Truth­-Makers

During the realist revival in the early years of this century, philosophers of various persuasions were concerned to investigate the ontology of truth. That is, whether or not they viewed truth as a correspondence, they were interested in the extent to which one needed to assume the existence of entities serving some role in accounting for the truth of sentences. Certain of these entities, such as the Sätze an sich of Bolzano, the Gedanken of Frege, or the propositions of Russell and Moore, were conceived as the bearers of the properties of truth and falsehood. Some thinkers however, such as Russell, Wittgenstein in the Tractatus, and Husserl in the Logische Untersuchungen, argued that instead of, or in addition to, truth-bearers, one must assume the existence of certain entities in virtue of which sentences and/or propositions are true. Various names were used for these entities, notably 'fact', 'Sachverhalt', and 'state of affairs'. (1) In order not to prejudge the suitability of these words we shall initially employ a more neutral terminology, calling any entities which are candidates for this role truth-makers

The ADA Amendments Act of 2008

The goal of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was to create a civil rights law protecting people with disabilities from discrimination on the basis of their disabilities. Disability rights advocates in 1990 were victorious in their efforts to open doors for people with disabilities and to change the country\u27s outlook and acceptance of people with disabilities. These advocates believed that the terms of the ADA, based as they were on Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, combined with the legislative history of the ADA, would provide clear instructions to the courts that the ADA was intended to provide broad coverage prohibiting discrimination against people with a wide range of physical and mental impairments. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court--with lower courts following in its lead, barricaded the door that the ADA had opened by interpreting the definition of disability in the ADA to create an overly demanding standard for coverage under the law. This article provides an overview of the advocacy effort that has resulted in restoring the original intent of the ADA and destroying the barriers of discrimination that prevent people with disabilities from fully participating in society

From Wolves, Lambs (Part I): The Eighth Amendment Case for Gradual Abolition of the Death Penalty

This spring, the Connecticut Supreme Court will take up a novel question, unprecedented in modern death penalty jurisprudence: Can a state gradually abolish its death penalty? Restated, can it leave the sentences of those currently on death row in place but abolish the death penalty going forward? This Article argues that it can. On simple statutory construction grounds, “prospective-only” repeals of death penalty legislation are not given retroactive effect. Although the constitutional considerations are admittedly less straightforward, prospective-only repeals do not offend the Constitution. The death penalty remains constitutional per se under the Eighth Amendment, and “as-applied” challenges under Atkins and Furman fare no better. Apart from the thorny legal question before the Connecticut Supreme Court, prospective-only repeal gives rise to two other difficult questions. The first is a pragmatic one: From the perspective of the abolition movement, is prospective-only abolishment of death-penalty legislation wise? The second is a moral one: Is it right to leave those who committed murder on day one on death row, while eliminating the death penalty for those who commit murder on day two? This Article answers both questions in the affirmative. Prospective-only death penalty repeal offers both retraction of the death penalty and preservation of the status quo. It is therefore a useful tool for winning states with inmates on death row to the cause of abolition. Furthermore, by retaining the death penalty for some so that no others will ever face a similar fate, legislators transform an immoral punishment into an arguably moral sacrifice. This is the uneasy morality of gradual abolition; from wolves, lambs

From Wolves, Lambs (Part I): The Eighth Amendment Case for Gradual Abolition of the Death Penalty

This spring, the Connecticut Supreme Court will take up a novel question, unprecedented in modern death penalty jurisprudence: Can a state gradually abolish its death penalty? Restated, can it leave the sentences of those currently on death row in place but abolish the death penalty going forward? This Article argues that it can. On simple statutory construction grounds, “prospective-only” repeals of death penalty legislation are not given retroactive effect. Although the constitutional considerations are admittedly less straightforward, prospective-only repeals do not offend the Constitution. The death penalty remains constitutional per se under the Eighth Amendment, and “as-applied” challenges under Atkins and Furman fare no better. Apart from the thorny legal question before the Connecticut Supreme Court, prospective-only repeal gives rise to two other difficult questions. The first is a pragmatic one: From the perspective of the abolition movement, is prospective-only abolishment of death-penalty legislation wise? The second is a moral one: Is it right to leave those who committed murder on day one on death row, while eliminating the death penalty for those who commit murder on day two? This Article answers both questions in the affirmative. Prospective-only death penalty repeal offers both retraction of the death penalty and preservation of the status quo. It is therefore a useful tool for winning states with inmates on death row to the cause of abolition. Furthermore, by retaining the death penalty for some so that no others will ever face a similar fate, legislators transform an immoral punishment into an arguably moral sacrifice. This is the uneasy morality of gradual abolition; from wolves, lambs

