some instances, bare facts are laid out; at other times, conflicting opinions are presented for consideration without much comment; in still other instances, the authors advance their own, local arguments. In their refreshingly brief epilogue, the authors acknowledge the “dense, detailed, highly particular and quantified” nature of their book and offer sixteen main conclusions suggested by their research into playwrights, publishers, playbooks, and their contexts (361). This is not simply a summary of the earlier sections’ main points of contention, but a synthesis of those observations and arguments. Here, too, is a final attempt to indicate several areas in need of further study, reminding readers that the purpose of this book is to advance the consideration of plays in the fields of print studies and theater studies, among others. A specific strength of the book is its detailed prologue on staging and publication practices prior to 1660: Milhous and Hume here display their interest in the principled tracing of cause-and-effect relationships where possible; they excel at embedding research on quantifiable economic issues pertaining to publication within specific historical circumstances. Most importantly, the authors remind readers that Renaissance plays were not held in the same esteem in their time as they are retrospectively; the assumption that they were colors much of the available scholarship. Of the three main sections, it is “Financial Contexts” that makes the most sustained original contribution to scholarship. Drawing upon the work of three long-eighteenth-century political arithmeticians in demographic economics, each whose studies looked at a different period in the long eighteenth century, Milhous and Hume establish an approximate average family income during the period. This allows the authors to address the question of a universal factor by which to convert eighteenth-century currency into present-day values. They then apply those theoretical abstractions in an effort to determine the pricing decisions and potential profits behind a collection of plays by Colley Cibber (Plays, 1721), John Gay’s...

Advective-diffusive motion on large scales from small-scale dynamics with an internal symmetry.

We consider coupled diffusions in n-dimensional space and on a compact manifold and the resulting effective advective-diffusive motion on large scales in space. The effective drift (advection) and effective diffusion are determined as a solvability conditions in a multiscale analysis. As an example, we consider coupled diffusions in three-dimensional space and on the group manifold SO(3) of proper rotations, generalizing results obtained by H. Brenner [J. Colloid Interface Sci. 80, 548 (1981)JCISA50021-979710.1016/0021-9797(81)90214-9]. We show in detail how the analysis can be conveniently carried out using local charts and invariance arguments. As a further example, we consider coupled diffusions in two-dimensional complex space and on the group manifold SU(2). We show that although the local operators may be the same as for SO(3), due to the global nature of the solvability conditions the resulting diffusion will differ and generally be more isotropic.

Competitively Scheduling Tasks with Intermediate Parallelizability

We introduce a scheduling algorithm Intermediate-SRPT, and show that it is O (log P )-competitive with respect to average flow time when scheduling jobs whose parallelizability is intermediate between being fully parallelizable and sequential. Here, the parameter P denotes the ratio between the maximum job size to the minimum. We also show a general matching lower bound on the competitive ratio. Our analysis builds on an interesting combination of potential function and local competitiveness arguments.

Extension properties and boundary estimates for a fractional heat operator

The square root of the heat operator ∂t−Δ, can be realized as the Dirichlet to Neumann map of the heat extension of data on Rn+1 to R+n+2. In this note we obtain similar characterizations for general fractional powers of the heat operator, (∂t−Δ)s, s∈(0,1). Using the characterizations we derive properties and boundary estimates for parabolic integro-differential equations from purely local arguments in the extension problem.

Scepticism by a Thousand Cuts

Global sceptical arguments seek to undermine vast swathes of our putative knowledge by deploying hypotheses that posit massive deception or error. Local sceptical arguments seek to undermine just a small region of putative knowledge, using hypotheses that posit deception or error of a more mundane kind. Those epistemologists who have devised anti-sceptical strategies have tended to have global sceptical arguments firmly in their sights. I argue here that local sceptical arguments, while less dramatic, ultimately pose just as serious a challenge to our epistemic self-image and that some prominent anti-sceptical strategies are very poorly placed to meet it.

