Lost Without Translation?: Cross-Referencing and a New Global Community of Courts

Anne-Marie Slaughter has described the new world order as characterized by some conceptual shifts, including an increasing cooperation of domestic courts across nation-state boundaries. The cross-jurisdictional referencing of legal norms and decisions, as Slaughter holds, would lead into a global community of courts. This article takes issue with that observation. We argue that for such a community to emerge, cross-referencing would need to be followed by an effective transmission of meaning from one (legal) context to another. Following recent insights in the field of International Relations norm research, however, we can expect such meanings to be contested-in particular, when different cultural repertoires operate on either side of the interactive processes. Therefore, a need for translation ensues (i.e., a translation of constitutional norms or concepts from one legal order into another). The conditions of a global community of courts are thus not easily met. In this respect, the aim of the article is to put Slaughter\u27s thesis to an empirical test. To extrapolate the normative structures of meaning-in-use the article builds on the analysis of semi-structured interviews with legal practitioners who were involved in the jurisprudence on anti-terrorism measures in two countries, Canada and Germany. During this empirical work, we found a global community of courts not yet emerged. Although the concept of community does matter as an explanatory reference for research on legal cross-referencing across national borders, our research suggests that practice of cross-referencing is still more culturally fragmented than unified, and normative references are more regionally diverse than globally shared. Moreover, the normative context within which referencing takes place remains strong, so that the meaning of foreign concepts is often constructed by means of contestation rather than transferred from one contest into another. Regulatory Translations: Expertise and Affect in Global Legal Fields, Symposium, May 16-18, 2013, Istanbul, Turke

Lost Without Translation?: Cross-Referencing and a New Global Community of Courts

Anne-Marie Slaughter has described the new world order as characterized by some conceptual shifts, including an increasing cooperation of domestic courts across nation-state boundaries. The cross-jurisdictional referencing of legal norms and decisions, as Slaughter holds, would lead into a global community of courts. This article takes issue with that observation. We argue that for such a community to emerge, cross-referencing would need to be followed by an effective transmission of meaning from one (legal) context to another. Following recent insights in the field of International Relations norm research, however, we can expect such meanings to be contested-in particular, when different cultural repertoires operate on either side of the interactive processes. Therefore, a need for translation ensues (i.e., a translation of constitutional norms or concepts from one legal order into another). The conditions of a global community of courts are thus not easily met. In this respect, the aim of the article is to put Slaughter\u27s thesis to an empirical test. To extrapolate the normative structures of meaning-in-use the article builds on the analysis of semi-structured interviews with legal practitioners who were involved in the jurisprudence on anti-terrorism measures in two countries, Canada and Germany. During this empirical work, we found a global community of courts not yet emerged. Although the concept of community does matter as an explanatory reference for research on legal cross-referencing across national borders, our research suggests that practice of cross-referencing is still more culturally fragmented than unified, and normative references are more regionally diverse than globally shared. Moreover, the normative context within which referencing takes place remains strong, so that the meaning of foreign concepts is often constructed by means of contestation rather than transferred from one contest into another. Regulatory Translations: Expertise and Affect in Global Legal Fields, Symposium, May 16-18, 2013, Istanbul, Turke

