Legal Ethics Advisors and the Interests of Justice: Is an Ethics Advisor a Conscience or a Co-Conspirator?

In this short paper, I cannot explore the full range of lawyer-client interactions. Nor can I develop a comprehensive theory, or a comprehensive set of rules, to tell lawyers when to follow, and when to resist, client instructions. I can, however, examine some aspects of attorney-client relations in my small corner of the world, where I often function as an ethics advisor to lawyers and law firms. My premise, which I believe Deborah Rhode would endorse, is that ethics advisors have an obligation, both to their clients and to the legal profession, to provide honest, straightforward answers to inquiries concerning ethical conduct. Anything less would be unethical. Dishonest ethics advice is a pure oxymoron, and has no place in the legal profession

Perturbative Approach to Flat Chern Bands in the Hofstadter Model

We present a perturbative approach to the study of the Hofstadter model for when the amount of flux per plaquette is close to a rational fraction. Within this approximation certain eigenstates of the system are shown to be multi-component wavefunctions that connect smoothly to the Landau levels of the continuum. The perturbative corrections to these are higher Landau level contributions that break rotational invariance and allow the perturbed states to adopt the symmetry of the lattice. In the presence of interactions, this approach allows for the calculation of generalised Haldane pseudopotentials, and in turn, the many-body properties of the system. The method is sufficiently general that it can apply to a wide variety of lattices, interactions and magnetic field strengths.Comment: 40 pages, 15 figures; v2 includes minor changes, additional references and an expanded background sectio

Three levels of metric for evaluating wayfinding

Three levels of virtual environment (VE) metric are proposed, based on: (1) users’ task performance (time taken, distance traveled and number of errors made), (2) physical behavior (locomotion, looking around, and time and error classification), and (3) decision making (i.e., cognitive) rationale (think aloud, interview and questionnaire). Examples of the use of these metrics are drawn from a detailed review of research into VE wayfinding. A case study from research into the fidelity that is required for efficient VE wayfinding is presented, showing the unsuitability in some circumstances of common metrics of task performance such as time and distance, and the benefits to be gained by making fine-grained analyses of users’ behavior. Taken as a whole, the article highlights the range of techniques that have been successfully used to evaluate wayfinding and explains in detail how some of these techniques may be applied

L’évolution à la pièce de la défense d’erreur de droit : l’erreur attribuable aux conseils inexacts d’un juriste ou aux jugements des tribunaux fut-elle laissée à la dérive ?

Depuis la seconde moitié du xxe siècle, plusieurs systèmes juridiques ont reconsidéré leur position de principe devant la défense d’erreur de droit. Si le droit pénal canadien ne fait pas exception, il se distingue toutefois par la singularité du processus d’évolution mis en place. En effet, le droit canadien, contrairement au droit français et au droit sud-africain, a maintenu l’interdiction de principe de cette défense tout en aménageant en parallèle une longue série d’exceptions à cette règle. Nous verrons que ce processus de modernisation n’est pas idéal puisqu’il mène à la création ad hoc de catégories rigides qui ne s’appuient pas sur un principe unificateur clair. Cette lacune est particulièrement évidente au moment de l’examen du sort réservé à la défense d’erreur de droit attribuable aux conseils inexacts d’un juriste ou aux jugements des tribunaux en droit canadien, français et sud-africain.Since the second half of the xxth century, many legal systems have reconsidered their position with regard to the defence of mistake of law. This is also true of Canadian criminal law, although it stands out owing to its peculiar evolution on this issue. Indeed, Canadian law, contrary to French law and South-African law, has maintained the principle of barring this defence while at the same time admitting a long list of exceptions to the rule. As we shall see, this modernization process is far from ideal since it leads to the ad hoc creation of rigid categories that are not based upon a clear unifying principle. This deficiency is especially obvious when comparing the outcome of a defence of mistake of law arising out of a court decision or solicitor’s opinion under Canadian, French and South African law

Magnetic Monopoles as Agents of Chiral Symmetry Breaking in U(1) Lattice Gauge Theory

We present results suggesting that magnetic monopoles can account for chiral symmetry breaking in abelian gauge theory. Full U(1) configurations from a lattice simulation are factorized into magnetic monopole and photon contributions. The expectation is computed using the monopole configurations and compared to results for the full U(1) configurations. It is shown that excellent agreement between the two values of is obtained if the effect of photons, which "dress" the composite operator psibarpsi, is included. This can be estimated independently by measurements of the physical fermion mass in the photon background.Comment: 14 pages REVTeX, including 5 figure

The heliospheric current sheet at solar maximum

Whilst near solar minimum it was possible to gain an understanding of the structure of the heliosphere in three dimensions using only low latitude in situ measurements, at solar maximum this was not the case. The Ulysses mission, with its unique almost polar orbit has provided an opportunity to investigate the structure of the heliosphere in three dimensions during a period of solar maximum. This thesis has focussed on investigating the topology and evolution of the HCS at solar maximum as well as the local structure of the boundary itself using magnetic field and plasma observations taken during the second Ulysses orbit. As a passive structure the Heliospheric Current Sheet (HCS) acts as a marker for the dynamic evolution of solar wind surrounding it while the large scale structure of the HCS also reflects the structure of the solar magnetic field. By combining simultaneous spacecraft observations at differing latitudes with potential field models the HCS was found to be near vertical at low latitudes and non planar at high latitudes. A second technique using minimum variance analysis to infer the orientation of the HCS concurred that the HCS extended to high latitudes, with the added suggestion that the topology was modified by stream interactions. Suprathermal electron heat flux measurements suggested the presence of substantial local HCS structure, especially during periods where the Ulysses trajectory skimmed along the HCS.Open acces

Data processing pipelines tailored for imaging Fourier-transform spectrometers

Cette thèse propose des algorithmes d'acquisition et de traitement de données adaptés aux spectromètres imageurs par transformation de Fourier. L'objectif visé est d'alléger le fardeau de post-traitement, afin que l'usager ait rapidement accès à des spectres étalonnés. La configuration d'instrument étudiée consiste en un interféromètre à balayage continu couplé à une caméra intégratrice à synchronisation externe. Un banc d'essai d'imageur spectral proche/moyen infrarouge fabriqué par la compagnie Telops Inc. a été utilisé pour développer et valider les algorithmes d'acquisition et de traitement de données. Deux thèmes spécifiques ont été étudiés, s'avérant d'intérêt pour cette configuration particulière. Le premier thème concerne l'optimisation du processus de. collection de données. Une nouvelle technique d'échantillonnage d'interférogramme est démontrée pour les spectromètres imageurs par transformation de Fourier. Cette technique permet à la fois de minimiser la quantité de données et de corriger au besoin la gigue d'échantillonnage induite par le retard inhérent au processus de photointégration. Le deuxième thème concerne l'étalonnage spectral de mesures obtenues avec une matrice de détecteurs. Une technique d'intégration de fonction d'appareil est adaptée aux spectromètres imageurs par transformation de Fourier. Des résultats d'étalonnage sont présentés, ainsi que des résultats d'élargissement de champ de vue qui dévoilent un comportement inattendu de l'instrument. Une étude de l'amplitude et de la phase de deux interférogrammes laser est ensuite faite pour scruter certaines contributions instrumentales. L'approche utilisée démontre la présence d'une subtile altération due à l'instrument. Un algorithme de correction est finalement proposé pour compléter le processus d'étalonnage spectral