2,417 research outputs found

    Multidisciplinary perspectives on Artificial Intelligence and the law

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    This open access book presents an interdisciplinary, multi-authored, edited collection of chapters on Artificial Intelligence (‘AI’) and the Law. AI technology has come to play a central role in the modern data economy. Through a combination of increased computing power, the growing availability of data and the advancement of algorithms, AI has now become an umbrella term for some of the most transformational technological breakthroughs of this age. The importance of AI stems from both the opportunities that it offers and the challenges that it entails. While AI applications hold the promise of economic growth and efficiency gains, they also create significant risks and uncertainty. The potential and perils of AI have thus come to dominate modern discussions of technology and ethics – and although AI was initially allowed to largely develop without guidelines or rules, few would deny that the law is set to play a fundamental role in shaping the future of AI. As the debate over AI is far from over, the need for rigorous analysis has never been greater. This book thus brings together contributors from different fields and backgrounds to explore how the law might provide answers to some of the most pressing questions raised by AI. An outcome of the Católica Research Centre for the Future of Law and its interdisciplinary working group on Law and Artificial Intelligence, it includes contributions by leading scholars in the fields of technology, ethics and the law.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

    3D Innovations in Personalized Surgery

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    Current practice involves the use of 3D surgical planning and patient-specific solutions in multiple surgical areas of expertise. Patient-specific solutions have been endorsed for several years in numerous publications due to their associated benefits around accuracy, safety, and predictability of surgical outcome. The basis of 3D surgical planning is the use of high-quality medical images (e.g., CT, MRI, or PET-scans). The translation from 3D digital planning toward surgical applications was developed hand in hand with a rise in 3D printing applications of multiple biocompatible materials. These technical aspects of medical care require engineers’ or technical physicians’ expertise for optimal safe and effective implementation in daily clinical routines.The aim and scope of this Special Issue is high-tech solutions in personalized surgery, based on 3D technology and, more specifically, bone-related surgery. Full-papers or highly innovative technical notes or (systematic) reviews that relate to innovative personalized surgery are invited. This can include optimization of imaging for 3D VSP, optimization of 3D VSP workflow and its translation toward the surgical procedure, or optimization of personalized implants or devices in relation to bone surgery

    The influence of CEO leadership on organizational learning in internationalizing high-tech companies in China

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    This research explores how CEO leadership affects the learning process of internationalizing high-tech companies. There has been a growing recognition of the role of leadership in the international learning process. For example, scholars have discussed the influence of several factors, such as leaders’ cognition, decision-making style, and entrepreneurship, on international learning process. Moreover, CEO leadership has been treated as an important factor that can affect a company’s organizational learning. However, very few studies have discussed the role of leadership in the organizational learning process of companies’ internationalization. Based on a review of existing research gaps in the role of leadership in organizational and international learning literature, this research seeks to gain rich insights into how leadership influences organizational learning in high-tech companies’ internationalizing in the Chinese context. This research focused on two common leadership styles in China, authoritarian leadership and empowering leadership. These two leadership styles can be explained through Chinese traditional philosophy and from the lens of power, authoritarian leadership and empowering leadership are deserved to be compared. This research adopts a qualitative approach based on 8 case studies of Chinese high-tech internationalizing companies. Semi-structured interviews with the CEO and at least two senior managers were carried out in each case. This research contributes to international learning process literature. CEO leadership is proposed as a key factor that can influence each construct associated with the international learning process and cause different international learning processes. This research also contributes to both leadership and internationalization literature as it uses organizational learning as a bridge linking leadership and internationalization. Different leadership styles could cause different internationalization outcomes in performance and management perspectives due to different international learning processes. Moreover, CEO leadership could be changed during companies’ internationalization process