Global well-posedness and asymptotic behavior of solutions to a reaction-convection-diffusion cholera epidemic model

In this paper, we study the initial boundary value problem of a reaction-convection-diffusion epidemic model for cholera dynamics, which was developed in [38], named susceptible-infected-recovered-susceptible-bacteria (SIRS-B) epidemic PDE model. First, a local well-posedness result relying on the theory of cooperative dynamics systems is obtained. Via a priori estimates making use of the special structure of the system and continuation of local theory argument, we show that in fact this problem is globally well-posed. Secondly, we analyze the local asymptotic stability of the solutions based on the basic reproduction number associated with this model.

Solitary gravity-capillary water waves with point vortices

We construct small-amplitude solitary traveling gravity-capillary water waves with a finite number of point vortices along a vertical line, on finite depth. This is done using a local bifurcation argument. The properties of the resulting waves are also examined: We find that they depend significantly on the position of the point vortices in the water column.

On the Measurement of Turbulence Over Complex Mountainous Terrain

The theoretical treatment of turbulence is largely based on the assumption of horizontally homogeneous and flat underlying surfaces. Correspondingly, approaches developed over the years to measure turbulence statistics in order to test this theoretical understanding or to provide model input, are also largely based on the same assumption of horizontally homogeneous and flat terrain. Here we discuss aspects of turbulence measurements that require special attention in mountainous terrain. We especially emphasize the importance of data quality (flux corrections, data quality assessment, uncertainty estimates) and address the issues of coordinate systems and different post-processing options in mountainous terrain. The appropriate choice of post-processing methods is then tested based on local scaling arguments. We demonstrate that conclusions drawn from turbulence measurements obtained in mountainous terrain are rather sensitive to these post-processing choices and give suggestions as to those that are most appropriate.

Testing against changing correlation

A test for time-varying correlation is developed within the framework of a dynamic conditional score (DCS) model for both Gaussian and Student t-distributions. The test may be interpreted as a Lagrange multiplier test and modified to allow for the estimation of models for time-varying volatility in the individual series. Unlike standard moment-based tests, the score-based test statistic includes information on the level of correlation under the null hypothesis and local power arguments indicate the benefits of doing so. A simulation study shows that the performance of the score-based test is strong relative to existing tests across a range of data generating processes. An application to the Hong Kong and South Korean equity markets shows that the new test reveals changes in correlation that are not detected by the standard moment-based test.

Addressing imbalanced data with argument based rule learning

In this paper we focus on improving rule based classifiers learned from class imbalanced data by incorporating expert knowledge into the learning process. Applying expert knowledge should overcome limitations of standard methods for imbalanced data when minority classes contain many rare examples and outliers. It should also improve the minority class while maintaining better classification accuracy of the majority classes than the standard methods. Unlike existing proposals for integrating global expert knowledge into rule induction, the class imbalance requires considering local characteristics of class distributions. Therefore, we consider argument based learning, where a domain expert can annotate (explain) some of learning examples to describe reasons for assigning them to specific classes. Using local arguments should improve the interpretability of rules and their consistency with the domain knowledge, and should also result in a better recognition of the minority class. The main aim of our study is to show how argument based learning can be adapted to learn rules from imbalanced data. To achieve it, we introduce a new argument based rule induction algorithm ABMODLEM with a specialized classification strategy for imbalanced classes. Then, we propose new methods for identifying the examples which should be explained by an expert. They exploit the idea of active learning with the query by an ensemble. The proposed approach has been evaluated in an extensive computational experiment. Results show that argument based learning improves the minority class recognition, especially for difficult data distributions with rare examples and outliers. Moreover, ABMODLEM is compared against standard rule classifiers and their extensions with SMOTE preprocessing.

Effect of epitaxial strain on cation and anion vacancy formation in MnO

Biaxial strain in coherent epitaxial thin films can have a pronounced effect on the point defect profile in the film material. Detailed fundamental knowledge of the interaction of strain with point defects is crucial in understanding the stoichiometry and resulting properties of strained thin films. Here we investigate the effect of biaxial strain on the formation energy of cation and anion vacancies using MnO as a model system. Our density functional theory calculations show that, as expected from local volume arguments, compressive strain favours the formation of cation vacancies. Interestingly, we find that small compressive and tensile strains lead to ordering of the resulting holes along the in-plane and normal direction respectively, which should manifest in different anisotropic properties in the two strain states.

