Justice, Reciprocity and the Internalisation of Punishment in Victims of Crime

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Neuroscience and Criminal Justice: Time for a Copernican Revolution ?

The main purpose of this Article is to argue for a fundamental change in the conceptual orientation of criminal justice: from one based on concepts such as free will, desert, and moral responsibility, to one based on empirical science. The Article describes research in behavioral genetics, acquired brain injuries, and psychological traumatization in relation to criminality. This research has reached a level of development at which the traditional approach to criminality is no longer tenable and should be discarded. I argue that mental health legislation provides a model that could be adapted and applied to offenders

Heat and extension at mid- and lower crustal levels of the Rio Grande rift

The process by which large amounts (50 to 200 percent) of crustal extension are produced was concisely described by W. Hamilton in 1982 and 1983. More recently, England, Sawyer, P. Morgan and others have moved toward quantifying models of lithospheric thinning by incorporating laboratory and theoretical data on rock rheology as a function of composition, temperature, and strain rate. Hamilton's description identifies three main crustal layers, each with a distinctive mechanical behavior; brittle fracturing and rotation in the upper crust, discontinuous ductile flow in the middle crust and laminar ductile flow in the lower crust. The temperature and composition dependent brittle-ductile transition essentially defines the diffuse boundary between upper and middle crust. It was concluded that the heat responsible for the highly ductile nature of the lower crust and the lensoidal and magma body structures at mid-crustal depths in the rift was infused into the crust by relatively modest ( 10 percent by mass) magmatic upwelling (feeder dikes) from Moho levels. Seismic velocity-versus-depth data, supported by gravity modeling and the fact that volumes of rift related volcanics are relatively modest ( 6000 cubic km) for the Rio Grande system, all imply velocities and densities too small to be consistent with a massive, composite, mafic intrusion in the lower crust

Graduates' responses to student loan debt in England: "sort of like an acceptance, but with anxiety attached"

In 2020–2021, 94% of undergraduates in England took out government-backed loans to fund their higher education. The growing and widespread use of student loans in England, mounting student debt, and governments’ increasing dependence on tuition fees underwritten by loans to finance public higher education raise important questions which this paper seeks to address. Specifically, the paper asks how do graduates respond to student loan debt and what does this tells us about the nature of the relationship between the graduate debtor and the state lender? We also question the usefulness of symbolic violence as a sociological lens to better understand graduates’ different patterns of responses and reactions to student loan debt and their relationship with the state lender. Our analysis draws on 98 in-depth qualitative interviews conducted with English graduates between 2020 and 2021. We conclude that a more comprehensive explanation requires an exploration of both symbolic violence and structural violence and a re-appraisal of the word ‘violence’ to better represent the wide range of graduates’ responses

No Time for Time from No-Time

Programs in quantum gravity often claim that time emerges from fundamentally timeless physics. In the semiclassical time program time arises only after approximations are taken. Here we ask what justifies taking these approximations and show that time seems to sneak in when answering this question. This raises the worry that the approach is either unjustified or circular in deriving time from no-time.Comment: Presented at Philosophy of Science Association 2021 meetin

An Alternative Interpretation of Statistical Mechanics

In this paper I propose an interpretation of classical statistical mechanics that centers on taking seriously the idea that probability measures represent complete states of statistical mechanical systems. I show how this leads naturally to the idea that the stochasticity of statistical mechanics is associated directly with the observables of the theory rather than with the microstates (as traditional accounts would have it). The usual assumption that microstates are representationally significant in the theory is therefore dispensable, a consequence which suggests interesting possibilities for developing non-equilibrium statistical mechanics and investigating inter-theoretic answers to the foundational questions of statistical mechanics

Modeling the Spread of the Zika Virus at the 2016 Olympics

The Zika Virus is an arbovirus that is spread by mosquitoes of the \emph{Aedes} genus and causes mild fever-like symptoms. It is strongly associated with microcephaly, a condition that affects development of fetal brains. With the recent emergence of Zika in Brazil, we develop an agent-based model to track mosquitoes and humans throughout the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro to investigate how the Olympics might affect the spread of the virus. There are many unknowns regarding the spread and prevalence of Zika, with approximately 80\% of infected individuals unaware of their infectious status. We therefore discuss results of experiments where several unknown parameters were varied, including the rate at which mosquitoes successfully bite humans, the percentage of initially infected mosquitoes, and the sizes of the human and mosquito populations. From these experiments, we make initial predictions regarding effective control measures for the spread of Zika

