Freedom From Torture in the "War on Terror": Is it Absolute?

Freedom from torture is regarded as “absolute,” meaning that a state cannot infringe the right for purposes which would seem legitimate such as the protection of national security. Indeed, the freedom is viewed as “non-derogable”; that is, infringements are not permitted even in special circumstances such as times of war or public emergency. Is it right, however, with the growth in international terrorism post-9/11, particularly suicide violence, that the freedom should remain without limitation? Perhaps the torture of terror suspects might provide state authorities with intelligence so that acts of atrocity can be averted? To go on and construct a possible argument justifying ill-treatment against a detainee this article questions whether in fact freedom from torture can be categorised as absolute

Human Rights and Antiterrorism: A Positive Legal Duty to Infringe Freedom From Torture?

In law freedom from torture and ill-treatment is “absolute,” meaning that a state cannot infringe the right for purposes that would seem legitimate such as the protection of national security. However, with the growth in international terrorism, particularly suicide violence, should the freedom remain without limitation? This article considers legitimizing torture by reference to the “positive” legal obligation the right imposes on states to prevent harm to individuals by third parties such as terrorists. Assuming such a legal argument could be made out, it is questioned whether adopting such measures of interrogation would in fact outweigh the negative consequences that would inevitably follow from reversing accepted international standards for the protection of, say, detainees from ill-treatment in state custody

Positive obligations and Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights: a defence of the UK's Human Rights Act 1998

The Human Rights Act 1998 came into effect in the UK in 2000, incorporating specific Articles of the European Convention on Human Rights, such as the freedoms from torture (Article 3) and slavery (Article 4), into British law. But this legislation, and the rights it enshrines, are under severe attack from politicians and sections of the British press. This article presents a strong defence of the statute, by reference to one of its notable achievements: the obligation it imposed on the UK to outlaw the holding of a person in slavery or servitude, or compelling them to perform compulsory labour

A Second Order Finite Volume Technique for Simulating Transport in Anisotropic Media

An existing two-dimensional finite volume technique is modified by introducing a correction term to increase the accuracy of the method to second order. It is well known that the accuracy of the finite volume method strongly depends on the order of the approximation of the flux term at the control volume (CV) faces. For highly orthotropic and anisotropic media, first order approximations produce inaccurate simulation results, which motivates the need for better estimates of the flux expression. In this article, a new approach to approximate the flux term at the CV face is presented. The discretisation involves a decomposition of the flux and an improved least squares approximation technique to calculate the derivatives of the dependent function on the CV faces for estimating both the cross diffusion term and a correction for the primary flux term. The advantage of this method is that any arbitrary unstructured mesh can be used to implement the technique without considering the shapes of the mesh elements. It was found that the numerical results well matched the available exact solution for a representative transport equation in highly orthotropic media and the benchmark solutions obtained on a fine mesh for anisotropic media. Previously proposed CV techniques are compared with the new method to highlight its accuracy for different unstructured meshes

Krylov subspace approximations for the exponential Euler method: error estimates and the harmonic Ritz approximant

We study Krylov subspace methods for approximating the matrix-function vector product φ(tA)b where φ(z) = [exp(z) - 1]/z. This product arises in the numerical integration of large stiff systems of differential equations by the Exponential Euler Method, where A is the Jacobian matrix of the system. Recently, this method has found application in the simulation of transport phenomena in porous media within mathematical models of wood drying and groundwater flow. We develop an a posteriori upper bound on the Krylov subspace approximation error and provide a new interpretation of a previously published error estimate. This leads to an alternative Krylov approximation to φ(tA)b, the so-called Harmonic Ritz approximant, which we find does not exhibit oscillatory behaviour of the residual error

Effective Cell-Centred Time-Domain Maxwell's Equations Numerical Solvers

This research work analyses techniques for implementing a cell-centred finite-volume time-domain (ccFV-TD) computational methodology for the purpose of studying microwave heating. Various state-of-the-art spatial and temporal discretisation methods employed to solve Maxwell's equations on multidimensional structured grid networks are investigated, and the dispersive and dissipative errors inherent in those techniques examined. Both staggered and unstaggered grid approaches are considered. Upwind schemes using a Riemann solver and intensity vector splitting are studied and evaluated. Staggered and unstaggered Leapfrog and Runge-Kutta time integration methods are analysed in terms of phase and amplitude error to identify which method is the most accurate and efficient for simulating microwave heating processes. The implementation and migration of typical electromagnetic boundary conditions. from staggered in space to cell-centred approaches also is deliberated. In particular, an existing perfectly matched layer absorbing boundary methodology is adapted to formulate a new cell-centred boundary implementation for the ccFV-TD solvers. Finally for microwave heating purposes, a comparison of analytical and numerical results for standard case studies in rectangular waveguides allows the accuracy of the developed methods to be assessed

Scale formation in saline water distillation

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Swashway Sandblow

A poem by Ian Turne

Conversion of a mathematics course to CAL: A case study of a large‐scale rapid change of resources and organization

During 1994–95, first‐year maths for the BTechEd degree at the University of Glasgow was student‐centred, teacher‐supported A modular online maths course replaced a traditional, lecture‐based course. Students worked at their own pace, with timetabled and open access computer classes and/or paper handbooks. The course was evaluated by open‐ended measures, and study of examination outcomes, providing us with some pedagogical questions and some recommendations for change. With some adaptation, and with important questions still open, the new course will continue to run