The reading of triumphal entries’ emblems: emblems as footnotes

Triumphal entries of the 16th and 17th centuries were composed of triumphal processions incorporating grand ephemeral monuments. At the bottom of these at eye level it was common to find emblems. While the form and nature of the triumphal procession, by moving from one monument to the next along the assigned route, produced a ‘progressive viewing experience’, the emblems, in stark contrast, compelled the viewer to take a pause in order to decode their meaning, a process that involved careful analysis and reflection. The use of emblems seems thus to represent a distinct interest and disposition, which appears to contradict the dynamic nature of the triumphal procession. This article explores the use of emblems by considering them as ‘visual footnotes’, hallmarks of scholars and literati. Consistent with early modern textual and literary practice, the analysis of the emblems in relation to the pageant as a whole, and especially of the ephemeral artistic monuments, allows the identification of the humanistic ‘universal’ discourse to emerge from the local and civic ad-hoc arguments. In addition, similarly to modern academic footnotes, they were addressed and aimed to benefit the ‘reading’ procedure by exposing the sources, justifications and enhancement of what was established by the main imagery, albeit directed at a selected few — the literati.

Cross-linguistic variation and efficiency by John A. Hawkins (review)

Reviewed by: Cross-linguistic variation and efficiency by John A. Hawkins Elaine J. Francis Cross-linguistic variation and efficiency. By John A. Hawkins. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. Pp. 271. ISBN 97980199665006. $49.95. How do performance factors influence the fixed grammatical conventions of languages? How does crosslinguistic variation in grammatical structure inform our understanding of language use? In Cross-linguistic variation and efficiency, John A. Hawkins presents new applications and refinements of the principles proposed in his earlier book Efficiency and complexity in grammars (2004), representing the latest development in a long line of research on the relationships among grammar, typology, and performance. As in his previous major works on this topic (Hawkins 1983, 1994, 2004), H argues that factors related to language use have left their mark on grammars in such a way that one can find evidence of their influence in numerous grammatical rules and crosslinguistic generalizations. In turn, he shows how linguistic evidence from grammatical rules and crosslinguistic generalizations can shed light on aspects of performance that might otherwise remain obscure. The current work applies the principles proposed in Hawkins 2004 to a wider range of empirical data and addresses a number of recent developments in language processing, syntactic theory, historical linguistics, and linguistic typology. Ch. 1 summarizes the performance grammar correspondence hypothesis (PGCH) and lays out some of its predictions. The PGCH is stated as follows: ‘Grammars have conventionalized syntactic structures in proportion to their degree of preference in performance, as evidenced by patterns of selection in corpora and by ease of processing in psycholinguistic experiments’ (3). The primary evidence for this hypothesis is found in parallels between patterns of variation in language use and patterns of variation among grammars, of which numerous examples are given throughout the book. Ch. 2 reviews the three major efficiency principles from Hawkins 2004: minimize domains (MiD), minimize forms (MiF), and maximize online processing (MaOP), and gives examples from both performance and grammar illustrating how these principles cooperate and compete with each other. One example is the distribution of gaps versus resumptive pronouns in relative clauses. Whereas gaps are favored by MiF, since there are fewer morphological forms to process, resumptive pronouns are favored by MiD, since they provide a local argument for processing lexical cooccurrences within the relative clause (24). H provides evidence both from systematic crosslinguistic variation in the distribution of gaps versus resumptive pronouns and from variation in usage for languages like Hebrew and Cantonese that allow the option of either gap or resumptive pronoun in certain positions. Both sources of data confirm the same pattern: resumptive pronouns are preferred more often in structurally more complex environments for which overall efficiency is achieved through domain minimization at the expense of form minimization. Ch. 3 situates the three major efficiency principles in the context of current findings in psycholinguistics. One current line of research develops the idea that linguistic elements are easier to process when they are more predictable within a given context (Levy 2008), and the related idea that speakers maintain, on average, a uniform information density in spontaneous speech by reducing the form of more-predictable information and elaborating the form of less-predictable information (Jaeger 2006). H’s MiF captures the same general idea, but lacks the precise metrics used to quantify predictability (or surprisal) and information density. H acknowledges the usefulness of these measures and sees them as a complement to his own proposals. Another current issue addressed in this chapter is the apparent contradiction between studies that show locality effects (i.e. a processing advantage for local dependencies as compared with nonlocal ones), and those that show antilocality effects (i.e. a processing advantage for nonlocal dependencies). H exemplifies this contrast with the case of relative clause extraposition in German and English (52–57). Konieczny’s (2000) German data showed antilocality effects in word-by-word reading, [End Page 253] in the form of shorter reading times on the verb when preceded by an object-modifying relative clause, but longer reading times on the verb when the relative clause was extraposed (55). In contrast, Francis’s (2010) English data showed locality effects in that whole-sentence reading times were faster...

