The Paradoxes of the Liberal Ethics of Non-interference

We analyse the liberal ethics of non-interference applied to social choice. Two liberal principles capturing non-interfering views of society, inspired by J.S. Mill's conception of liberty are examined, which capture the idea that society should not penalise agents after changes in their situation that do not affect others. Two paradoxes of liberal approaches are highlighted. First, it is shown that a restricted view of non-interference, as reflected in the Individual Damage Principle, together with some standard axioms in social choice leads straight to welfare egalitarianism. Second, it is proved that every weakly paretian social welfare ordering that satisfies a general principle of noninterference must be dictatorial. Both paradoxes raise important issues for liberal approaches in social choice and political philosophy.Liberalism, Noninterference, Equality, Impossibility

Intergenerational Justice in the Hobbesian State of Nature

We analyse the issue of justice in the allocation of resources across generations. Our starting point is that if all generations have a claim to natural resources, then each generation should be entitled to exercise veto power on the unpalatable choices of the other generations. We analyse this situation as one of bargaining à la Rubinstein, Safra and Thomson [15], which incorporates a notion of justice as mutual advantage, rather than justice as impartiality, as in the Kantian-Rawlsian tradition. Our framework captures some key aspects of the interaction between isolated agents in a Hobbesian state of nature, in which agents are not placed behind a veil of ignorance, but none of them is sufficiently strong to impose their will against all others (state of war of all against all). We analyse some new social welfare relations emerging from this Hobbesian framework. JEL Categories: D63, Q01Intergenerational justice; bargaining; Hobbes; social choice.

Opportunities as chances: maximising the probability that everybody succeeds

Opportunities in society are commonly interpreted as chances of success. Within this interpretation, should opportunities be equalised? We show that a liberal principle of justice and a limited principle of social rationality imply that opportunity proles should be evaluated by means of a Nashcriterion. The interpretation is new: the social objective should be to maximise the chance that everybody in society succeeds. In particular, the failure of even only one individual must be considered maximally detrimental. We also study a renement of this criterion and its extension to problems of intergenerational justice

An Energy Autonomous House Equipped with a Solar PV Hydrogen Conversion System

The use of RES in buildings is difficult for their random nature; therefore the plants using photovoltaic solar collectors must be connected to a power supply or interconnected with Energy accumulators if the building is isolated. The conversion of electricity into hydrogen technology is best suited to solve the problem and allows you to transfer the solar energy captured from day to night, from summer to winter. This paper presents the feasibility study for a house powered by PV cogeneration solar collectors that reverse the electricity on the control unit that you command by a PC to power the household, using a heat pump, an electrolytic cell for the production of hydrogen to accumulate; control units sorting to the utilities the electricity produced by the fuel cell. The following are presented: The Energy analysis of the building, the plant design, economic analysi

Solar Energy System in A Small Town Constituted of A Network of Photovoltaic Collectors to Produce Electricity for Homes and Hydrogen for Transport Services of Municipality

The supply of Energy resources to the villages located in inland and hilly regions, is disadvantageous both for the domestic and transport purposes. Because these conditions may produce the depopulation of the inland zone, a smart way to ease this inconvenience is to produce in situ electrical Energy for houses and fuel for cars, getting them from an available Energy source in the village, as the solar Energy. The only technology to produce hydrogen ecologically and to minimize CO2 emission, is through RES (Renewable Energy Sources). The solar energy plants must use the surfaces of buildings instead of occupying other green areas useful for agricultural activities. On this basis, we propose in this paper a demonstrative project for a village in Sardinia, consisting of photovoltaic collectors connected in a network, to provide electricity to homes and hydrogen for transport purposes

