Copyrighting the Dead Sea Scrolls: Qimron v. Shanks

In 1992, Professor Elisha Qimron of Ben Gurion University in Be\u27er Sheva, Israel, brought suit against the editors and publisher of A Facsimile Edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls, a complete set of photographs of the scrolls, for copyright infringement and the tort of mental anguish asking for approximately $250,000 in damages. The case centered on an appendix of the book which included a portion of a scroll text, Misgat Ma\u27Aseh ha-Torah—Some Rulings Pertaining to the Torah (MMT), reconstructed by Qimron. MMT consists of 121 lines of text, and Qimron\u27s reconstruction—referred to in the suit as the Compiled Text (CT)—consisted of the MMT and 11 lines reconstructed by Qimron, for a total of 132 lines. Qimron contended that the CT was his original work and its publication in the Facsimile Edition was an infringement of his copyright. Qimron won at trial in Israel and the case is pending before the Israeli Supreme Court. So striking was the trial court\u27s ruling that for the first time in the history of the Israeli Supreme Court an amicus curiae brief was filed. Two things make this case remarkable. First, it was the first case in the world to recognize the copyrightability (including both economic and moral rights) of a scholarly reconstruction of an ancient text. Second, an American publisher was held liable by an Israeli court, applying Israeli copyright law as if it were American copyright law, for a copyright infringement that occurred in America. This Article argues that the Israeli district court was too quick in finding that reconstructed manuscripts are copyrightable. It ignored the inherent paradoxes of claiming, on the one hand, that a reconstruction was an historically accurate version of an ancient manuscript, and on the other hand, claiming that the reconstruction was a work of “originality.” The court also brushed aside the grave danger that its ruling might pose for the freedom of scholarly inquiry and ignored the entire fifty-year context of recriminations and backbiting that surround the Dead Sea Scrolls. This Article also argues that the court was mistaken when it presumed that the United States provides moral rights protection. The court\u27s conflicts of law analysis set a worrying precedent in this age of cross-border transactions by presuming that all legal systems protect intellectual property rights in the same fashion. Finally, after outlining and critiquing the district court\u27s decision, this Article will offer some suggestions on how the Israeli Supreme Court should proceed to redress the balance between protecting an author\u27s rights and freedom of inquiry

Numerical Modeling Of Hohlraum Radiation Conditions: Spatial And Spectral Variations Due To Sample Position, Beam Pointing, And Hohlraum Geometry

View-factor simulations are presented of the spatially varying radiation conditions inside double-ended gold Hohlraums and single-ended gold Hohlraums (\u27\u27 halfraums \u27\u27) used in inertial confinement fusion and high-energy density physics experiments [J. Lindl, Phys. Plasmas 11, 339 (2004); M. D. Rosen, Phys. Plasmas 3, 1803 (1996)]. It is shown that in many circumstances, the common assumption that the Hohlraum \u27\u27 drive \u27\u27 can be characterized by a single temperature is too simplistic. Specifically, the radiation conditions seen by an experimental package can differ significantly from the wall reemission measured through diagnostic holes or laser entrance holes (LEHs) by absolutely calibrated detectors. Furthermore, even in situations where the radiation temperature is roughly the same for diagnostics and experimental packages, or for packages at different locations, the spectral energy distributions can vary significantly, due to the differing fractions of reemitting wall, laser hot spots, and LEHs seen from different locations. We find that the spatial variation of temperature and especially the differences between what diagnostics looking in the LEH measure versus the radiation temperature on wall-mounted experimental packages are generally greater for double-ended Hohlraums than for halfraums. View-factor simulations can also be used to explore experimental variables (halfraum length and geometry, sample position, and beam pointing) that can be adjusted in order to, for example, maximize the radiation flux onto a sample, or other package. In this vein, simulations of Hohlraums and halfraums with LEH shields are also presented. (c) 2005 American Institute of Physics

Race Gaps in School Trust: Where They Come from and How to Resolve Them

Trust in American institutions varies widely among adults from different racial-ethnic backgrounds. This brief, from PRC faculty research associate David Yeager and colleagues, demonstrates that unjust treatment causes minority adolescents to lose trust in school, but a respectful "wise feedback" intervention can repair distrust.Population Research Cente

Judicial Choice and Disparities between Measures of Economic Values

An important idea, which characterizes law in society, is a reluctance to move from the status quo. In general, one can argue that legal institutions and legal doctrine are not engaged in the redistribution of wealth from one party to another. This paper explores a possible explanation for that principle. The authors\u27 research suggests that, across a wide range of entitlements and in a variety of contexts, individuals value losses more than foregone gains. The paper argues, as a matter of efficiency, that law and social policy might have developed in a manner consistent with this valuation disparity. Furthermore, this valuation disparity can be transformed into conceptions of fairness, and, as a matter of fairness, legal decisions might have developed in a manner consistent with this fairness norm. In the first part of the paper, the economic and psychological research on the valuation disparity is described in detail. The paper then examines a series of legal doctrines, all of which can be explained by the valuation disparity phenomenon revealed in the experimental data. Cohen and Knetsch conclude that the behaviour of legal institutions and actors can be explained by the valuation disparity

The Extremely Red Objects Found Thus Far in the Caltech Faint Galaxy Redshift Survey

We discuss the very red objects found in the first field of the Caltech Faint Galaxy Redshift Survey, for which the observations and analysis are now complete. In this field, which is 15 arcmin$^2$ and at J005325+1234 there are 195 objects with $K_s < 20$ mag, of which 84% have redshifts. The sample includes 24 spectroscopically confirmed Galactic stars, 136 galaxies, three AGNs, and 32 objects without redshifts. About 10% of the sample has $(R-K) \ge 5$ mag. Four of these objects have redshifts, with $0.78 \le z \le 1.23$. Three of these are based on absorption features in the mid-UV, while the lowest redshift object shows the standard features near 4000\AA. Many of the objects still without redshifts have been observed spectroscopically, and no emission lines were seen in their spectra. We believe they are galaxies with $z \sim 1 - 1.5$ that are red due to their age and stellar content and not to some large amount of internal reddening from dust. Among the many other results from this survey of interest here is a determination of the median extinction in the mid-UV for objects with strong emission line spectra at $z \sim 1 - 1.3$. The result is extinction by a factor of $\sim$2 at 2400\AA.Comment: 6 pages, Latex, with 2 figures. To be published in the proceedings of the conference "Infrared Surveys: A Prelude to SIRTF

New Challenges For Wind Shock Models: The Chandra Spectrum Of The Hot Star Delta Orionis

The Chandra spectrum of delta Ori A shows emission lines from hydrogen- and helium-like states of Si, Mg, Ne, and O, along with N VII Lyalpha and lines from ions in the range Fe XVII-Fe XXI In contrast to the broad lines seen in zeta Pup and zeta Ori (850 +/- 40 and 1000 +/- 240 km s(-1) half-width at half-maximum [HWHM], respectively), these lines are broadened to only 430 +/- 60 km s(-1) HWHM. This is much lower than the measured wind terminal velocity of 2000 km s(-1). The forbidden, intercombination, and resonance (fir) lines from He-like ions indicate that the majority of the X-ray line emission does not originate at the base of the wind, in agreement with the standard wind shock models for these objects. However, in that model the X-ray emission is distributed throughout an expanding, X-ray-absorbing wind, and it is therefore surprising that the emission lines appear relatively narrow, unshifted, and symmetric. We compare the observed line profiles to recent detailed models for X-ray line pro le generation in hot stars, but none of them offers a fully satisfactory explanation for the observed line profiles