VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Legislative and adjudicative ideals: the role of political morality in statutory interpretation

In Law’s Empire, Ronald Dworkin articulates four ideals of political morality: integrity, justice, fairness, and procedural due process. Although he explicitly articulates integrity in both a legislative and adjudicative principle, the other ideals remain somewhat vaguely defined. However, Dworkin’s analysis of constructive interpretation gives rise to the view, often present but unstated in theories of statutory interpretation, that the ideals which guide legislation should also guide interpretation. If legal reasoning is a matter of interpreting in view of the object of interpretation’s purpose, in order to devise a theory of statutory interpretation, we must first look to the purposes and ideals of the object in question: legislation.
While I reject Dworkinian integrity as a viable ideal, the remaining three values offer important guidance. Fairness and due process both require strict textual fidelity, both from legislators in crafting laws and from judges in interpreting those laws. Justice requires that laws pursue legitimate purposes using legitimate means. Legislators must draft laws in this way and judges must interpret laws as though they have been drafted in this way. To draw out the complexities of this view, we can look to the classical legal concept of equity, particularly as expressed in the philosophy of Thomas Hobbes. Equity, for Hobbes, is a legal interpretive principle which demands that laws be interpreted in view of both the law’s immediate purpose, as well as the ultimate purpose of all laws – the reason that the government was instituted – which Hobbes argues is safety.
Finally, we can apply our insights regarding statutory interpretation to other spheres of legal interpretation. Adrian Vermeule’s common good constitutionalism provides a methodologically similar, explicitly Dworkinian example of a theory of constitutional interpretation, through which we can explore legal interpretation in general.

Keywords: legal interpretation
statutory interpretation
philosophy
law
jurisprudence
legal philosophy
Advisor: Tasioulas, J
Half-souled bodies: punishing civil servants for past state atrocities

This thesis investigates the principal question of whether civil servants should be punished for past state atrocities under transitional circumstances. It looks into three sub-questions to answer this principal question. First, it inquires into whether retributivism provides an application justification of punishment in transitional circumstances. By addressing challenges about the effectiveness of punishment, the standing of the punisher, and the retroactivity of punishment, it argues that expressivist retributivism offers a defeasible justification for punishing civil servants in transitional circumstances. Second, it examines how civil servants can be held complicitly responsible for state atrocities. It proposes that an individual is complicitly responsible for a collective wrongdoing if she has taken an action that carries an impermissible risk of causing the collective wrongdoing’s success, and this action expresses a culpable choice. It also argues that this principle of complicit responsibility can overcome the problem of overdetermination. Third, it investigates what valid justifications and excuses civil servants can claim to counter blame and punishment. It rejects the cog-theory justification, the superior order justification, and the excuse of absent discriminatory intent. However, it argues that non-culpable ignorance can excuse civil servants' contribution to atrocities, and their ignorance is non-culpable if they have fulfilled their respective level of epistemic obligations. Therefore, this thesis argues that any civil servants who have contributed to state atrocities and cannot appeal to any valid justification or excuse deserve to be punished. If there are no forward-looking considerations that can outweigh retributive justice in the transitional context, these civil servants should be punished.

Keywords: transitional justice
complicit responsibility
civil servant
punishment
retributivism
Advisor: McDermott, D
The democratic road to socialism (again): strategies of Anglo-American democratic socialism 2015-2020

This thesis attempts to assess the strategic questions and possibilities raised by the coming to prominence of ‘democratic socialism’ in the UK and US in 2015- 2020, with the rise of Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour left on the one hand, and of the Democratic Socialists of America, spurred on by the campaigns of Bernie Sanders, on the other. In doing so, it also hopes to give readers an account of what, in fact, ‘democratic socialism’ constitutes in the contemporary Anglo-American context, and, crucially, make out what might productively differentiate it from other socialist orientations on the question of strategy. In particular, the thesis argues that contemporary democratic socialism presents a coherent answer to a key strategic challenge: how, given the dual improbability of either a revolutionary or moderate, gradualist method of socialist transformation, to proceed as a socialist actor seeking transformational change in the context of a capitalist democracy. However, whether democratic socialism presents a convincing answer to this challenge, the thesis argues, is open to debate.
In order to achieve its aims, the thesis combines the academic literature on socialist strategy and rational political choice in capitalist democracies, with the political literature produced by the contemporary Anglo-American democratic socialist movement itself, while also inspecting the real practices of that movement. The thesis focuses on three strategic elements of the democratic socialist movement: non-reformist reforms, in and against the state, and class-struggle elections.