Root dynamics and soil-enzyme activities in field bean/barley intercrops

The study and design of cropping systems that better exploit ecological processes is a priority of the scientific community and intercrops, involving two or more crop species growing simultaneously on the same field, are considered valuable to increase the productivity of traditional family farming and for the sustainable intensification of industrial agriculture. Advantages of intercrops are based on ecological principles such as diversity, complementarity, facilitation and replacement, which are enhanced in cereal/legume associations because of the differences in the morphology and distribution of the root systems and in the use of different N sources. Understanding the complexity of plant-plant and plant-soil interactions is crucial because beneficial complementarity and facilitation relationships can rapidly turn into negative competition. The field experiment consisted of a barley (Hordeum vulgare L. subsp. polystichum, var. Jallon) field bean (Vicia faba minor Beck, var. Vesuvio) intercrop (IC) and the respective sole crops (SC) grown at low (0 kg ha-1) and high (120 kg N ha-1 and 100 kg P ha-1) fertilizer inputs. Seed density was100 seeds m-2 for Fb, 250 seeds m-2 for B, and 100:125 seeds m-2 in the Fb:B IC, where plants were arranged in a 1:1 row ratio spaced 15 cm. At barley heading, soil and root samples were collected from the 0-20 cm soil profile and roots were cleaned from the soil with a water flow and then separated by species. Root morphological traits such as length, diameter, surface area and volume were analysed with WinRhizo, then samples were oven dried. On soil samples dehydrogenase, ß-glucosidase, alkaline phosphatase and arylsulphatase activities were determined, and the geometric mean (GMea) of the assayed soil enzyme activities was calculated. Root density of IC was intermediate between Fb and B SC, the former displaying the highest density on dw basis, the latter on length basis. In both SCs root density was higher without fertilizer input, demonstrating a higher investment in roots in response to NP limitation. In contrast, fertiliser input increased root density in the IC, which we interpreted as a competitive root growth stimulated by the higher nutrient availability in soil. The specific root length (SRL, m/g) increased in Fb SC in response to NP supply, demonstrating an energy investment in root elongation instead in feeding N2-fixing bacteria when mineral N was available, which is confirmed by the lower nodule density. The opposite occurred in the B SC, where SRL was reduced by mineral supply. In the IC, NP input increased the SRL of both species, demonstrating strong interspecific competition for nutrient acquisition and not complementarity, as it is generally supposed for cereal/legume intercrops. As a result of the higher investment of resources in root elongation, in Fb, nodule density decreased dramatically. In the fertilized IC soil also the GMea was higher, suggesting a major production of exudates from roots

The involvement of indoleacetic acid in paradormancy and sylleptic shoot development of grafted peach trees and hybrid rootstoks.

The physiological mechanisms controlling the induction of lateral branching, which is part of the expression of growth vigour, were investigated in two hybrid rootstocks (GF 677 and Mr.S. 2/5) widely used in peach [Prunus persica (L.) Batsch] cultivation that were grafted to a nectarine scion (cv. 'Big Top'). As expected, field-grown rootstocks showed different degrees of vigour and also induced distinct patterns of growth on the scion. The higher the rootstock vigour, the greater the number and length of lateral shoots developed by the scion. Hence, the growth vigour affected paradormancy and we hypothesized that auxin, which is known to suppress axillary bud development following bud break when transported basipetally along the shoot, might mediate rootstock-induced branching in the top of the tree. The role of indole-3-acetic acid as a hormonal signal in lateral branching was assessed by analysing its concentration in apical and axillary buds collected from growing shoots, both intact and at different times after apex removal. Shoot pruning was used as a means to force axillary buds to overcome paradormancy, assuming that their responses would reflect their intrinsic capacity of resuming growth. The development of lateral buds of both grafted scions and intact rootstocks was positively correlated with the respective auxin concentration and following shoot apex removal the relationships became stronger. Therefore, auxin may be responsible for mediating the expression of growth vigour. The invigorating effect of a rootstock would then be dependent on its ability of inducing high auxin levels in axillary buds. The hormone would act directly within bud tissues to stimulate their growth following bud break

Phytoremediation for improving the quality of effluents from a conventional tannery wastewater treatment plant

In the present study, the quality of effluents from a conventional wastewater treatment plant in Italy has been analyzed. Residual level of contamination by 4-nnonylphenol, mono- and di-ethoxylated nonylphenols has been recorded in the effluents that resulted to be also phytotoxic and genotoxic. The possibility of exploiting phytoremediation as a sustainable tertiary treatment for the depletion of the priority pollutants and for the reduction in the residual toxicity has been verified at mesocosm scale. The phyto-based treatment has been performed by the exploitation of Phragmites australis by either a bacterialassisted and not assisted approach. In relation to the bacterial-assisted approach, two new bacterial strains, capable of using the nonylphenols as a sole carbon source, have been isolated. One was identified as a plant growth-promoting rhizobacteria (PGPR) belonging to the Stenotrophomonas species, and the second one was classified as a Sphingobium species strain. Both strains were independently bioaugmented in the P. australis rhizosphere. In relation to the not assisted approach, the phyto-based process determined 87, 70 and 87 % for 4-n-nonylphenol, mono-ethoxylated nonylphenols and di-ethoxylated nonylphenols, respectively. The toxicological assessment of the process evidenced the complete depletion of either the phytotoxicity or the genotoxicity of the treated effluents. With reference to the bacterial-assisted approach, the PGPR Stenotrophomonas species strain resulted to be capable of significantly increasing the efficiency of the phyto-based process in nonylphenol depletion up to 88 % for the 4-n-nonylphenol, 84 % for the mono-ethoxylated nonylphenol and 71 % for the di-ethoxylated nonylphenol