Interpretative Plausibility Assessment
Notations allowing the editor to structure critical doubt by ordering alternative lectiones#footnote[lectio] according to their degree of plausibility, or by declaring them simply non-comparable.
Delimiters
| Side | Sign | Name | Unicode |
|---|---|---|---|
| Left | % | Percent Sign | U+0025 |
| Right | % | Percent Sign | U+0025 |
%abc% ↓ Formatter optimisation for human legibility ↓ %abc‰ |
|---|
| Side | Sign | Name | Unicode |
|---|---|---|---|
| Left | % | Percent Sign | U+0025 |
| Right | ‰ | Per Mill Sign | U+2030 |
Internally Allowed Constructs
| Construct | Specific Reference | General Reference |
|---|---|---|
Plain | — | 🔎 Plain |
Direction | — | 🔎 Direction |
Language | — | 🔎 Language |
Whitespace | — | 🔎 Whitespace |
Newline | — | 🔎 Newline |
LineBreak | — | 🔎 LineBreak |
SectionBreak | — | 🔎 SectionBreak |
WordBreak | — | 🔎 WordBreak |
Vacat | — | 🔎 Vacat |
Gap-Known | — | 🔎 Gap-Known |
Gap-Range | — | 🔎 Gap-Range |
Gap-Unknown | — | 🔎 Gap-Unknown |
Fracture | — | 🔎 Fracture |
Unclear | — | 🔎 Unclear |
Supplied | — | 🔎 Supplied |
PreviousSeen | — | 🔎 PreviousSeen |
Omitted | — | 🔎 Omitted |
Surplus | — | 🔎 Surplus |
Erasure | — | 🔎 Erasure |
Correction | — | 🔎 Correction |
Addition | — | 🔎 Addition |
Ligature | — | 🔎 Ligature |
Abbreviation | — | 🔎 Abbreviation |
ApparatusMark | — | 🔎 ApparatusMark |
ApparatusNote | — | 🔎 ApparatusNote |
LexicalUnit | — | 🔎 LexicalUnit |
PlausibilityAssessment | — | 🔎 PlausibilityAssessment |
Strong | — | 🔎 Strong |
Emphasis | — | 🔎 Emphasis |
Comment | — | 🔎 Comment |
Cite | — | 🔎 Cite |
Locus | — | 🔎 Locus |
Facsimile | — | 🔎 Facsimile |
Plausibility Operators
The editor has two fundamental plausibility operators.
[>],
[Preferred],
[≻],
[The previous lectio is preferable to the next one],
[|],
[Alternative],
[∥],
[The lectiones are non-comparable alternatives: the editor expresses no preference],
)
When the editor wishes to specify the extent of the plausibility gap between two consecutive lectiones, a degree modifier may be appended to the > operator: ? (small gap) or ! (marked gap). These are the same modifiers used for absolute epistemicity (cf. Interpretative Certainty or Precision Assessment).
[>?],
[≿],
[The previous lectio is slightly preferable to the next one: the plausibility gap is small.],
[>!],
[⋟],
[The previous lectio is clearly preferable to the next one: the plausibility gap is marked.],
)
Each relationship exists exclusively between two adjacent lectiones (a pair). Plausibility chains with mixed assertions are permitted, freely combining > and | (cf. Examples of Mixed Plausibility Sequences).
To Draw an Analogy
To understand the structure of a plausibility chain, an architectural metaphor is helpful. Each relationship between two adjacent lectiones represents one element of a path that always proceeds from left to right, in a descending direction: the leftmost lectio is always the most plausible.
The > operator introduces a descending step, whose steepness is determined by the degree modifier: >? indicates a gentle step, > a step of medium steepness, and >! a steep step. The | operator, by contrast, introduces a landing: the two lectiones stand at the same level, with no preference expressed by the editor.
A plausibility chain is therefore an architecture of steps and landings that, taken as a whole, always tends downward — even when the path alternates between horizontal stretches and descents of varying steepness.