A Critical Take on the Policy Recommendations of the EU High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence

The European Commission recently published the policy recommendations of its “High-Level Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence”: a heavily anticipated document, particularly in the context of the stated ambition of the new Commission President to regulate in that area. This article argues that these recommendations have significant deficits in a range of areas. It analyses a selection of the Group’s proposals in context of the governance of artificial intelligence more broadly, focusing on issues of framing, representation and expertise, and on the lack of acknowledgement of key issues of power and infrastructure underpinning modern information economies and practices of optimisation

Swimming capabilities of stoats and the threat to inshore sanctuaries

Stoats (Mustela erminea) are small carnivorous mammals which were introduced into New Zealand in the late 19th century, and have now become widespread invasive pests. Stoats have long been known to be capable of swimming to islands 1-1.5 km offshore. Islands further out have usually been assumed to be safe from invasion, therefore routine stoat monitoring on them has been considered un-necessary. Recent incursions, including a stoat found on Rangitoto Island (3 km offshore) in 2010, and another which was deduced to have reached Kapiti (5 km offshore) in 2009, along with distribution modelling and genetic studies, strongly support the proposition that stoats can swim much further than 1.5 km. Acceptance of this hypothesis depends on estimating the probability that such small animals could indeed swim so far unaided. This paper reports the results of a project designed to assist this debate by recording the paddling action, speed and minimal endurance of nine stoats observed (once each) swimming against an endless current in a flume at the Aquatic Research Centre, University of Waikato. Four of the five males and two of the four females could hold a position for at least five minutes against the maximum current available, averaging 1.36 ± 0.336 km/h. In steady swimming against a current of c. 1 km/hr, they all used a rapid quadripedal paddling action (averaging 250 strokes/min, stronger with the spread forepaws). Four of the nine swam strongly for >1 h, including one female who covered 1.8 km in nearly 2 h non- stop. Results from such artificial conditions cannot be conclusive, but support suggestions that wild stoats could indeed swim much further than 1.5 km, hence we conclude that the “risk zone” for stoat reinvasions of inshore islands has been seriously under-estimated

Is That Your Final Decision? Multi-Stage Profiling, Selective Effects, and Article 22 of the GDPR

Provisions in many data protection laws require a legal basis, or at the very least safeguards, for significant, solely automated decisions; Article 22 of the GDPR is the most notable. - Little attention has been paid to Article 22 in light of decision-making processes with multiple stages, potentially both manual and automated, and which together might impact upon decision subjects in different ways. - Using stylised examples grounded in real-world systems, we raise five distinct complications relating to interpreting Article 22 in the context of such multi-stage profiling systems. - These are: the potential for selective automation on subsets of data subjects despite generally adequate human input; the ambiguity around where to locate the decision itself; whether 'significance' should be interpreted in terms of any potential effects or only selectively in terms of realised effects; the potential for upstream automation processes to foreclose downstream outcomes despite human input; and that a focus on the final step may distract from the status and importance of upstream processes. - We argue that the nature of these challenges will make it difficult for courts or regulators to distil a set of clear, fair and consistent interpretations for many realistic contexts