Graduate indebtedness: its perceived effects on behaviour and life choices – a literature review

Around the world, student loan debt is rising. Growing numbers of students rely on student loans to pay for their higher education and their levels of borrowing are increasing compared with previous decades. In countries like England it is anticipated that the majority of graduates will be repaying their loans for most of their working lives. For many, having student loan debt is no longer a short-term status and it is becoming the new normal. There is now value in exploring how student loan debt influences individuals’ choices, behaviour and life events once they have left higher education. Yet, the academic literature on the impact of student loan debt on decisions made after leaving higher education and later in life is scarce. The few studies available, mostly based in the US, tend to show that individuals with student loan debt make different career choices, delay buying a home, have worse mental health, and are less well-off financially throughout their lifetime as well as being less prepared for retirement. Student loan debt amongst women is also negatively related to family formation. The possible critical impact of student loan debt on the future of our societies and economies calls for further research to fill the gaps in this limited extant literature. This includes moving beyond its US-focus, its dependence on secondary datasets, and its narrow focus within a small number of disciplines. Future research should aim to improve and expand methodological research designs, in particular by using qualitative methods, analysing longitudinal datasets, improving sampling, and trying to show causality. Questions asked in these studies should encompass such issues as the evaluation of possible delays in decision-making, the difference between completers and non-completers, the importance of attitude to debt, and the impact of different student loan repayment plans

Benefit, Harm, and Cost-effectiveness Associated With Magnetic Resonance Imaging Before Biopsy in Age-based and Risk-stratified Screening for Prostate Cancer

IMPORTTANCE: If magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) mitigates overdiagnosis of prostate cancer while improving the detection of clinically significant cases, including MRI in a screening program for prostate cancer could be considered. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the benefit-harm profiles and cost-effectiveness associated with MRI before biopsy compared with biopsy-first screening for prostate cancer using age-based and risk-stratified screening strategies. DESIGN, SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: This decision analytical model used a life-table approach and was conducted between December 2019 and July 2020. A hypothetical cohort of 4.48 million men in England aged 55 to 69 years were analyzed and followed-up to 90 years of age. EXPOSURES: No screening, age-based screening, and risk-stratified screening in the hypothetical cohort. Age-based screening consisted of screening every 4 years with prostate-specific antigen between the ages of 55 and 69 years. Risk-stratified screening used age and polygenic risk profiles. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: The benefit-harm profile (deaths from prostate cancer, quality-adjusted life-years, overdiagnosis, and biopsies) and cost-effectiveness (net monetary benefit, from a health care system perspective) were analyzed. Both age-based and risk-stratified screening were evaluated using a biopsy-first and an MRI-first diagnostic pathway. Results were derived from probabilistic analyses and were discounted at 3.5% per annum. RESULTS: The hypothetical cohort included 4.48 million men in England, ranging in age from 55 to 69 years (median, 62 years). Compared with biopsy-first age-based screening, MRI-first age-based screening was associated with 0.9% (1368; 95% uncertainty interval [UI], 1370-1409) fewer deaths from prostate cancer, 14.9% (12 370; 95% UI, 11 100-13 670) fewer overdiagnoses, and 33.8% (650 500; 95% UI, 463 200-907 000) fewer biopsies. At 10-year absolute risk thresholds of 2% and 10%, MRI-first risk-stratified screening was associated with between 10.4% (7335; 95% UI, 6630-8098) and 72.6% (51 250; 95% UI, 46 070-56 890) fewer overdiagnosed cancers, respectively, and between 21.7% fewer MRIs (412 100; 95% UI, 411 400-412 900) and 53.5% fewer biopsies (1 016 000; 95% UI, 1 010 000-1 022 000), respectively, compared with MRI-first age-based screening. The most cost-effective strategies at willingness-to-pay thresholds of £20 000 (US $26 000) and £30 000 (US$39 000) per quality-adjusted life-year gained were MRI-first risk-stratified screening at 10-year absolute risk thresholds of 8.5% and 7.5%, respectively. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: In this decision analytical model of a hypothetical cohort, an MRI-first diagnostic pathway was associated with an improvement in the benefit-harm profile and cost-effectiveness of screening for prostate cancer compared with biopsy-first screening. These improvements were greater when using risk-stratified screening based on age and polygenic risk profile and may warrant prospective evaluation