From Pandemic to Pedagogy: Teaching the Technology of Lawyering in Law Clinics

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the nation’s approach to work and learning. Law schools, law firms, courts, and administrative agencies abruptly closed their offices and quickly reimagined how to perform their daily functions remotely. Many of these institutions have plans to maintain aspects of remote operations and services post-pandemic. With this in mind, the authors of this Article conducted a survey of law school clinical faculty during the winter of 2021 to better understand how clinicians pivoted their instruction and practice using technology during the pandemic. The authors use the survey results to show how the COVID-19 experience positions clinical programs to be leaders in answering the growing calls to incorporate technical competency into legal education. The authors draw on the experiences of clinicians during the pandemic to demonstrate how law practice technology can be deliberately and thoughtfully integrated into existing clinical pedagogy and practice. The Article concludes by urging clinicians to build on the current momentum to embrace what they call “the technology of lawyering” as an indispensable component of clinical education

R|S Atlas: Identifying Existing Cohort Study Data Resources to Accelerate Epidemiological Research on the Influence of Religion and Spirituality on Human Health

OBJECTIVE: Many studies have documented significant associations between religion and spirituality (R/S) and health, but relatively few prospective analyses exist that can support causal inferences. To date, there has been no systematic analysis of R/S survey items collected in US cohort studies. We conducted a systematic content analysis of all surveys ever fielded in 20 diverse US cohort studies funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to identify all R/S-related items collected from each cohort\u27s baseline survey through 2014. DESIGN: An R|S Ontology was developed from our systematic content analysis to categorise all R/S survey items identified into key conceptual categories. A systematic literature review was completed for each R/S item to identify any cohort publications involving these items through 2018. RESULTS: Our content analysis identified 319 R/S survey items, reflecting 213 unique R/S constructs and 50 R|S Ontology categories. 193 of the 319 extant R/S survey items had been analysed in at least one published paper. Using these data, we created the R|S Atlas (https://atlas.mgh.harvard.edu/), a publicly available, online relational database that allows investigators to identify R/S survey items that have been collected by US cohorts, and to further refine searches by other key data available in cohorts that may be necessary for a given study (eg, race/ethnicity, availability of DNA or geocoded data). CONCLUSIONS: R|S Atlas not only allows researchers to identify available sources of R/S data in cohort studies but will also assist in identifying novel research questions that have yet to be explored within the context of US cohort studies

First Results from the AMoRE-Pilot neutrinoless double beta decay experiment

The Advanced Molybdenum-based Rare process Experiment (AMoRE) aims to search for neutrinoless double beta decay (0$\nu\beta\beta$) of $^{100}$Mo with $\sim$100 kg of $^{100}$Mo-enriched molybdenum embedded in cryogenic detectors with a dual heat and light readout. At the current, pilot stage of the AMoRE project we employ six calcium molybdate crystals with a total mass of 1.9 kg, produced from $^{48}$Ca-depleted calcium and $^{100}$Mo-enriched molybdenum ($^{48\textrm{depl}}$Ca$^{100}$MoO$_4$). The simultaneous detection of heat(phonon) and scintillation (photon) signals is realized with high resolution metallic magnetic calorimeter sensors that operate at milli-Kelvin temperatures. This stage of the project is carried out in the Yangyang underground laboratory at a depth of 700 m. We report first results from the AMoRE-Pilot $0\nu\beta\beta$ search with a 111 kg$\cdot$d live exposure of $^{48\textrm{depl}}$Ca$^{100}$MoO$_4$ crystals. No evidence for $0\nu\beta\beta$ decay of $^{100}$Mo is found, and a upper limit is set for the half-life of 0$\nu\beta\beta$ of $^{100}$Mo of $T^{0\nu}_{1/2} > 9.5\times10^{22}$ y at 90% C.L.. This limit corresponds to an effective Majorana neutrino mass limit in the range $\langle m_{\beta\beta}\rangle\le(1.2-2.1)$ eV

