Safety management theory and the military expeditionary organization: A critical theoretical reflection

Management of safety within organizations has become a key topic within safety science. Theorizing on this subject covers a diverse pallet of concepts such as “resilience” and “safety management systems”. Recent studies indicate that safety management theory has deficiencies. Our interpretation of these deficiencies is that much confusion originates from the issue that crucial meta-theoretical assumptions are mostly implicit or applied inconsistently. In particular, we argue that these meta-theoretical assumptions are of a systems theoretical nature. Therefore, we provide a framework that will be able to explicate and reflect on systems theoretical assumptions. With this framework, we analyze the ability of two frequently used safety management theories to tackle the problem of managing safety of Dutch military expeditionary organizations. This paper will show that inconsistent and implicit application of systems theoretical assumptions in these safety management theories results in problems to tackle such a practical problem adequately. We conclude with a reflection on the pros and cons of our framework. Also, we suggest particular meta-theoretical aspects that seem to be essential for applying safety management theory to organizations

A Defense of Traditional Hypotheses about the Term Structure of Interest Rates

Expectations theories of asset returns may be interpreted either as stating that risk premia are zero or that they are constant through time. Under the former interpretation, different versions of the expectations theory of the term structure are inconsistent with one another, but I show that this does not necessarily carry over to the constant risk premium interpretation of the theory. I present a general equilibrium example in which different types of risk premium are constant through time and dependent only on maturity. Furthermore, I argue that differences among expectations theories are second-order effects of bond yield variability. I develop an approximate linearized framework for analysis of the term structure in which these differences disappear, and I test its accuracy in practice using data from the CRSP government bond tapes.Economic

The Shearing HI Spiral Pattern of NGC 1365

The Tremaine-Weinberg equations are solved for a pattern speed that is allowed to vary with radius. The solution method transforms an integral equation for the pattern speed to a least squares problem with well established procedures for statistical analysis. The method applied to the HI spiral pattern of the barred, grand-design galaxy NGC 1365 produced convincing evidence for a radial dependence in the pattern speed. The pattern speed behaves approximately as 1/r, and is very similar to the material speed. There are no clear indications of corotation or Lindblad resonances. Tests show that the results are not selection biased, and that the method is not measuring the material speed. Other methods of solving the Tremaine-Weinberg equations for shearing patterns were found to produce results in agreement with those obtained using the current method. Previous estimates that relied on the assumptions of the density-wave interpretation of spiral structure are inconsistent with the results obtained using the current method. The results are consistent with spiral structure theories that allow for shearing patterns, and contradict fundamental assumptions in the density-wave interpretation that are often used for finding spiral arm pattern speeds. The spiral pattern is winding on a characteristic timescale of ~ 500 Myrs.Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journa

“You Have Been in Afghanistan”: A Discourse on the Van Alstyne Method

This essay pays tribute to William Van Alstyne, one of our foremost constitutional scholars, by applying the methods of textual interpretation he laid out in a classic essay, Interpreting This Constitution: On the Unhelpful Contribution of Special Theories of Judicial Review. I make use of the graphical methods Van Alstyne has applied to the general study of the First Amendment to examine the Supreme Court\u27s recent decisions in the context of the Free Exercise Clause, in particular the landmark case of Employment Division v. Smith . The application of Van Alstyne\u27s use of the burden of proof as an interpretive tool and the results of the application of the graphic analysis, I argue, suggest that Smith is a gravely flawed decision, inconsistent both with precedent and with sophisticated textual analysis of the sort that much of Van Alstyne\u27s own distinguished scholarship holds before us as a model of principled and neutral constitutional application

Schizophrenia and the Virtues of Self-Effacement

Michael Stocker’s “The Schizophrenia of Modern Ethical Theories” attacks versions of consequentialism and deontological ethics on the grounds that they are self-effacing. While it is often thought that Stocker’s argument gives us a reason to favour virtue ethics over those other theories, Simon Keller has argued that this is a mistake. He claims that virtue ethics is also self-effacing, and is therefore afflicted with the self-effacement- related problems that Stocker identifies in consequentialism and deontology. This paper defends virtue ethics against this claim. Although there is a kind of self-effacement invol- ved in the exercise of virtue, this is quite different from the so-called schizophrenia that Stocker thinks is induced by modern ethical theory. Importantly, manifesting virtue does not require one to embrace mutually inconsistent moral commitments, as is at times encouraged by consequentialists and deontologists. This paper also considers a reading of the virtue-ethical criterion of right action that is encouraged by Bernard Williams’s distinction between a de re and a de dicto interpretation of the phrase “acting as the virtuous person would.” I argue that such a reading addresses concerns that a virtue-ethi- cal criterion of right action inevitably generates a problematic form of self-effacement

D-linking and the semantics of wh-in-situ

Theories of pair-list readings of multiple wh-questions commonly posit an interpretive asymmetry between the fronted and in-situ wh-phrases, where the fronted wh-phrase is argued to function as the sortal key, have a requirement to be interpreted exhaustively, or be obligatorily D-linked. To clarify the empirical landscape of such debate, I present three experiments which tease apart the effects of these often-confounded discourse factors on the order and interpretation of multiple wh-questions. They are found to have either inconsistent or insignificant effects, arguing against a unique discourse-sensitivity of the fronted wh-phrase. Theories of questions which encode such an asymmetry should accordingly be revised

Severability as Conditionality

The Supreme Court currently operates under the premise that if it finds one part of a law unconstitutional, it can strike down other parts as well. But it is not clear where the Court finds this power to declare laws inseverable. And that lack of clarity has created a doctrinal muddle wherein the Court applies several inconsistent tests. Three such theories are implicit in the current judicial doctrine and academic debate about severability: (1) that it is an equitable remedial power, akin to the power to issue a civil injunction; (2) that it is a variant of intentionalist statutory interpretation, wherein courts strike down further provisions of a partially unconstitutional law so as to preserve the legislators¿ hypothetical intentions; and (3) that it is a judicial contract remedy applied to legislative deals. This Article explores these three theories, teasing out their respective logics and showing that they are implausibly broad and inconsistent with Article III of the Constitution. This Article then develops and defends a fourth, narrower theory: that a court can declare a statute inseverable only where the legislature has made one part of the statute conditional on the continued validity of another