Accuracy in Sentencing

A host of errors can occur at sentencing, but whether a particular sentencing error can be remedied may depend on whether judges characterize errors as involving a miscarriage of justice -- that is, a claim of innocence. The Supreme Court\u27s miscarriage of justice standard, created as an exception to excuse procedural barriers in the context of federal habeas corpus review, has colonized a wide range of areas of law, from plain error review on appeal, to excusing appeal waivers, the scope of cognizable claims under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, the post-conviction statute for federal prisoners, and the Savings Clause that permits resort to habeas corpus rather than § 2255. That standard requires a judge to ask whether a reasonable decision maker would more likely than not reach the same result. However, the use of the miscarriage of justice standard with respect to claims of sentencing error remains quite unsettled In this Article, I provide a taxonomy of types of innocence of sentence claims, and describe how each has developed, focusing on federal courts. I question whether finality should play the same role regarding correction of errors in sentences, and I propose that a single miscarriage of justice standard apply to all types of sentencing error claims, when not considering on appeal under reasonableness review. Finally, I briefly describe how changes to the sentencing process or sentencing guidelines could also reflect certain concerns with accuracy

Fungal behaviour: a new frontier in behavioural ecology

As human beings, behaviours make up our everyday lives. What we do from the moment we wake up to the moment we go back to sleep at night can all be classified and studied through the concepts of behavioural ecology. The same applies to all vertebrates and, to some extent, invertebrates. Fungi are, in most people's eyes perhaps, the eukaryotic multicellular organisms with which we humans share the least commonalities. However, they still express behaviours, and we argue that we could obtain a better understanding of their lives - although they are very different from ours - through the lens of behavioural ecology. Moreover, insights from fungal behaviour may drive a better understanding of behavioural ecology in general

Consommation et approvisionnements en denrées alimentaires

La sociologie économique permet de réinterroger le lien entre production et consommation. Ce lien s’est historiquement construit à partir des pratiques de production et de consommation, mais également des pratiques commerciales. Il est mis aujourd’hui en débat à la fois dans le contexte de la reconstruction de la confiance après les crises sanitaires et dans le cadre de la mise en oeuvre de propositions émanant de collectifs issus de la société civile. Le lien entre production et consommation peut s’appréhender à la fois sous l’angle des compétences, et notamment celles des consommateurs – comment les consommateurs se repèrent-ils dans l’offre alimentaire ? –, mais également à travers les formes de gouvernance qui s’exercent au sein des systèmes alimentaires – qui participe aux décisions quant aux choix qui sont faits pour ces systèmes ? Il convient tout d’abord de revenir sur la construction historique des modes d’approvisionnement des denrées alimentaires, pour comprendre comment les consommateurs ont progressivement appris à choisir et acheter des produits alimentaires dont ils ne connaissent pas les modes de production. On explicitera ensuite les réponses apportées par les systèmes alimentaires aux crises alimentaires et les propositions, visant à réinterroger cette relation entre producteurs et consommateurs, faites par des mouvements sociaux

Brief of Amici Curiae of Professors of History, Political Science, and Law in Support of Petitioner

Anthropogenic global warming caused by CO2 emissions is strongly and fundamentally linked to future energy production. The Special Report on Emission Scenarios (SRES) from 2000 contains 40 scenarios for future fossil fuel production and is used by the IPCC to assess future climate change. Previous scenarios were withdrawn after exaggerating one or several trends. This study investigates underlying assumptions on resource availability and future production expectations to determine whether exaggerations can be found in the present set of emission scenarios as well. It is found that the SRES unnecessarily takes an overoptimistic stance and that future production expectations are leaning towards spectacular increases from present output levels. In summary, we can only encourage the IPCC to involve more resource experts and natural science in future emission scenarios. The current set, SRES, is biased toward exaggerated resource availability and unrealistic expectations on future production outputs from fossil fuels

Fungal foraging behaviour and hyphal space exploration in micro-structured Soil Chips

