The Failed Powder Boat Explosion During the First Attack on Fort Fisher in December 1864.

This paper attempts to provide a detailed understanding of how General Benjamin Butler\u27s proposal to detonate an explosive laden ship to secure Fort Fisher and ultimately Wilmington, North Carolina failed because of a flawed plan, a gross failure of communication and a desire for personal glory over intelligent planning led to an embarrassing Union defeat in 1864

Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology: Cosmic Laboratories for New Physics (Summary of the Snowmass 2001 P4 Working Group)

The past few years have seen dramatic breakthroughs and spectacular and puzzling discoveries in astrophysics and cosmology. In many cases, the new observations can only be explained with the introduction of new fundamental physics. Here we summarize some of these recent advances. We then describe several problem in astrophysics and cosmology, ripe for major advances, whose resolution will likely require new physics.Comment: 27 pages, 14 figure

The economics of the drug war : effective federal policy or missed opportunity?

We calculated the value of two distinct economic inefficiencies that result from the prohibition of drugs. We define and illustrate these inefficiencies as the two direct components of the deadweight loss created by prohibition. The first is under-consumption and the second component, unique to our analysis, is the payment for risk. Using the 1999 illegal quantities and prices, the derived legal prices, and the estimated demand elasticities for four illegal drugs, we calculated the estimated quantity demanded for these drugs in legal markets. We then used the results of these calculations and estimated the total deadweight loss of the drug war in 1999 to be over $90 billion-$65 billion in payment for risk and $24 billion in under-consumption. We then focus our analysis on the indirect components of the deadweight loss, e.g., costs to reduce supply, cost of incarceration, and productivity losses, etc. Our conservative estimate for indirect deadweight loss for 1999 was$96.1 billion. In the final chapter, we estimate that of the total deadweight loss, America could gain $6.7 billion annually in taxes from legal drug sales, save over$34 billion annually in drug war costs, and recoup the remainder via reductions in prohibition-related phenomena.http://archive.org/details/theeconomicsofdr109455950Lieutenant Commander (Select), United States NavyCaptain, United States ArmyApproved for public release; distribution is unlimited

THE RANGE AND ROLE OF THEORY IN INFORMATION SYSTEMS DESIGN RESEARCH: FROM CONCEPTS TO CONSTRUCTION

This paper reports results from a field study of cross-disciplinary design researchers in information systems, software engineering, human-computer interaction, and computer-supported cooperative work. The purpose of the study was to explore how these different disciplines conceptualize and conduct design-as-research. The focus in this paper is on how theories are used in a design research project to motivate and inform the particulars of designed artifacts and design methods. Our objective was to better understand how elements of a theory are translated into design action, and how theoretical propositions are translated and then realized in designed artifacts. The results reveal a broad diversity in the processes through which theories are translated into working artifacts. The paper contributes to our understanding of design research in information systems by providing empirical support for existing constructs and frameworks, identifying some new approaches to translating theoretical concepts into research designs, and suggesting ways in which action and artifact-oriented research can more effectively contribute to a cumulative and progressive science of design