Artificial agents among us: Should we recognize them as agents proper?

In this paper, I discuss whether in a society where the use of artificial agents is pervasive, these agents should be recognized as having rights like those we accord to group agents. This kind of recognition I understand to be at once social and legal, and I argue that in order for an artificial agent to be so recognized, it will need to meet the same basic conditions in light of which group agents are granted such recognition. I then explore the implications of granting recognition in this manner. The thesis I will be defending is that artificial agents that do meet the conditions of agency in light of which we ascribe rights to group agents should thereby be recognized as having similar rights. The reason for bringing group agents into the picture is that, like artificial agents, they are not self-evidently agents of the sort to which we would naturally ascribe rights, or at least that is what the historical record suggests if we look, for example, at what it took for corporations to gain legal status in the law as group agents entitled to rights and, consequently, as entities subject to responsibilities. This is an example of agency ascribed to a nonhuman agent, and just as a group agent can be described as nonhuman, so can an artificial agent. Therefore, if these two kinds of nonhuman agents can be shown to be sufficiently similar in relevant ways, the agency ascribed to one can also be ascribed to the other-this despite the fact that neither is human, a major impediment when it comes to recognizing an entity as an agent proper, and hence as a bearer of rights

T cell adhesion and cytolysis of pancreatic cancer cells: a role for E-cadherin in immunotherapy?

Pancreatic cancer is an aggressive and potent disease, which is largely resistant to conventional forms of treatment. However, the discovery of antigens associated with pancreatic cancer cells has recently suggested the possibility that immunotherapy might become a specific and effective therapeutic option. T cells within many epithelia, including those of the pancreas, are known to express the αEβ7-integrin adhesion molecule, CD103. The only characterised ligand for CD103 is E-cadherin, an epithelial adhesion molecule which exhibits reduced expression in pancreatic cancer. In our study, CD103 was found to be expressed only by activated T cells following exposure to tumour necrosis factor beta 1, a factor produced by many cancer cells. Significantly, the expression of this integrin was restricted mainly to class I major histocompatibility complex-restricted CD8+ T cells. The human pancreatic cancer cell line Panc-1 was transfected with human E-cadherin in order to generate E-cadherin negative (wild type) and positive (transfected) sub-lines. Using a sensitive flow cytometric adhesion assay it was found that the expression of both CD103 (on T cells) and E-cadherin (on cancer cells) was essential for efficient adhesion of activated T cells to pancreatic cancer cells. This adhesion process was inhibited by the addition of antibodies specific for CD103, thereby demonstrating the importance of the CD103→E-cadherin interaction for T-cell adhesion. Using a 51Cr-release cytotoxicity assay it was found that CD103 expressing T cells lysed E-cadherin expressing Panc-1 target cells following T cell receptor stimulation; addition of antibodies specific for CD103 significantly reduced this lysis. Furthermore, absence of either CD103 from the T cells or E-cadherin expression from the cancer cells resulted in a significant reduction in cancer cell lysis. Therefore, potentially antigenic pancreatic cancer cells could evade a local anti-cancer immune response in vivo as a consequence of their loss of E-cadherin expression; this phenotypic change may also favour metastasis by reducing homotypic adhesion between adjacent cancer cells. We conclude that effective immunotherapy is likely to require upregulation of E-cadherin expression by pancreatic cancer cells or the development of cytotoxic immune cells that are less dependent on this adhesion molecule for efficient effecter function

About the Impossibility of Absolute State Sovereignty. The Modern Era and the Early Legal Positivist Claim

State sovereignty is often thought to be and seen as absolute, unlimited. However, there is no such a thing as absolute state sovereignty. Indeed, absolute or unlimited sovereignty is impossible because all sovereignty is necessarily underpinned by its conditions of possibility. The present chapter consists of two main parts. Firstly, and in order to show more clearly how sovereignty is limited, two kinds of agents are introduced: (a) individuals; and (b) states. The aim is to demonstrate how different sorts of constraints or limitations operate in relation to individuals and states without diminishing their respective sovereignties. Secondly, the chapter identifies specific theorists that take sovereignty to be absolute in the modern era, focusing in particular on two bodies of literature that constitute the roots for current legal positivism—i.e. Jean Bodin and Thomas Hobbes—and argues that in both cases they introduce conceptual, substantial, and contextual limitations. I argue that the modern era starts with a relative essence of sovereignty that has its origin in the working logic of fragmented regulatory governance. With this early and disjointed background of a national and transnational plurality of sources both Bodin and Hobbes aim to bring together these heterogeneous elements under the contextualisation of the paradox of sovereignty. The implications of understanding state sovereignty as limited rather than absolute are several, both directly and indirectly. A main immediate consequence is that sovereign states can cooperate together, limit their sovereignty and still be considered sovereign