Physician-Assisted Suicide: A Common Law Roadmap for State Courts

Part I examines the development of the law legalizing passively hastening death and how this development relied significantly on distinguishing passively hastening death from actively hastening death. Part II subjects the arguments used to legitimate passively hastening death to a traditional criminal law analysis and demonstrates their weaknesses which were simple to conceal when there was little enthusiasm for, and discussion of, the legalization of actively hastening death. The central role of consent in legitimating passively hastening death is analyzed in Part III. Although passively hastening death technically satisfies all of the elements of the crimes of assisted suicide and homicide, it is not illegal because it is legitimated by consent – consent of a competent patient or consent of the surrogate of an incompetent patient. Consent is the mechanism for implementing the fundamental principle. This analysis is applied to actively hastening death in Part IV. Because there is no legally significant distinction between actively and passively hastening death, consent legitimates actively hastening death just as it does passively hastening death. Nonetheless, Part V explores other reasons why actively hastening death ought to be prohibited and concludes that any arguments of any substance that can be made against actively hastening death can be equally applied to passively hastening death and should, therefore, be rejected in the latter as they are in the former. Safeguards must be established to prevent abuse of actively hastening death just as they have for passively hastening death

A comparison of lyman alpha and HeI lambda 10830 line structure and variations in early-type star atmospheres

Fabry-Perot interferometric profiles for fifty of the early-type stars including supergiants, eclipsing binaries, Bp and Ap stars, Be and shell stars, and variable stars have been obtained. Results for beta Persei (Algol) just before primary and secondary eclipses show strong emission profiles lasting about 0.1 phase. An absorption line was seen during secondary eclipse. Bright supergiant stars (O9-A2) show time-variable, complicated absorption/emission profiles similar to those obtained for the Be/shell stars

A Monte Carlo approach to mean-square approximation

Monte Carlo algorithm for mean square approximation

A comparison of lyman alpha and He lambda 10830 line structures and variations in early-type star atmospheres

Line profiles were first obtained at maximum velocity separation of the spectroscopic binary Spica (alpha Vir), and then high resolution spectrophotometric images of selected features in the 1.1 micron spectrum of Comet Kohoutek were obtained in order to gain insight into the structures and variations in early-type star atmospheres

New approaches to some methodological problems of meteor science

Several low cost approaches to continuous radioscatter monitoring of the incoming meteor flux are described. Preliminary experiments were attempted using standard time frequency stations WWVH and CHU (on frequencies near 15 MHz) during nighttime hours. Around-the-clock monitoring using the international standard aeronautical beacon frequency of 75 MHz was also attempted. The techniques are simple and can be managed routinely by amateur astronomers with relatively little technical expertise. Time series analysis can now be performed using relatively inexpensive microcomputers. Several algorithmic approaches to the analysis of meteor rates are discussed. Methods of obtaining optimal filter predictions of future meteor flux are also discussed

The Stature of the Colombian Elite Before the Onset of Industrialization, 1870-1919

The average height of Colombian women increased 8.95 cm between 1905 and 1985 and of men 8.96 cm in the same time period. Thus the country was a success story according to international standards in this respect. The information for the adult height of Colombians born between 1905 and 1985 was obtained from a database with more than 9 million observations constructed with the national ID cards. This implies that the results are indicative of what happened to the overall population. For the pre-industrial era in Colombia, which is before the 20th century, information on height is only available from 1870. The source in this case is the records of the passports issued to Colombian citizens, for which we have obtained about 17.000 observations. The analysis of those records for the period 1870-1919 reveals some striking results. In the first place, the long run behavior of height was stable, unlike what is observed with the national ID card records, beginning in 1905, in which case heights were increasing. The group included in the passport records is much taller than those from the ID card. For the period 1905-1909 the average passport height for men was 168.7 cm compared with 162 cm for national ID cards. In the case of women the former had an average height of 158 cm and the later 150 cm. Another characteristic found in the passport sample is that there were almost no regional differences, unlike what is observed in the case of the national ID cards. The reason why the behavior of the height of Colombians obtained in the passports differs from the one recorded in the national ID cards is that in the 19th century and early 20th century Colombians who traveled abroad, mainly to Europe and the US, belonged to the elite. Thus, they seemed to have good levels of nutrition and living conditions which made them relatively tall even by the standards of European countries at that time. However, although tall by the standards of the 19th century these Colombians had an average height which was below Colombians born in 1985. While the average height for men in this group in 1900 was 168.2 cms, Colombians born in 1985 grew to an average height of 170.6 cm. Thus, the health conditions under which the elite found itself was holding their height down. Only until the late 1920’s, when the earliest the international advances in modern medical technology would have been felt, could many of the health impediments for advances in height would have begun to be eliminated.

A Tropical Sucess Story: A Century of Improvements in the Biological Standard of Living, Colombia 1910-2002

Since the late 1970's there has a been a growing interest among economic historians in the study of the behavior of height over time, as an alternative method for measuring the standard of living. Adult height reflects the net nutritional status of a person during the years of physical growth, which is influenced by food intake, health, and work effort. Thus is provides a measure of the biological standard of living, one of the dimensions of the overall standard of living. This paper studies the behavior in the height of Colombian women and men born since 1910 to 1984. For Colombians born in 1984 the adult height was recorded in 2002, when they received their citizenschip card. Thus, the height data discussed in this paper reflect the behavior from 1910 to 2002 of the determinants of height. The information that is used comes from the citizenship card (cédula de ciudadanía). with 8.454.348 observations, this is one of the largest databases, relative to the population of the country, found in the literature of anthropometric history to date. In economic terms Colombia was a success story during the twentieth century. The rate of growt of per capita GDP from 1905 to 2000 was 2.3% one of the highest in Latin America. This economic success was reflected in several dimensions of the standard of living, one of which is the height of its population. Colombian men born in 1984 were 7.9 cm.taller than those born in 1910,while in the case of women the increase was of 8.8 cm.,an enormous improvement in physical well being which was achieved in only three generations. This paper is divided in three main sections. First,the characteristics of the database are discussed. Then the national evolution of height for Colombians born in the period 1910-1984 is presented. Next, the behavior in the average height of the departments, the main sub-national territorial units, is compared and a convergence analysis is performed for the period as a whole. Finally, some conclusions are draw in the last section.