Sex Tourism and the Ethics of Contingent Responsibility

Sitting in the garden of the bar Chez Angeline in the perfumed island of Nosy Bé in Madagascarperfumed literally by culture of the Ylang-Ylang flowerI was transfixed by the singing of a raggedy minstrel with a home-made vahila, the Madagascan guitar. It was a song of warning, about AIDS, and the words were as follows: Vazaha Vazaha Vazaha Malagasy Malagasy Malagasy Hélas Hélas Hélas après le plaisir de lamour SIDA il est là Oh quelle chose SIDA SIDA nous guette SIDA nous cherche SIDA nous trouv

Boxer Deconstructionist

A ghost is haunting Australian politics, the ghost of Aboriginal power. Perhaps in the way that Marxism has been a `critical factor in the articulation of world politics, Aboriginal power has been a spectre in white Australian history. And despite all the struggles, the regular announcements of victory, assimilation, `reform or ten point plans, Aboriginal power persists. Marxism, too, continues to haunt the languages we use to analyse politics and history.2 How does one explain the persistence, even the growth of Aboriginal power; the power it uses to unravel those often-held certainties of politics and history

Clues on the obscured active nucleus of NGC 1365

Copyright © European Southern Observatory (ESO) 1999We have analyzed optical spectra (ESO-CASPEC) from the composite starburst-Seyfert galaxy NGC 1365 taken on the nucleus and the following positions (relative to nucleus): 2 arcsec N, 2 arcsec W; 2 arcsec S; 4 arcsec S; 5 arcsec S; 10 arcsec S and 20 arcsec W. A nuclear broad-line component indicative of the AGN source is confirmed in Hβ and Hα . Narrow-line widths vary between 150 and 200 km s(-1) . Extranuclear line ratios in the observed regions are mostly consistent with the lines being formed in HII regions. One of the exceptions is a rise of [OIII]lambda5007 /Hβ from 0.5 to 5 within 5 arcsec (from west to east) across the nucleus suggesting the transition from gas ionized by stars to gas ionized by the active nucleus. Faint emission-line gas observed 20 arcsec W of the nucleus (called region II) shows line ratios lying in the AGN part of diagnostic diagrams. While at first glance shocks by bar streaming motions appear to be a suggestive explanation for these line ratios we stress that there is no positive evidence for the velocities > 300 km s(-1) required for this mechanism. Another, presently more likely, explanation is that region II belongs to the far cone of the bipolar nuclear outflow which can be glimpsed through the dusty disk. Photoionization of a single-density cloud system by a diluted AGN continuum reproduces the measured line ratios, but leads via the ionization parameter to an intrinsic Hα luminosity of the obscured AGN of ~ 10(42) erg s(-1) of which less than ~ 4% are observed in the central few arcseconds. Dust obscuration could explain Hα but its concomitant gas column cannot account for the lack of Seyfert-1 typical hard X-rays from the nucleus. Based on observations collected at the European Southern Observatory, La Silla, ChileHartmut Schulz, Stefanie Komossa, Clemens Schmitz, and Anita Muck

Gradient-free quantum optimization on NISQ devices

Variational Quantum Eigensolvers (VQEs) have recently attracted considerable attention. Yet, in practice, they still suffer from the efforts for estimating cost function gradients for large parameter sets or resource-demanding reinforcement strategies. Here, we therefore consider recent advances in weight-agnostic learning and propose a strategy that addresses the trade-off between finding appropriate circuit architectures and parameter tuning. We investigate the use of NEAT-inspired algorithms which evaluate circuits via genetic competition and thus circumvent issues due to exceeding numbers of parameters. Our methods are tested both via simulation and on real quantum hardware and are used to solve the transverse Ising Hamiltonian and the Sherrington-Kirkpatrick spin model.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figures, comments welcome

Flavor Ratios of Astrophysical Neutrinos: Implications for Precision Measurements