How do fungi navigate through the complex microscopic maze-like structures found in the soil? Fungal behaviour, especially at the hyphal scale, is largely unknown and challenging to study in natural habitats such as the opaque soil matrix. We monitored hyphal growth behaviour and strategies of seven Basidiomycete litter decomposing species in a micro-fabricated "Soil Chip" system that simulates principal aspects of the soil pore space and its micro-spatial heterogeneity. The hyphae were faced with micrometre constrictions, sharp turns and protruding obstacles, and the species examined were found to have profoundly different responses in terms of foraging range and persistence, spatial exploration and ability to pass obstacles. Hyphal behaviour was not predictable solely based on ecological assumptions, and our results obtained a level of trait information at the hyphal scale that cannot be fully explained using classical concepts of space exploration and exploitation such as the phalanx/guerrilla strategies. Instead, we propose a multivariate trait analysis, acknowledging the complex trade-offs and microscale strategies that fungal mycelia exhibit. Our results provide novel insights about hyphal behaviour, as well as an additional understanding of fungal habitat colonisation, their foraging strategies and niche partitioning in the soil environment

Fungal behaviour: a new frontier in behavioural ecology

While there is increasing acceptance that non-neural organisms such as plants, slime moulds, and bacteria can perform behaviours, the vast kingdom of fungi is usually forgotten. We argue that fungi can also be studied through the theoretical framework of behavioural ecology. This would benefit both fungal biologists – yielding a better understanding of the lives of fungi – and behavioural ecologists, providing access to model organisms that can help to explain the evolution of primary senses and potentially discover behaviours new to science. Fungi have senses analogous to those of other organisms, they exhibit behaviour, and they have memory. This suggests a multitude of questions and new paths that could be taken to broaden our understanding of this forgotten and underestimated branch in the tree of life. As human beings, behaviours make up our everyday lives. What we do from the moment we wake up to the moment we go back to sleep at night can all be classified and studied through the concepts of behavioural ecology. The same applies to all vertebrates and, to some extent, invertebrates. Fungi are, in most people’s eyes perhaps, the eukaryotic multicellular organisms with which we humans share the least commonalities. However, they still express behaviours, and we argue that we could obtain a better understanding of their lives – although they are very different from ours – through the lens of behavioural ecology. Moreover, insights from fungal behaviour may drive a better understanding of behavioural ecology in general

Community assembly and stability in the root microbiota during early plant development

Little is known about how community composition in the plant microbiome is affected by events in the life of a plant. For example, when the plant is exposed to soil, microbial communities may be an important factor in root community assembly. We conducted two experiments asking whether the composition of the root microbiota in mature plants could be determined by either the timing of root exposure to microbial communities or priority effects by early colonizing microbes. Timing of microbial exposure was manipulated through an inoculation experiment, where plants of different ages were exposed to a common soil inoculum. Priority effects were manipulated by challenging roots with established microbiota with an exogenous microbial community. Results show that even plants with existing microbial root communities were able to acquire new microbial associates, but that timing of soil exposure affected root microbiota composition for both bacterial and fungal communities in mature plants. Plants already colonized were only receptive to colonizers at 1 week post-germination. Our study shows that the timing of soil exposure in the early life stages of a plant is important for the development of the root microbiota in mature plants

Heavy Residue Formation in 20 MeV/nucleon 197Au + 90Zr collisions

The yields and velocity distributions of heavy residues and fission fragments from the reaction of 20 MeV/nucleon 197Au + 90Zr have been measured using the MSU A1200 fragment separator. A bimodal distribution of residues is observed, with one group, resulting from peripheral collisions, having fragment mass numbers A=160-200, while the other group, resulting from ``hard'' collisions, has A=120-160. This latter group of residues can be distinguished from fission fragments by their lower velocities. A model combining deep-inelastic transfer and incomplete fusion for the primary interaction stage and a statistical evaporation code for the deexcitation stage has been used to describe the properties of the product distributions.Comment: 19 pages, 6 figures, preprint submitted to Nucl. Phys.