    Post-dam land property dynamics of the ManāáčŁÄ«r in Kabna Al-FĆ«qqara

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    Dams almost inevitably displace communities from their lands. Yet despite extensive research, there is virtually no research on cases where displaced people reject formal resettlement in favour of self-directed resettlement. Furthermore, there has also been very little research addressing adaptive responses of land tenures, rights and relations in such contexts. This study addresses this research gap through investigating the land property adaptations amongst the ManāáčŁÄ«r people displaced by the Merowe dam in 2008. A large proportion of the ManāáčŁir elected to stay around the dam’s reservoir, remaining rooted to their homeland. Through a contextualised ethnographic case study methodology, focusing on the hamlet of Kabna al-FĆ«qqara located towards the tail end of the reservoir, this research explores the land property dynamics of their informal (re)settlement. The methodological approach adapted the analytical framework of property developed by F. von Benda-Beckmann, K. von Benda-Beckmann and Wiber (2006) which distinguishes between categorical property, visible at the legal/institutional layer of social organisation and refers to property rules and norms, and concretised property which relates to the actual ‘lived’ property relations on the ground. The analysis reveals how adaptations occur at both these layers of property in complex, interrelated ways. The concrete actions and social practices of inhabitants in reserving and reclaiming the unoccupied wastelands above their hamlets are the primary means through which adaptations are pursued. These actions are informed by existing categorical customary rules and norms and in turn reform and update these norms. As a result, new categorical land rights are in the process of emerging. The customary institutional mechanisms which underlie these dynamics, while flexible and enabling, are pursued in the context of a wider legal/institutional rupture. The findings reveal the complexity underlying the processes of concrete property making and the wider, more contested, dynamics of ‘institution-making’ concerning the emergence of law

    Energy Research Governance in the European Union

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    A major share of Europe’s knowledge about its incumbent energy cultures is pre-defined in closed spaces of negotiations. One such space are the negotiations surrounding the European Union®s research and innovation Framework Programmes, which are the focus of this thesis. With these programmes, the European Union not only funds energy research across Europe, but likewise produces guiding energy research narratives that act beyond their scope into the research agendas of its Member States. Energy research governance, considered as the wider scope surrounding the Framework Programmes negotiations in the European Union, takes place in hybrid spaces, were science and politics meet and are influencing each other, inheriting limiting, and enabling effects on both sides. This study aims to determine how these spaces are organised, who is participating under which conditions, and how decisions on energy research agendas and research funding conditions are taken. Therefore, this thesis enfolds the emergence history of energy policy, research policy and the governance of its overlap, namely energy research. It then examines in depth the negotiations that took place during the reform process of the Frame-work Programmes between its seventh and eighth repetition. The perspective of scientific, political and hybrid social worlds is taken to draw an encompassing picture of the situation of energy research governance of the European Union. The methodological background of this study is a situational analysis, which was conducted based on narrative expert interviews, participant observations and documents, drawing on sensitizing concepts from the fields of Science and Technology Studies, sociology, and political sciences. The investigated hybrid spaces revealed the importance of historical rooted (energy) re-search narratives, that are combined with a set of standards and standardized governance practices making the Framework Programmes a robust governance tool, despite changing political climates. Moreover, the role of so far largely overlooked boundary social worlds became apparent. Whereas strategies of narrative governance were found to be a structuring element across all social worlds and hybrid spaces. The newly developed continuum of implicatedness disclosed movements of visibility and agency among the participating negotiators of energy research governance. These results have in common that they bear diverse forms of ambivalences a collective, an individual or a group of collectives is confronted with. The author concludes that these the ambivalences must be met with strategies of disclosure and debate, rather than with vain attempts to resolve irresolvable contradictions

    Culture Enhancement for Exergames for Individuals with Intellectual Disability

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    Background: Individuals with intellectual disabilities (ID) often face barriers when trying to engage in physical activity. Exergames, which combine physical exercise with gaming technology, have shown the potential to promote physical activity among this group of individuals. However, the suitability of exergames for individuals with ID from different cultural backgrounds has received limited attention. Objective: This project is aimed to investigate cultural aspects of exergames for individuals with ID. The main goals were to explore how cultural factors affect engagement and experience, pinpoint culturally suitable design elements, cre- ate guidelines for cultural sensitivity, and look at the effects of culture-enhanced exergames. Methods: A mixed-methods approach was used. This was a literature review, interviews with individuals with ID from a different cultural background than Norway, expert consultations, and an iterative design process. Results: The research showed a few cultural factors affecting the engagement and experience of individuals with ID in exergames, such as language prefer- ences and, specifically to one exergame, local waste sorting regularities. The evaluation of culture-enhanced exergames gave positive impacts on the users’ physical activity levels and overall well-being. Conclusions: The project examines the impact of cultural variety in the design of exergames for individuals with ID. By addressing these factors, exergames can be made more engaging and accessible to more users in the world