We discuss flavor-mixing probabilities and flavor ratios of high energy astrophysical neutrinos. In the first part of this paper, we expand the neutrino flavor-fluxes in terms of the small parameters U_{e3} and pi/4 - theta_{23}, and show that there are universal first and second order corrections. The second order term can exceed the first order term, and so should be included in any analytic study. We also investigate the probabilities and ratios after a further expansion around the tribimaximal value of sin^2 theta_{12} = 1/3. In the second part of the paper, we discuss implications of deviations of initial flavor ratios from the usually assumed, idealized flavor compositions for pion, muon-damped, and neutron beam sources, viz., (1 : 2 : 0), (0 : 1 : 0), and (1 : 0 : 0), respectively. We show that even small deviations have significant consequences for the observed flavor ratios at Earth. If initial flavor deviations are not taken into account in analyses, then false inferences for the values in the PMNS matrix elements (angles and phase) may result.Comment: 32 pages, 15 figures. Minor changes, matches version in JHE

We must become gatekeepers : editing indigenous writing

With the proliferation of Indigenous texts currently published by specialist and mainstream publishers, non-Indigenous editors increasingly find themselves negotiating the uncomfortable territories of race, politics and power for which current training (in an Australian context) leaves them poorly prepared. Indigenous writer Anita Heiss advocates the employment of Indigenous editors as an \u27ideal\u27 solution, though few are currently working in the Australian industry. Margaret McDonell, an experienced non-Indigenous editor of Indigenous texts, suggests non-Indigenous editors need to \u27undertake a journey of learning\u27 during which \u27assumptions, biases, tastes and preconceptions\u27 are examined. Yet this presents a difficult task within a postcolonial society, when, as identified by Clare Bradford, even the classification of texts into genres such as fiction and the short story represents an entirely Eurocentric construct, \u27not readily correspond[ing] with Aboriginal schemata\u27. The Australian Society of Authors\u27 discussion paper \u27Writing about Indigenous Australia: Some Issues to Consider and Protocols to Follow\u27 provides practical guidelines that may be adapted for editorial use. This article canvasses these and other ideas with a focus on establishing an ethical and appropriately sensitive cross-cultural approach to editing Indigenous writing.<br /

The Duty-cycle of Gamma-ray Blazars: a New Approach, New Results

We study several properties of blazars detected in the gamma-ray energy range by comparing the EGRET sources with a sample of radio blazars which can be considered possible gamma-ray candidates. We define three classes: non-gamma-ray blazars, blazars with quasi-steady gamma-ray emission, and gamma-ray blazars with substantial activity level. By combining the information of detected and candidate AGNs, we characterise the blazar activity, including the discovery of a region of consistency between the gamma-ray flaring duty-cycle and the recurrence time between flares. We also find a possible relation between the activity index of FSRQs and their black hole mass.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, to appear in the proceedings of the Gamma 2004 Symposium on High Energy Gamma Ray Astronomy, Heidelberg, July 2004 (AIP Proceedings Series). More detailed results are presented in Vercellone et al., 2004, MNRAS, 353, 89

Exploring the relation between (sub-)millimeter radiation and gamma-ray emission in blazars with Planck and Fermi

The coexistence of Planck and Fermi satellites in orbit has enabled the exploration of the connection between the (sub-)millimeter and gamma-ray emission in a large sample of blazars. We find that the gamma-ray emission and the (sub-)mm luminosities are correlated over five orders of magnitude. However, this correlation is not significant at some frequency bands when simultaneous observations are considered. The most significant statistical correlations, on the other hand, arise when observations are quasi-simultaneous within 2 months. Moreover, we find that sources with an approximate spectral turnover in the middle of the mm-wave regime are more likely to be strong gamma-ray emitters. These results suggest a physical relation between the newly injected plasma components in the jet and the high levels of gamma-ray emission.Comment: 39 pages, 6 figures. Accepted for publication in ApJ; for an emulated ApJ version, see http://www.metsahovi.fi/~leon/submm_gamma/ms_16apr12.pd

The Touch of Iconoclasm

This article reflects on some depicted, intentional acts of iconoclasm undertaken by Isis in Northern Iraq, and viewed as online videos. It attempts to consider what makes these moving images compelling to audiences who share an orientation to the protection and preservation of ancient artefacts. In doing so it prompts a reflection on their circulation as part of stories that get told about cultural heritage, and particularly the simple civilizational oppositions that get set up between ‘Western’ and ‘Islamic’ culture. Centring on the significance of the sensation of touch to practices of cultural inscription, it suggests that the Northern Iraq videos animate forms of synaesthesic material engagement that are denied by the modernist technologies of museum culture