On the uniqueness of solutions to the periodic 3D Gross-Pitaevskii hierarchy

In this paper, we present a uniqueness result for solutions to the Gross-Pitaevskii hierarchy on the three-dimensional torus, under the assumption of an a priori spacetime bound. We show that this a priori bound is satisfied for factorized solutions to the hierarchy which come from solutions of the nonlinear Schr\"{o}dinger equation. In this way, we obtain a periodic analogue of the uniqueness result on $\mathbb{R}^3$ previously proved by Klainerman and Machedon, except that, in the periodic setting, we need to assume additional regularity. In particular, we need to work in the Sobolev class $H^{\alpha}$ for $\alpha>1$. By constructing a specific counterexample, we show that, on $\mathbb{T}^3$, the existing techniques don't apply in the endpoint case $\alpha=1$. This is in contrast to the known results in the non-periodic setting, where the these techniques are known to hold for all $\alpha \geq 1$. In our analysis, we give a detailed study of the crucial spacetime estimate associated to the free evolution operator. In this step of the proof, our methods rely on lattice point counting techniques based on the concept of the determinant of a lattice. This method allows us to obtain improved bounds on the number of lattice points which lie in the intersection of a plane and a set of radius $R$, depending on the number-theoretic properties of the normal vector to the plane. We are hence able to obtain a sharp range of admissible Sobolev exponents for which the spacetime estimate holds.Comment: 42 page

A better life through information technology? The techno-theological eschatology of posthuman speculative science

This is the pre-peer reviewed version of the article, published in Zygon 41(2) pp.267-288, which has been published in final form at http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118588124/issueThe depiction of human identity in the pop-science futurology of engineer/inventor Ray Kurzweil, the speculative-robotics of Carnegie Mellon roboticist Hans Moravec and the physics of Tulane University mathematics professor Frank Tipler elevate technology, especially information technology, to a point of ultimate significance. For these three figures, information technology offers the potential means by which the problem of human and cosmic finitude can be rectified. Although Moravec’s vision of intelligent robots, Kurzweil’s hope for immanent human immorality, and Tipler’s description of human-like von Neumann probe colonising the very material fabric of the universe, may all appear to be nothing more than science fictional musings, they raise genuine questions as to the relationship between science, technology, and religion as regards issues of personal and cosmic eschatology. In an attempt to correct what I see as the ‘cybernetic-totalism’ inherent in these ‘techno-theologies’, I will argue for a theology of technology, which seeks to interpret technology hermeneutically and grounds human creativity in the broader context of divine creative activity

Lexical retrieval in discourse: An early indicator of Alzheimer’s dementia

We examined the progression of lexical-retrieval deficits in individuals with neuropathologically determined Alzheimer’s disease (AD; n=23) and a comparison group without criteria for AD (n=24) to determine whether linguistic changes were a significant marker of the disease. Our participants underwent multiple administrations of a neuropsychological battery, with initial administration occurring on average 16 years prior to death. The battery included the Boston Naming Test (BNT), a letter fluency task (FAS) and written description of the Cookie Theft Picture (CTP). Repeated measures analysis revealed that the AD-group showed progressively greater decline in FAS and CTP lexical performance than the comparison group. Crosssectional time-specific group comparisons indicated that the CTP differentiated performance between the two groups at 7–9 years prior to death and FAS and BNT only at 2–4 years. These results suggest that lexical retrieval deficits in written discourse serve as an early indicator of AD

Teaching Access, or Freedom of Information Law

Based on the author\u27s experience developing and administering the course and materials, this article provides an introduction and resources to teach a graduate journalism or professional law school course on access to government, commonly called freedom of information law , which may be constructed as a capstone course in law school. The appendices provide supporting material and references

Working, travelling, and identity: J.B. Priestley’s English Journey (1934)

The motivation for travel is central to its form and content. This article addresses an under-represented area of travel writing: the travel text that results from a journey undertaken for work purposes. By considering J. B. Priestley’s English Journey as a case-study, it argues that the text’s critical reception, at first disorientated and confused, and later dominated by historical and political readings, has resulted from Priestley’s emphasis on work rather than leisure. In his text Priestley explores the relationship of work and identity, and his own position as writer and traveller is central to this, symbolised in his preoccupation with the figure of the travelling salesman

Peirce's evolutionary pragmatic idealism

In this paper I synthesize a unified system out of Peirce's life work, and name it “Peirce's Evolutionary Pragmatic Idealism”. Peirce developed this philosophy in four stages: (I) His 1868–69 theory that cognition is a continuous and infinite social semiotic process, in which Man is a sign.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/43816/1/11229_2004_Article_BF00413590.pd