The hypothetical consent objection to anti-natalism

Abstract: A very common but untested assumption is that potential children would consent to be exposed to the harms of existence in order to experience its benefits (if it were possible for us to ask and for them to respond). And so, would-be parents might appeal to the following view: Procreation is all-things-considered permissible, as it is morally acceptable for one to knowingly harm an unconsenting patient if one has good reasons for assuming her hypothetical consent—and procreators can indeed reasonably rely on some notion of hypothetical consent. I argue that this view is in error. My argument appeals to a consent-based version of anti-natalism advanced by Seana Valentine Shiffrin. Anti-natalism is the view that it is (almost) always wrong to bring people (and perhaps all sentient beings) into existence. While, like Shiffrin, I stop short of advocating a thoroughgoing anti-natalism, I nevertheless argue that procreators cannot appeal to hypothetical consent to justify exposing children to the harms of existence. I end by suggesting a more promising route by which this justification might be achieved

Intergenerational Justice Today

UID/FIL/00183/2013A theory of intergenerational justice consists in the study of the moral and political status of the relations between present and past or future people, more specifically, of the obligations and entitlements they can potentially generate. The challenges that justify talking about responsibilities between generations are myriad (e.g., the amount of public debt that is fair to incur; the funding of future pensions; reparations for past wrongs; climate change). And the disputes they prompt can focus on the past just as much as on the present, even though the fact that the human species has reached a state of technological progress that enables it to have an irredeemable impact on the planet and perhaps even endanger future human existence tends to make concerns about the future more pressing. Debates on intergenerational justice are twofold. The first revolves around the issue of whether claims of justice across generations whose members' lifetimes do not necessarily overlap could be justified. And the second revolves around the specific conception of justice in play, that is, around the nature of the standard that must be applied as well as around the identification of the contents of the duties that present generations supposedly have vis‐à‐vis past or future generations. This survey article depicts the conceptual and argumentative framework in which these debates are set. It aims to outline certain of the main features shared by the most influential contemporary theories of intergenerational justice, and the problems inherent in them. It concludes by suggesting that, even though the idea of succeeding generations is merely an abstraction, there are specific empirical states of affairs that require different theoretical responses to intergenerational justice.authorsversionpublishe

Prediction of mechanical and radiation parameters of glasses with high Bi2O3 concentration

This study aims to perform multidirectional characterizations on nuclear shielding efficiencies on some bismuth-based glasses. Accordingly, the γattenuation coefficients for xBi2O3-(75-x)B2O3–25Li2O (x = 0, 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 the 70 mol%) were widely evaluated using simulations and theoretical methods. Linear attenuation coefficient (LAC) of the glasses was obtained by the Monte Carlo general-purpose simulation code FLUKA and compared with the XCOM database up to 15 MeV. Moreover, LAC values have been utilized to evaluate related parameters like mass attenuation coefficient (MAC), total molecular cross-section (σt), total atomic cross-section (σa), half-value layer (HVL), total electronic cross-section (σe), mean free path (MFP), effective atomic number (Zeff), and effective electron density (Neff). The results noted that the XCOM and FLUKA data of the shielding parameters are in great agreement. Relatively higher density (5.818 g/cm3), greater LAC, MAC, Zeff, and lower HVL, MFP values are achieved for 70Bi2O3-5B2O3–25Li2O glass. Accordingly, this glass sample is a better gamma shield. © 2021 The AuthorsTaif University Researchers Supporting Project number (TURSP-2020/45) Taif University, Taif, Saudi Arabia

Background study of the AMoRE-pilot experiment

We report a study on the background of the Advanced Molybdenum-Based Rare process Experiment (AMoRE), a search for neutrinoless double beta decay (\znbb) of $^{100}$Mo. The pilot stage of the experiment was conducted using $\sim$1.9 kg of \CAMOO~ crystals at the Yangyang Underground Laboratory, South Korea, from 2015 to 2018. We compared the measured $\beta/\gamma$ energy spectra in three experimental configurations with the results of Monte Carlo simulations and identified the background sources in each configuration. We replaced several detector components and enhanced the neutron shielding to lower the background level between configurations. A limit on the half-life of $0\nu\beta\beta$ decay of $^{100}$Mo was found at $T_{1/2}^{0\nu} \ge 3.0\times 10^{23}$ years at 90\% confidence level, based on the measured background and its modeling. Further reduction of the background rate in the AMoRE-I and AMoRE-II are discussed