Going Retro: Abolition For All

The opening of the twenty-first century has seen a flurry of death penalty repeals. This development is encouraging, but only partly so. Amidst the cheers for abolition, there is an unfairness of the highest order: the maintenance of the death penalty for some, but not others, for no other reason than the date of their crimes. State legislatures are repealing the death penalty prospectively only, and these states’ executive branches are leaving their prisoners on death row. In New Mexico and Connecticut, a total of thirteen prisoners remain on death row after those states abolished the death penalty. Some states, however, are “going retro.” In 2012, California’s Proposition 34 would have applied retroactively, reducing over 700 death row prisoners’ sentences to life without parole (“LWOP”). More states should attempt to pass retroactive death penalty repeals, but they are not doing so, for two reasons. The first is political: legislators are not pursuing retroactive legislation because they do not have the votes. The second reason is legal: legislators are not pursuing retroactive legislation because they believe that the separation of powers and state constitutional prohibitions on retroactive laws forbid it. These arguments are reasonable ones, and they reach far beyond the death penalty sphere—to retroactive crack sentencing laws and retroactive juvenile LWOP sentencing laws, among others. This Article argues that neither the separation of powers nor state constitutional prohibitions on retroactive laws prohibits states from retroactively repealing their death penalties. While politics may prevent legislatures from pursuing retroactive repeal of the death penalty, the law should not. As California’s 2012 repeal bill makes clear, “fairness, equality, and uniformity” demand retroactivity. They demand abolition for all

Gray Matters: Autism, Impairment, and the End of Binaries

First diagnosed by psychiatrist Leo Kanner in 1943, autism has exploded into the public consciousness in recent years. From science to science fiction, academia to popular culture, autism has captured the world\u27s attention and imagination. Autism has also ignited a fierce debate among stakeholders who seek to define its essence. Many parents of autistic children regard autism as a scourge and press for a cure. The neurodiversity movement, comprised mostly of autistic adults, regards autism as a different way of being worthy of respect and even celebration. The autism war is well underway, and given autism\u27s swelling ranks and proposed changes to the American Psychiatric Association\u27s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual in 2013, this war shows no signs of abating. Notwithstanding its rise to prominence in recent years as something both terrifying and terrific, autism remains understudied in legal scholarship. This Article situates the autism war within the larger theoretical debate over the social construction of disability and impairment. This Article argues that the oft-claimed binary between the social model of disability, which holds that disability is socially constructed, and the medical model of disability, which holds that it is not, is not as stark as it is often made out to be. Both models regard disability as something that ought to be gotten rid of, both acknowledge the inevitability of impairment, and neither requires a particular policy response. At bottom, the two models describe dueling theories about the causation of disability. But disability socially constructed or not does not explain the autism war; impairment is where the action is. This Article argues that although impairments such as autism may refer to some biological pathology, they are in part socially constructed. Autism is constructed not just by medical researchers and clinicians who name and diagnose it, but also by those who are so named - autistic people themselves, many of whom define autism as a different way of being. Autism may be both a still unknown biological pathology and, according to autism\u27s neurodiversity movement, an experience. Although this understanding of impairment cannot make peace between autism\u27s sides, it helps to explain how the sides are at odds and why they are likely to stay that way

How Housing Slumps End

We construct a simple probit model of the determinants of real house price slump endings. We find that the probability of a house price slump ending is higher, the smaller was the pre-slump house price run-up; the greater has been the cumulative house price decline; the lower are real mortgage interest rates; and the higher is GDP growth. Slumps are longer, other things being equal, where housing supply is more elastic, but shorter the more developed are financial institutions. For slumps of a given size, shorter sharper slumps are associated with worse macroeconomic performance in the short run, but with better performance in the long run. This suggests that for sufficiently low discount rates, policy makers should not impede the decline in real house prices, and this conclusion is reinforced by the finding that after a certain duration, house price slumps can become self reinforcing. On the other hand, we also find evidence that during downturns, falling house prices can lead to lower private sector credit flows. Policy makers thus face a delicate balancing act. While they should not intervene to artificially prop up overvalued house prices, they should ensure that their macroeconomic and banking policies are such as to make a bottoming-out more likely. This suggests that they should keep real interest rates low, and ensure that banks are well-capitalised.House prices, Slumps, Probit, VAR

Global analysis of gene expression reveals mRNA superinduction is required for the inducible immune response to a bacterial pathogen.

The inducible innate immune response to infection requires a concerted process of gene expression that is regulated at multiple levels. Most global analyses of the innate immune response have focused on transcription induced by defined immunostimulatory ligands, such as lipopolysaccharide. However, the response to pathogens involves additional complexity, as pathogens interfere with virtually every step of gene expression. How cells respond to pathogen-mediated disruption of gene expression to nevertheless initiate protective responses remains unclear. We previously discovered that a pathogen-mediated blockade of host protein synthesis provokes the production of specific pro-inflammatory cytokines. It remains unclear how these cytokines are produced despite the global pathogen-induced block of translation. We addressed this question by using parallel RNAseq and ribosome profiling to characterize the response of macrophages to infection with the intracellular bacterial pathogen Legionella pneumophila. Our results reveal that mRNA superinduction is required for the inducible immune response to a bacterial pathogen