A more general treatment of the philosophy of physics and the existence of universes

Natural philosophy necessarily combines the process of scientific observation with an abstract (and usually symbolic) framework, which provides a logical structure to the development of a scientific theory. The metaphysical underpinning of science includes statements about the process of science itself, and the nature of both the philosophical and material objects involved in a scientific investigation. By developing a formalism for an abstract mathematical description of inherently non-mathematical, physical objects, an attempt is made to clarify the mechanisms and implications of the philosophical tool of Ansatz. Outcomes of the analysis include a possible explanation for the philosophical issue of the 'unreasonable effectiveness' of mathematics as raised by Wigner, and an investigation into formal definitions of the terms: principles, evidence, existence and universes that are consistent with the conventions used in physics. It is found that the formalism places restrictions on the mathematical properties of objects that represent the tools and terms mentioned above. This allows one to make testable predictions regarding physics itself (where the nature of the tools of investigation is now entirely abstract) just as scientific theories make predictions about the universe at hand. That is, the mathematical structure of objects defined within the new formalism has philosophical consequences (via logical arguments) that lead to profound insights into the nature of the universe, which may serve to guide the course of future investigations in science and philosophy, and precipitate inspiring new avenues of research

Entertainment Law: Redefining the Role of Transactional Attorneys

This thesis will examine how the role of transactional lawyers and their relationships with artists in the music industry first developed and then have adapted to changes in the industry to stay relevant. This evolution is due to a number of reasons: the diminishing power of the record industry; the failure of anti-file sharing laws; and the progress of technology to make music more accessible than it has ever been around the world. Therefore, the role of what a transactional entertainment lawyer needs to do to be successful has shifted. This research is significant because while there has been extensive research on how record labels have consolidated and artists have gained more independence, there is little research offering analysis of the transformation of the legal, transactional side of the industry

Fugitive Slaves and Ship-jumping Sailors: The Enforcement and Survival of Coerced Labor

This article explores the relationship between the law of maritime labor and the law of slavery. In the eighteenth century, both sailors and slaves were part of a broad regime of unfree labor relations, with slaves, of course, the most oppressed. In the nineteenth century, an era otherwise supposedly devoted to the ideal of free labor, sailors and slaves instead remained unfree, subject to federal laws providing for the forced return to their toils if they deserted - the Merchant Seaman\u27s Act and the Fugitive Slave Act. Both of those statutes were deemed to be within Congress\u27 authority, despite questionable foundations for those conclusions on the face of the Constitution. Exploring the similarities and differences between the conditions and legal treatment of merchant seamen and slaves may yield important insights into the understanding of the congressional reaction to those conditions and the Supreme Court\u27s understanding of Congressional power

Remarks on the analyticity of subadditive pressure for products of triangular matrices

We study Falconer's subadditive pressure function with emphasis on analyticity. We begin by deriving a simple closed form expression for the pressure in the case of diagonal matrices and, by identifying phase transitions with zeros of Dirichlet polynomials, use this to deduce that the pressure is piecewise real analytic. We then specialise to the iterated function system setting and use a result of Falconer and Miao to extend our results to include the pressure for systems generated by matrices which are simultaneously triangularisable. Our closed form expression for the pressure simplifies a similar expression given by Falconer and Miao by reducing the number of equations needing to be solved by an exponential factor. Finally we present some examples where the pressure has a phase transition at a non-integer value and pose some open questions.Comment: 10 pages, 1 figure, to appear in Monatshefte f\"ur Mathemati