Rehab or Relocation? Estimating the Demand for Cocaine through an American Port City Analysis

Over the past five decades American drug policy can succinctly be classified by two words: expensive and punitive. American drug policy makers have conducted the “war on drugs” largely through supply side intervention. As the theory goes, by attacking drug producers, drug prices will rise due to the increased risk faced by suppliers, this risk will in turn be passed along to consumers in the form of higher prices. In order to critically asses the merits of such an expensive antidrug policy it is essential to estimate the price elasticity of demand for drugs. The main finding of this paper is that cocaine users are extremely price inelastic and that a doubling of cocaine prices will result in approximately a five percent drop in cocaine usage. Further, policy analysis reveals that the theory driving supply side intervention is fundamentally flawed. Over the past thirty years, as antidrug spending has increased fivefold, drug prices have declined be nearly eighty percent – bolstering a conclusion that American policy makers need to rethink the “war on drugs”

Significance of Proper Selection of Handling Equipment in Inland Intermodal Transport Terminals

The paper deals with the methodology of handling equipment designing in intermodal transport terminals. The overall performance of the intermodal transport terminal, and hence its effectiveness, is most affected by the capacity of handling equipments that transfer intermodal transport units between transport modes. The first part of the paper describes the various types of handling equipments conventionally used in intermodal terminals. The second part of the paper contains the basic characteristics of the methodology of designing specific handling equipment and provides a calculation methodology for determining the operational needs of intermodal transport terminals

The Report of the Ecological Society of America Committee on the Scientific Basis for Ecosystem Management

Ecosystem management is management driven by explicit goals, executed by policies, protocols, and practices, and made adaptable by monitoring and research based on our best understanding of the ecological interactions and processes necessary to sustain ecosystem composition, structure, and function

Nature as capital: Advancing and incorporating ecosystem services in United States federal policies and programs

The concept of nature as capital is gaining visibility in policies and practices in both the public and private sectors. This change is due to an improved ability to assess and value ecosystem services, as well as to a growing recognition of the potential of an ecosystem services approach to make tradeoffs in decision making more transparent, inform efficient use of resources, enhance resilience and sustainability, and avoid unintended negative consequences of policy actions. Globally, governments, financial institutions, and corporations have begun to incorporate natural capital accounting in their policies and practices. In the United States, universities, nongovernmental organizations, and federal agencies are actively collaborating to develop and apply ecosystem services concepts to further national environmental and economic objectives. Numerous federal agencies have begun incorporating these concepts into land use planning, water resources management, and preparations for, and responses to, climate change. Going forward, well-defined policy direction will be necessary to institutionalize ecosystem services approaches in federal agencies, as well as to guide intersector and interdisciplinary collaborative research and development efforts. In addition, a new generation of decision support tools are needed to further the practical application of ecosystem services principles in policymaking and commercial activities. Improved performance metrics are needed, as are mechanisms to monitor the status of ecosystem services and assess the environmental and economic impacts of policies and programs. A greater national and international financial commitment to advancing ecosystem services and natural capital accounting would likely have broad, long-term economic and environmental benefits.Keywords: US federal agencies, environmental policy, natural capital, ecosystem service

The IPBES Conceptual Framework - connecting nature and people

The first public product of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) is its Conceptual Framework. This conceptual and analytical tool, presented here in detail, will underpin all IPBES functions and provide structure and comparability to the syntheses that IPBES will produce at different spatial scales, on different themes, and in different regions. Salient innovative aspects of the IPBES Conceptual Framework are its transparent and participatory construction process and its explicit consideration of diverse scientific disciplines, stakeholders, and knowledge systems, including indigenous and local knowledge. Because the focus on co-construction of integrative knowledge is shared by an increasing number of initiatives worldwide, this framework should be useful beyond IPBES, for the wider research and knowledge-policy communities working on the links between nature and people, such as natural, social and engineering scientists, policy-makers at different levels, and decision-makers in different sectors of society

Top 40 Priorities for Science to Inform US Conservation and Management Policy

To maximize the utility of research to decisionmaking, especially given limited financial resources, scientists must set priorities for their efforts. We present a list of the top 40 high-priority, multidisciplinary research questions directed toward informing some of the most important current and future decisions about management of species, communities, and ecological processes in the United States. The questions were generated by an open, inclusive process that included personal interviews with decisionmakers, broad solicitation of research needs from scientists and policymakers, and an intensive workshop that included scientifically oriented individuals responsible for managing and developing policy related to natural resources. The process differed from previous efforts to set priorities for conservation research in its focus on the engagement of decisionmakers in addition to researchers. The research priorities emphasized the importance of addressing societal context and exploration of trade-offs among alternative policies and actions, as well as more traditional questions related to ecological processes and functions.Keywords: Priority setting, Natural resource management, Ecosystems, Conservation, Decisionmaker

Which English do we teach?