Computational modelling of salamander retinal ganglion cells using machine learning approaches

Artificial vision using computational models that can mimic biological vision is an area of ongoing research. One of the main themes within this research is the study of the retina and in particular, retinal ganglion cells which are responsible for encoding the visual stimuli. A common approach to modelling the internal processes of retinal ganglion cells is the use of a linear - non-linear cascade model, which models the cell's response using a linear filter followed by a static non-linearity. However, the resulting model is generally restrictive as it is often a poor estimator of the neuron's response. In this paper we present an alternative to the linear - non-linear model by modelling retinal ganglion cells using a number of machine learning techniques which have a proven track record for learning complex non-linearities in many different domains. A comparison of the model predicted spike rate shows that the machine learning models perform better than the standard linear - non-linear approach in the case of temporal white noise stimuli

Obeticholic acid for the treatment of non-alcoholic steatohepatitis: interim analysis from a multicentre, randomised, placebo-controlled phase 3 trial

Background Non-alcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) is a common type of chronic liver disease that can lead to cirrhosis. Obeticholic acid, a farnesoid X receptor agonist, has been shown to improve the histological features of NASH. Here we report results from a planned interim analysis of an ongoing, phase 3 study of obeticholic acid for NASH. Methods In this multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled study, adult patients with definite NASH,non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) activity score of at least 4, and fibrosis stages F2–F3, or F1 with at least oneaccompanying comorbidity, were randomly assigned using an interactive web response system in a 1:1:1 ratio to receive oral placebo, obeticholic acid 10 mg, or obeticholic acid 25 mg daily. Patients were excluded if cirrhosis, other chronic liver disease, elevated alcohol consumption, or confounding conditions were present. The primary endpointsfor the month-18 interim analysis were fibrosis improvement (≥1 stage) with no worsening of NASH, or NASH resolution with no worsening of fibrosis, with the study considered successful if either primary endpoint was met. Primary analyses were done by intention to treat, in patients with fibrosis stage F2–F3 who received at least one dose of treatment and reached, or would have reached, the month 18 visit by the prespecified interim analysis cutoff date. The study also evaluated other histological and biochemical markers of NASH and fibrosis, and safety. This study is ongoing, and registered with ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT02548351, and EudraCT, 20150-025601-6. Findings Between Dec 9, 2015, and Oct 26, 2018, 1968 patients with stage F1–F3 fibrosis were enrolled and received at least one dose of study treatment; 931 patients with stage F2–F3 fibrosis were included in the primary analysis (311 in the placebo group, 312 in the obeticholic acid 10 mg group, and 308 in the obeticholic acid 25 mg group). The fibrosis improvement endpoint was achieved by 37 (12%) patients in the placebo group, 55 (18%) in the obeticholic acid 10 mg group (p=0·045), and 71 (23%) in the obeticholic acid 25 mg group (p=0·0002). The NASH resolution endpoint was not met (25 [8%] patients in the placebo group, 35 [11%] in the obeticholic acid 10 mg group [p=0·18], and 36 [12%] in the obeticholic acid 25 mg group [p=0·13]). In the safety population (1968 patients with fibrosis stages F1–F3), the most common adverse event was pruritus (123 [19%] in the placebo group, 183 [28%] in the obeticholic acid 10 mg group, and 336 [51%] in the obeticholic acid 25 mg group); incidence was generally mild to moderate in severity. The overall safety profile was similar to that in previous studies, and incidence of serious adverse events was similar across treatment groups (75 [11%] patients in the placebo group, 72 [11%] in the obeticholic acid 10 mg group, and 93 [14%] in the obeticholic acid 25 mg group). Interpretation Obeticholic acid 25 mg significantly improved fibrosis and key components of NASH disease activity among patients with NASH. The results from this planned interim analysis show clinically significant histological improvement that is reasonably likely to predict clinical benefit. This study is ongoing to assess clinical outcomes