    Emerging adults’ perceptions of their family systems: resilience and connections after the COVID-19 pandemic

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    Family systems can be conceptualized as complex adaptive systems consisting of intricate interconnections among family members that adapt dynamically to the environment. The COVID-19 pandemic was a chronic and persistent trauma to many systems including families. Family resilience, an ongoing process of the system that helps the family adapt to changes and find an improved level of functioning, may have contributed to how families are faring after the COVID-19 lockdown period. Purpose: This study focused on family resilience as a possible moderator between COVID-19-related changes and family satisfaction, and how structural dynamics of family connections can affect family resilience. Methods: N = 149 emerging adults ages 18-29 in Thunder Bay, Ontario, completed an online survey regarding their family of origin, responding as a child within the family system. Various scales assessed the number of COVID-19 stressors, COVID-19 impacts on the family, family resilience, family satisfaction, and the frequency of connections with each family member. [...

    Psychodrama with alcoholics : a social work perspective

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    This thesis consists of a review of psychodrama literature, and an empirical application of the method in a psychotherapeutic context.' The literature review describes the classical psychodrama method, its history, techniques, associated and derivative methods. The descriptive part of the study also reviews applications of psychodrama, sociodrama, and role playing relevant to social work training and practice, with special reference to the field of alcoholism treatment.· The empirical study compares the use of psychodrama and role playing with inpatients receiving treatment in an alcoholism programme

    Musiktheorie als interdisziplinĂ€res Fach: 8. Kongress der Gesellschaft fĂŒr Musiktheorie Graz 2008

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    Im Oktober 2008 fand an der UniversitĂ€t fĂŒr Musik und darstellende Kunst Graz (KUG) der 8. Kongress der Gesellschaft fĂŒr Musiktheorie (GMTH) zum Thema »Musiktheorie als interdisziplinĂ€res Fach« statt. Die hier vorgelegten gesammelten BeitrĂ€ge akzentuieren Musiktheorie als multiperspektivische wissenschaftliche Disziplin in den Spannungsfeldern Theorie/Praxis, Kunst/Wissenschaft und Historik/Systematik. Die sechs Kapitel ergrĂŒnden dabei die Grenzbereiche zur Musikgeschichte, MusikĂ€sthetik, zur Praxis musikalischer Interpretation, zur kompositorischen Praxis im 20. und 21. Jahrhundert, zur Ethnomusikologie sowie zur Systematischen Musikwissenschaft. Insgesamt 45 AufsĂ€tze, davon 28 in deutscher, 17 in englischer Sprache, sowie die Dokumentation einer Podiumsdiskussion zeichnen in ihrer Gesamtheit einen höchst lebendigen und gegenwartsbezogenen Diskurs, der eine einzigartige Standortbestimmung des Fachs Musiktheorie bietet.The 8th congress of the Gesellschaft fĂŒr Musiktheorie (GMTH) took place in October 2008 at the University for Music and Dramatic Arts Graz (KUG) on the topic »Music Theory and Interdisciplinarity«. The collected contributions characterize music theory as a multi-faceted scholarly discipline at the intersection of theory/practice, art/science and history/system. The six chapters explore commonalties with music history, music aesthetics, musical performance, compositional practice in twentieth- and twenty-first-century music, ethnomusicology and systematic musicology. A total of 45 essays (28 in German, 17 in English) and the documentation of a panel discussion form a vital discourse informed by contemporaneous issues of research in a broad number of fields, providing a unique overview of music theory today. A comprehensive English summary appears at the beginning of all contributions
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