Die Rolle der englischen Sprache hat sich in den letzten Jahrzehnten enorm verändert, von der Familiensprache (früher Muttersprache) einiger weniger Länder zur weltweiten internationalen Lingua franca (ELF), unabhängig vom Englisch jener Länder. Anders als im klassischen Fremdsprachenunterricht nimmt ELF-bezogener Unterricht nicht an, dass Lernende eine Sprache hauptsächlich zur Kommunikation mit Familiensprachlichen erlernen, sondern zur Kommunikation mit anderen Fremdsprachigen mit den unterschiedlichsten linguistischen Hintergründen. Hauptziel der ELF-Kommunikation ist nicht die Fehlerfreiheit, gemessen an familiensprachigen Standards, sondern die erfolgreiche Kommunikation. Die ELF-Forschung hat ergeben, dass strikte Einhaltung familiensprachiger Standards Lingua-Franca-Kommunikation nicht fördert, sondern im Gegenteil eher stört. Englischlernende in Österreich werden mit großer Wahrscheinlichkeit nicht hauptsächlich mit Familiensprachigen kommunizieren, sondern in ELF-Kontexten. Daher sollte ein ELF-informierter Sprachunterricht sie entsprechend vorbereiten. Unterricht sollte von Prinzipien der ELF-Forschung, insbesondere des Lingua Franca Core (Kernaspekte der international verständlichen Aussprache) geleitet werden. Die vorliegende Studie ergab jedoch, dass der österreichische Englischunterricht bis heute stark in traditionellen Modellen verharrt. Um den Einfluss der ELF-Forschung auf den Unterricht zu ermitteln, wurden Schulbücher für die 7. Klasse AHS (11. Schulstufe) und insbesondere die Hörverständnisübungen analysiert. Die Analyse der rechtlichen Rahmenbedingungen (Lehrpläne) und theoretischen Konstrukte (GERS), der Ausspracheübungen in den Lehrbüchern, der Lehrerhandbücher und der Tonaufnahmen soll zeigen, in welchem Ausmaß ELF den Unterricht beeinflusst. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die Forschung noch wenig Einfluss auf die Unterrichtspraxis zu haben scheint, trotz Bemühungen in den Lehrplänen, sich teilweise vom Primat der Familiensprachen zu entfernen. Unglücklicherweise erfolgt die Leistungsbeurteilung weiterhin hauptsächlich nach familiensprachigen Maßstäben. Daher neigen Lehrwerke dazu, nicht-familiensprachige Aspekte weitgehend auszublenden. Um die Realität des Sprachunterrichts jener der englischen Sprache im 21. Jahrhundert anzupassen, wird noch erheblicher Aufwand nötig sein. Lehrmittel sollten deutlich adaptiert werden, wenn das Ziel ist, erfolgreiche Lingua-Franca-Sprechende auszubilden.Over the past four decades, the role of English has shifted away from a native or foreign language in ways only comparable to Latin and certainly on an unprecedented scale. Non-native speakers far outnumber native speakers and English has become a worldwide lingua franca (English as a Lingua Franca, ELF), disconnected from the English of native speakers. Unlike traditional foreign language teaching, ELF-informed teaching does not assume that students learn a language mainly in order to communicate with its native speakers but with other non-native speakers of various linguistic backgrounds. The main aim of ELF communication is not correctness by native-speaker standards but communicative success. According to ELF research, adherence to native-speaker standards is not a suitable means of ensuring successful communication in ELF interactions but may actually impede communication. Austrian learners of English are most likely to participate mainly in ELF encounters rather than encounters with native speakers. Therefore, English language teaching (ELT) should prepare them for such communication situations. Teaching should be informed by ELF research, particularly the Lingua Franca Core (LFC). However, as this study found, Austrian ELT is still deeply rooted in a native-speaker centred approach. In order to determine the influence of ELF research on Austrian ELT, textbooks for upper-intermediate learners (seventh form of Austrian general secondary school) and particularly the listening comprehension tasks on the CDs supplied by the publishers were analysed. The analysis of the surrounding theoretical and legal framework (the curricula and the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages) and of the pronunciation sections in the textbooks, teacher’s supplements and audio material audio materials shall provide insights into the degree of implementation of ELF research into Austrian ELT. The findings indicate that ELF research appears to have had little impact on Austrian ELT practices, despite efforts in the curricula to at least partly move away from native-speaker supremacy. However, assessment of learners is still largely based on native-speaker models and therefore textbooks tend to err on the side of caution and largely ignore ELF. Considerable efforts are still needed to align the conceptualisation of ELT with the reality of English in the 21st century. In conclusion, it can be said that teaching materials should be revised if the aim is to educate and produce successful ELF users

Über das Verhältnis von Wahrscheinlichkeitstheorie und Pascals Wette

Ich betrachte das als Pascals Wette bekannte theistische Argument im Lichte der modernen Wahrscheinlichkeits- sowie Entscheidungstheorie und untersuche deren Auswirkungen sowohl auf die Stärken und Schwächen der Wette als auch auf ihre Kritik. Beginnend mit einer gründlichen Prüfung des ursprünglichen Arguments untersuche ich Pascals Rhetorik und deren Bedeutung für die möglichen Interpretationen des Begriffs der „Wahrscheinlichkeit“. Als nächstes präsentiere ich einige Beispiele, um unterschiedliche Entscheidungsstrategien und deren jeweilige Schwächen vorzustellen. Abschließend gehe ich noch auf häufig gegen die Pascalsche Wette gemachte Einwände wie etwa das „Viele-Götter-Argument“ ein und wie diese noch auf eine entscheidungstheoretisch umstrukturierte Version der Wette anwendbar sind.I look at the theistic argument known as Pascals Wager in the light of modern probability theory as well as decision theory and examine it's consequences on the strengths and weaknesses of the Wager and it's criticism. Starting with a thorough examination of the original argument, I discuss Pascal's rhetoric and it's implications on the possible meanings of the term „probability“. Next, I go over some examples to highlight different decision-making strategies and their shortcomings. Finally, I talk about common arguments against Pascal's Wager like the „many-gods-objection“ and how they still apply to a decision-theoretically restructured version of the Wager