| • Science | • People | • Locations | • Timeline |
Questions have a number of secondary uses: They may be used ("Socratically") guide the questioner along an avenue of research. A rhetorical question is asked in order to make a point, and does not expect an answer (often the asnwer is implied or obvious). Presuppositional questions, such as "Have you stopped beating your wife?" may be used as a joke or to embarrass the audience, because any answer a person could give would imply more information than he was willing to affirm. Questions can also be titles of works of art and literature.
In grammar, most languages distinguish interrogative sentences that put questions from declarative sentences that state propositions by syntax. Some devices used by languages for marking questions include altered word order, the use of an interrogative mood or some other verb inflection such as the subjunctive mood, or the use of grammatical particles. In languages written in the Latin alphabet, the question mark (or, in the case of SpanishThis article is about the international language known as Spanish. For other languages spoken in Spain see Languages of Spain Spanish is an Iberian Romance language, and the third or fourth most spoken language in the world. It is spoken as a first langua, a pair of them) identifies questions orthographically.
In some spoken languages such as English, the tonal indicator of a question is usually a raised inflection on the last syllableThis article discusses the unit of speech. For the computer operating system, see Syllable (operating system). A syllable is a unit of speech that is made up of one or more phones (single sounds or "phonetic segments") and in turn makes up words. It influ of the statement being posed. For example, the spoken sentence "You've got a fever" becomes a question when the last syllable is spoken with a higher pitch.
The simplest questions implicitly or explicitly request information from a certain range (finite or infinite) of alternatives. When information purporting to be that requested is presented back to the questioner, the question is said to be answered. The information thus presented is called an answer. Answers may be rightFor the direction right see left and right or starboard. For the political trend or ideology, see Right wing. The following article discusses the notion of rights in matters of philosophy and Law. At its most fundamental, a right is a claim, on other pers or wrongA wrong is a concept in law and ethics. In law, a wrong can be a legal injury is any damage resulting from a violation of a legal right. It can also imply the state of being contrary to the principles of justice or law. It means that something is contrary. They are wrong if they present false information. If they present information from outside the proferred alternatives, they may be called wrong or simply inappropriate or irrelevant. This depends on the context, as do several other possibilities: Sometimes "I don't know" is an acceptable answer, sometimes even a right answer. The same is true of "None of the above" and "There is no answer." An answer is the, or a, right answer, if it presents true information which falls within the determined range of alternatives. Questions of this simplest sort usually begin with Who, what, which, where, when, does/do, is/are.
Other questions do not so easily fit this mold. For example, questions beginning "Why" and "How" often request any information at all that will alleviate certain confusion in a person who wants to ask that question. Here the manner in which the information is presented might be more imporant than which information is presented; the questioner may even already know all of the information cantained in the right answer, and merely needs it to be expressed in a more useful form.