Epilogue to “Islam in China/China in Islam”

Epilogue to “Islam in China/China in Islam” Jonathan Lipman (bio) In my opening comments during the conference “The Everyday Life of Islam: Focus on Islam in China,” held at Cornell University on April 27 and 28, 2012, I proposed a number of themes, tensions, and conflicts on which we might focus our discussion of the papers. This epilogue will summarize some of the conversations that ensued and note areas of particular interest that emerged from revisions to the five essays presented in this special issue of Cross-Currents: East Asian History and Culture Review. Some conference participants attempted to make generalizations at national and transnational levels, while others stuck tenaciously to local details. Our discussions sometimes strayed from “everyday life,” but rarely from diverse, sometimes divisive, solutions to the everyday problem of “being Muslim and being Chinese” and its macrocosmic projection, “Islam in China/China in Islam,” or, in Rian Thum’s contribution, Islam not in China. The essays here, influenced by conversations and debates during the conference, suggest future agendas for study of Islam in China and research on Muslim minorities and comparative religion and politics. categories and paradigms Intellectual contexts deeply influence academic arguments, which depend upon, and arise directly from, the categories scholars use to order information and the questions they ask of their materials. Readers should particularly [End Page 601] note the conjunctions and contrasts between the paper by a scholar from China (Wang) and those by U.S.-based scholars (Caffrey, Erie, Thum, and Turnbull). Pairs of “translated” terms such as minzu/ethnic group and zongjiao/religion do not embody simple one-on-one mappings. Rather, they exemplify differences between complex discourses influenced by languages, national histories, state interventions, academic cultures, and more. In this collection, the essayists and many of their informants pursue understandings of Islamic or Hui or Uyghur authenticity, the right way to believe or understand or pray or eat as one of “us”—as a Muslim in China—but they clearly disagree about what that right way might be, or even in what discursive realm the right way might be found. Erie’s abstraction of local arguments about shari’a makes a valuable analysis of this point—who has the authority to determine what “Islamic law” (or Islam itself) might be in a China dominated by the Communist Party? One could ask the same question about the Qing government, or that of the Republic of China. Though those earlier regimes intruded into everyday life less urgently,1 Muslims sometimes called on them to adjudicate Islamic rectitude, orthodoxy, or authenticity.2 Most obviously, some contributors focus on Islam as doctrine (orthodoxy), others on Islamic practice (orthopraxy), and still others on the Islamic behavior of people defined as Muslims (that is, how to act like a Hui, Uyghur, etc.). In the People’s Republic of China (PRC) these distinctions engage the separation between zongjiao and minzu, a conceptual differentiation so crucial to the state that two separate government bureaucracies have been created to deal with its two sides. Reifying a discursive practice over a century old, the PRC has organized the society it governs into discrete, unquestionable groupings called minzu, formerly anglicized as “minority nationalities” but now officially translated as “ethnic groups.”3 In the 1950s and 1960s, the Minzu Commission of the PRC government identified precisely fifty-six “minority minzu” within its borders, theoretically based on criteria developed by Stalin in the 1920s and on the “avowedly scientific scale of material stages of social process (derived from Morgan and Engels, refined by Lenin and Stalin)” (Harrell 1995, 9). No one in the PRC can question the facticity of these minzu entities, despite the political, subjective, local, sometimes cursory process of their identification or, more accurately, “differentiation” (Ch. shibie)—a process that included both [End Page 602] observation and creation. No one, inside or outside the PRC, can doubt the draconian power of the institutions that have perpetuated and strengthened the state-recognized minzu since then while denying the existence of any others.4 While religious affiliation and practice remain more or less voluntary in the PRC, membership in a minzu is held to be genetic, biological, and therefore (in theory) necessary...

