Media – the Video Appeals Committee

Review of the work of the Video Appeals Committee which hears appeals from makers of videos from decisions of the British Board of Film Classification, to refuse certificates or to grant certificates in respect of videos works, with which they disagree. Article by John Wood (Solicitor with Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, London; former Director of the Serious Fraud Office and Director of Public Prosecutions, Hong Kong) published in Amicus Curiae - Journal of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies and its Society for Advanced Legal Studies. The Journal is produced by the Society for Advanced Legal Studies at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies, University of London

The original discovery of the Roman shipwreck at Xlendi, Gozo

'Xlendi Bay in Gozo is an important archaeological site but this was not realised until the 1960s. The reason for this is that its importance is maritime and its potential was only brought to light with the accidental discovery of artefacts on the seabed by British Navy divers. This discovery and subsequent investigation of the site came soon after SCUBA equipment started to become widely available and closely followed the development of the new discipline of underwater archaeology[. .. ] The objects that were raised by these pioneers are now held in the Gozo museum where they attract a lot of interest from members of the public [ ... ]' (Azzopardi 2006, 1)peer-reviewe

Tobacco pipes from an underwater excavation at the quarantine harbour, Malta

This excavation was carried out in an area earmarked for development just off the lazaretto on Manoel Island in Marsamxett harbour (Figs. 2 and 3), between 22 and 29 June 2001.'7 The topography of the seabed consists of a steep slope descending from 4 to 27m at an angle of 55 degrees, values approximate. The top of the slope is littered with war damaged and discarded worked stone blocks (some of archaeological value) and a variety of debris. The main sediment consists of a mixture of grey silt and sand. Artefacts recovered ranged in date from before the era of the Knights of Saint John to Royal Naval issues (1530-1930). Seaweed and silt were removed from the artefacts before desalination.35 of the 42 pipes are stylistically Ottoman chibouks - ceramic bowls which would have had perishable reed or wooden stems. The other 7 fragments have origins in northern Europe.peer-reviewe

Climate Change and Game Theory

This survey paper examines the problem of achieving global cooperation to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Contributions to this problem are reviewed from non-cooperative game theory, cooperative game theory, and implementation theory. Solutions to games where players have a continuous choice about how much to pollute, games where players make decisions about treaty participation, and games where players make decisions about treaty ratification, are examined. The implications of linking cooperation on climate change with cooperation on other issues, such as trade, is examined. Cooperative and non-cooperative approaches to coalition formation are investigated in order to examine the behaviour of coalitions cooperating on climate change. One way to achieve cooperation is to design a game, known as a mechanism, whose equilibrium corresponds to an optimal outcome. This paper examines some mechanisms that are based on conditional commitments, and could lead to substantial cooperation.Climate change negotiations, game theory, implementation theory, coalition formation, subgame perfect equilibrium, Environmental Economics and Policy,

Refractory solids in chondrites and comets: How similar

The grains of ice, dust, and organic material that came together to form the solar system have been preserved to differing degrees in the most primitive solar system bodies, asteroids and comets. The study of samples of asteroids (in the form of chondritic meteorites) reveals that the dust component was extensively altered by high-temperature events and processes in the early solar system, before it was aggregated into chondritic planetesimals. The nature of these high-temperature events and processes is not known, but the evidence of their operation is pervasive and unequivocal. Are the refractory particles in comets likely to be similar to these chondrite components. Probably not (except for the presolar carbonaceous grains in chondrites), because the chondritic components are products of severe thermal processing, and all imaginable energy sources that could have provided the heat tend to diminish with distance from the sun. Every indication is that comets formed at much greater radial distances than asteroids, so the particles they incorporated would have experienced less heating. The possibilities cannot be completely ruled out that comets, too, formed inside the present orbit of Jupiter, or that thermally-processed grains were able to diffuse great radial distances before being incorporated in accreting objects, but it is far more likely that most of the refractory grains in comets have been spared the extreme thermal processing that shaped the character of chondritic components