Segmentation Stability: a Key Component for Joint Attention

It is now well established that joint attention is a key capability for socially interacting robots (Brooks et al., 1999, Kaplan and Hafner, 2004, Scassellati, 1999, Itti, 2003). It is also a key component for epigenetic robotic applications in general. This subject has been widely discussed and we present here one specific technical improvement for joint attention which relies on image segmentation. In the new Talking Robots (Baillie, 2004) experiment that we have started, following a successful reimplementation of the Sony’s Talking Heads (Steels, 1998) experiment o

Notes

Notes by John E. Lindberg, Lawrence S. May, Clifford A. Goodrich, William T. Huston, Louis Albert Hafner, Robert A. Stewart, Benedict R. Danko, and James D. Matthews

Is the Wedding of Trade and Human Rights a Marriage of Convenience or a Lasting Union?

A review of: Forced to Be Good: Why Trade Agreements Boost Human Rights. By Emilie Hafner-Burton. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2009. 220pp

Making Human Rights a Reality

Emilie Hafner-Burton’s Making Human Rights a Reality offers an accessible and informed analysis of the significant gap between the normative universalism of international human rights law and its limited effects in practice. The book’s primary purpose is to offer a pragmatic, strategic alternative to global legalism for promoting the progressive realization of fundamental human rights. In Hafner-Burton’s view, the cause of human rights promotion would be better-served by relying on states with strong human rights records (both in terms of respecting rights at home and commitment to promoting them abroad) to use foreign policy as a tool for changing the incentive structures in other countries in ways that enhance human rights protection in these countries. Her goal is to change the “calculus of abuse” (4) in contexts where real and meaningful change is possible

Commentary to Professor Hafner

This Comment is a response to Professor Hafner\u27s presentation in which he considered fragmentation as an unavoidable consequence of the increasing number of norms and judicial mechanisms, as well as of the regionalization of international law and the weakening of the state system

Commentary to Professor Hafner

This Comment is a response to Professor Hafner\u27s presentation in which he considered fragmentation as an unavoidable consequence of the increasing number of norms and judicial mechanisms, as well as of the regionalization of international law and the weakening of the state system

Craig Hafner Going Back to Africa

News release announcing college graduate and current member of the Front Line missionary program, Craig Hafner, is going back to Africa sometime this year with his wife to be a Flying Missionary

Swiss and Albanian archaelogists discover 8,500 year old pre-historic settlement

University of Bern professor Albert Hafner confirms that a collaboration under the regional project EXPLO has resulted in ground-breaking findings from the village of Lin, near Pogradec on the Lake Ohrid shoreline

Toward a Smart EU Energy Policy: Rationale and 22 Recommendations

We are in desperate need of an EU Energy Policy. The facts are that, yes, there is indeed an EU Energy Policy. It is a policy based on a vision, a vision with three components. The policy is aiming for “markets, competition and efficiency”, it is equally focussing on “a sustainable energy economy”, and thirdly, it wants to “secure the EU’s energy supply”. Three objectives, three separate action lines. Balancing the three objectives in an integrated approach is challenging and difficult. To what extent is the market approach consistent with the other two policy packages? What impact does a climate package with tradable emission rights and non-tradable targets for green energy have on the market designs for gas and electricity? Are the necessary investments in new pipes and wires for securing our energy supplies sufficiently coming under the prevailing regulatory framework? Or, to put it differently; are we smart enough in the way in which we are making implementing steps in order to meet our stated objectives? Our paper ends with a proposed new vision and a set of 22 recommendations to the new European Commission.energy policy; climate change; security of energy supply; EU internal marke