Stochastic Navier–Stokes Equations in Unbounded Channel Domains

In this paper we prove the existence and uniqueness of path-wise strong solution to stochastic viscous flow in unbounded channels with multiple outlets using local monotonicity arguments. We devise a construction for solvability using a stochastic basic vector field.

On the Diophantine equation [formula omitted

Recently, mixed polynomial–exponential equations similar to the one in the title have been considered by many authors. In these results a certain non-coprimality condition plays an important role. In this paper we completely solve the title equation for odd positive integers x with x<50. Since we avoid the mentioned non-coprimality condition, this can be considered as a partial completion of the above mentioned results. It seems that the deep effective tools (such as Baker's method) alone are not capable to handle the problem. We combine local arguments and Baker's method to prove our results.

Non-uniqueness of weak solutions to the wave map problem

In this note we show that weak solutions to the wave map problem in the energy-supercritical dimension 3 are not unique. On the one hand, we find weak solutions using the penalization method introduced by Shatah [12] and show that they satisfy a local energy inequality. On the other hand we build on a special harmonic map to construct a weak solution to the wave map problem, which violates this energy inequality.Finally we establish a local weak-strong uniqueness argument in the spirit of Struwe [15] which we employ to show that one may even have a failure of uniqueness for a Cauchy problem with a stationary solution. We thus obtain a result analogous to the one of Coron [2] for the case of the heat flow of harmonic maps.

Almost-Killing conserved currents: A general mass function

A new class of conserved currents, describing nongravitational energy-momentum density, is presented. The proposed currents do not require the existence of a (timelike) Killing vector, and are not restricted to spherically symmetric spacetimes (or similar ones, in which the Kodama vector can be defined). They are based instead on almost-Killing vectors, which could in principle be defined on generic spacetimes. We provide local arguments, based on energy density profiles in highly simplified (stationary, rigidly rotating) star models, which confirm the physical interest of these almost-Killing currents. A mass function is defined in this way for the spherical case, qualitatively different from the Hern\'andez-Misner mass function. An elliptic equation determining the new mass function is derived for the Tolman-Bondi spherically symmetric dust metrics, including a simple solution for the Oppenheimer-Snyder collapse. The equations for the nonsymmetric case are shown to be of a mixed elliptic-hyperbolic nature.

The moduli space of even surfaces of general type with [formula omitted], [formula omitted] and [formula omitted

Even surfaces of general type with K2=8, pg=4 and q=0 were found by Oliverio [35] as complete intersections of bidegree (6,6) in a weighted projective space P(1,1,2,3,3).In this article we prove that the moduli space of even surfaces of general type with K2=8, pg=4 and q=0 consists of two 35-dimensional irreducible components intersecting in a codimension one subset (the first of these components is the closure of the open set considered by Oliverio). All the surfaces in the second component have a singular canonical model, hence we get a new example of a generically nonreduced moduli space.Our result gives a posteriori a complete description of the half-canonical rings of the above even surfaces. The method of proof is, we believe, the most interesting part of the paper. After describing the graded ring of a cone we are able, combining the explicit description of some subsets of the moduli space, some deformation theoretic arguments, and finally some local algebra arguments, to describe the whole moduli space.This is the first time that the classification of a class of surfaces is done using moduli theory: up to now first the surfaces were classified, on the basis of some numerical inequalities, or other arguments, and later on the moduli spaces were investigated.

A Call for Polycultural Arguments: Critiquing the Monoculture Rhetoric of the Local Food Movement

Through an analysis of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, No Impact Man, and Deep Economy, this essay examines how local food movement arguments reinforce a monoculture identity for the movement. Analyzing movement rhetoric for how it accounts (or does not account) for the lived experiences of the poor, illustrates how blind spots in local food movement arguments aimed at popular audiences construct those of low socioeconomic status as outside the bounds of movement membership. The essay contends that recognition of broader practices, knowledge, and lived experiences in movement rhetoric might make space for the development of a polycultural movement.