Patent ID: 8392354

Claim:
A system comprising: a database representing a volumetric storage space comprising a set of unique volumetric storage units, wherein data elements are stored to specific ones of the volumetric storage units, wherein a spatial position of the data elements within the volumetric storage space is defined at least in part by which of the volumetric storage units the data elements are stored, wherein the database is a probabilistic database in which each of the data elements has an associated probability, which is determined based on a level of consistency between that data element and other ones of the data elements that are stored in the database; a probability engine operable to dynamically determine a certainty value for objects included within the volumetric storage space, wherein the more perfectly one of the objects is represented within the probabilistic storage space, the greater the certainty value determined by the probability engine will be for that object, and wherein the less perfectly one of the objects is represented within the probabilistic storage space, the lesser the certainty value determined by the probability engine will be for that object; and a query engine configured to permit a user to query the volumetric storage space for objects, wherein the query engine is operable to execute binary queries, inference queries, and graduated queries.