TAXATION-DEBT REDUCTION

Inherent in an economy financed by a large volume of credit, extending over varying intervals of time, is the problem of debt reduction and revalorization. The ramifications of this problem in the income tax field have long intrigued legal scholars and confounded the courts. A recent case illustrates anew the danger, to client and counsel, lurking in the assumption that the tax significances of debt reduction have finally been reduced to mathematical certainty. The taxpayer borrowed $90,000 from a bank in 1925, using the funds to pay off encumbrances upon, and make improvements on, a piece of property. As a part of the transaction he executed bonds, secured by a mortgage on the property, which the bank sold to the public. The taxpayer retired the bonds as they matured until the advent of the depression when he found it necessary to secure extensions of interest and principal payments. Finally, in 1938, 1939, and 1940, he repurchased certain of the bonds at less than par, making some purchases through the secretary of a bondholders\u27 committee, and through a security house; and others directly from the bondholders. The commissioner adjusted the taxpayer\u27s tax returns for those years by adding to income the difference between the issue price and retirement price of each bond. Before the Tax Court a majority felt that the gain resultant from the committee and security house purchases was income, as these lacked the personal element necessary to find gifts from the bondholders. But they thought the gains from the direct purchases were gifts within the doctrine of Helvering v. American Dental Co. Six judges dissented on the grounds that the Supreme Court never intended to make the tax consequences of bond repurchases dependent on the degree of acquaintance between debtor and bondholder. Hence, they argued, the gains from all purchases were income under United States v. Kirby Lumber Co. On cross appeal to the seventh circuit it was held that, since none of the purchases was made in an open market, the gains from all the purchases were gifts to the taxpayer from the bondholders. Thus is provided fresh impetus for the spirited controversy as to when, if ever, a taxpayer realizes taxable gain through the reduction of his indebtedness

JUDGMENTS--CRITERIA OF FINALITY OF STATE COURT DECREES FOR THE PURPOSE OF FEDERAL REVIEW

At the suit of the plaintiff, an incorporated religious organization, a permanent injunction issued from a lower state court enjoining the enforcement of certain ordinances of the defendant City of Los Angeles on the ground that they violated the plaintiff\u27s religious liberty under the Constitutions of California and the United States. The case was appealed to the Supreme Court of California which sustained the ordinances as Constitutional and entered a judgment which provided . . . the Judgment . . . in the above cause . . . is hereby reversed. On plaintiff\u27s appeal, defendant questioned the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court of the United States on the ground that in California a simple reversal without direction to the trial court does not dispose of the case but remands it for a new trial. Held, appeal dismissed; the decree of the California Supreme Court was not a final judgment which might be appealed under section 237 of the Judicial Code. The Gospel Army v. The City of Los Angeles, (U.S. 1947) 67 S. Ct. 1428

ABATEMENT AND REVIVAL-FEDERAL COURTS-ABATEMENT OF ACTION BY FEDERAL OFFICIAL UNLESS SUCCESSOR SUBSTITUTED AS PARTY PLAINTIFF WITHIN SIX MONTHS

The administrator of the Office of Price Administration began an action on behalf of the United States against the defendant to enforce certain penalties for the violation of the Emergency Price Control Act. While the action was pending the administrator was succeeded in office. Counsel for the government, however, failed to move to substitute his successor as a party plaintiff until more than six months thereafter. The defendant then moved to dismiss the action on the grounds that unless such substitution was made within the six months specified by section 780 of the Judicial Code and Rule 25(d), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the action abated. Held, motion granted. Bowles v. Ohlhausen, (D.C. Ill. 1947) 71 F. Supp. 199

WILLS-VALIDITY OF A STATUTORY COMPROMISE OF A WILL CONTEST WHICH ALTERS OR REDUCES POSSIBLE INTERESTS CREATED UNDER THE WILL

Testator\u27s will created a trust of realty and personalty worth about nine million dollars. Small life annuities, subject to spendthrift provisions, were given to various heirs, with remainder on the death of the survivor of two grandsons to T\u27s legal heirs. Several years after T\u27s death the heirs filed a bill to construe the will, claiming that it gave them vested remainders in the trust estate. Pending decision, all the present heirs executed an agreement to compromise the controversy which provided for immediate distribution to themselves of six million dollars from the corpus. The agreement was submitted to the court for approval under the Dodge Act, providing for the compromise of will contests. Decision was then rendered in the construction suit that by \u27\u27legal heirs T referred to those persons who would be his heirs at the termination of the trust, rather than the persons who were his heirs at the time of his death. Accordingly, approval of the compromise was denied upon the ground that it was not fair and reasonable to work such a substantial reduction in the estate to which unborn persons might ultimately succeed. On appeal by the heirs, held, affirmed. Hay v. LeBus, 317 Mich. 698, 27 N.W. (2d) 309 (1947)