Keywords: Jeremy Corbyn
socialist strategy
non-reformist reforms
Bernie Sanders
democratic socialism
class-struggle elections
capitalist democracy
Democratic Socialists of America
British Labour Party
in and against the state
capitalist state
rational choice
Advisor: White, S
Prohairesis, voluntariness and virtue

In the ethics of both Aristotle and Epictetus, prohairesis occupies a central role, relating ends, desire and action. Because Epictetus’s conception of prohairesis is founded upon Stoic psychology, its dissimilarity to Aristotle’s has often been emphasised. However, I contend that this view risks understating the connection between the two: Aristotle and Epictetus each maintain that prohairesis cannot be compelled, thus affording it great significance in defining autonomy, voluntariness of action and virtue of character. As Aristotle says, “people do bad things even when compelled to but no one decides under compulsion” (EE II.11, 1228a12–15).

Advisor: Nielsen, K
Measuring composition and strain in bimetallic catalyst nanoparticles using advanced electron microscopy

Polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) are promising energy-conversion devices due to their high efficiency and near-zero carbon emission footprint. PEMFCs still require a high mass of precious metal Pt as an electrocatalyst for oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) to ensure sufficient power output efficiency, but the sources and cost of Pt greatly limit its commercial application in fuel cells technology. The development of high-active and low-cost ORR electrocatalysts is therefore of much significance for the commercialization of fuel cells. Compared to Pt, bimetallic (Pt-Co) nanoparticles exhibit superior catalytic performance with less mass of precious metal, but the intrinsic mechanism of this catalytic enhancement has not been fully explained. Strain and composition are two fundamental effects that are highly associated with the catalytic activity of the Pt-based nanoparticles. Thus, being able to measure local composition and strain at an atomic scale within the individual nanoparticle will further our understanding of the operation of heterogeneous catalysts.
In this thesis, the strain analysis and composition quantification are precisely and simultaneously performed on the individual nanoparticle at an atomic scale for four Pt-Co nanoparticle ensembles, to relate composition and size to strain. We find that no compressive strain on the Pt-rich outer shell is imposed by the alloy core. Dilation strain is found to be distributed throughout the individual nanoparticles, with the radial dilation strain being much larger than the circumferential dilation strain at the surface. Remarkably, all the Pt-Co stoichiometries studied have a relatively invariant surface lattice parameter, which is smaller than that for pure Pt but larger than that predicted using the measured local composition, whether or not an acid de-alloying treatment is applied. This work makes it possible to design the optimum ORR catalysts by tuning strain, composition, and structure of the Pt-based bimetallic nanoparticles.

Keywords: strain
STEM
fuel cell
composition
nanoparticle
catalyst
electron microscopy
Advisor: Nellist, P
Lozano-Perez, S
Ozkaya, D
"The stuffe not ours": the work of derivation in early modern Englishwomen's writing

Twentieth-century critics sought writing by women that captured authentic female voices of the past, but primarily found derivative texts: translations and paraphrases. These texts were deemed emblematic of a patriarchal dynamic, with women silenced by the male-authored source text. The disappointment palpable in this scholarship, where women’s texts are seen as insufficiently subversive, has long affected the critical fortunes of early modern women’s writing in English. This thesis argues instead that the authentic female voice is a misnomer for the real interest of derivative texts, namely evidence of women’s authorship: the will and capacity to make. Far from mechanical exercises, women’s translations and paraphrases abound in all that we associate with canonical genius: creativity, intellectual vigour, political comment, and formal experimentation. My chapters address writers as various as Anne Lock, Mary Sidney, Margaret Tyler, Anne Dowriche, and Lucy Hutchinson. Moving between a range of literary genres in which they wrote, as well as a range of derivative modes, I demonstrate the diverse interests of these writings, including many areas of thought and action typically assumed to exclude women. Far from constituting a distinctly female tradition, their derivative texts demonstrate the continuity of women’s engagements with the intellectual mainstream. As such, they reveal that the mainstream was never entirely male to begin with.

Keywords: atomism
early modern women
Mary Sidney
Epicureanism
romance
originality
Anne Lock
sonnet
derivation
psalm
women's writing
paraphrase
Protestant
early modern literature
feminism
Lucy Hutchinson
Lucretius
Espejo de príncipes y cavalleros
formalism
De rerum natura
Anne Dowriche
Margaret Tyler
The Mirror of Knighthood
authorship
translation
chivalric romance
Advisor: Hutson, L
Policing illegal drug and wildlife trades - the role of the police, legal online platforms, private organisations and individuals, and cybercriminal traders

This thesis explores the actors and activities involved in the policing of online illegal drug and wildlife trades on the Darknet and surface web. As the role of policing evolves due to advances in technology, the blurring of national boundaries, the increasing knowledge and skills of other actors, and the growing volume and value of these trades, more research is required about who and what is involved in this endeavour to increase its efficiency.
Policing has been argued to take place in a network, where various actors come together to perform operations (Dupont, 2004). One of the most recent policing classifications is Button (2019)’s policing taxonomy which involves technological components. This thesis designs its own policing framework and tests the relevance of Button (2019)’s model in the context of online illegal drug and wildlife trades. Beyond the Police which possess powers of search and arrest to protect citizens, legal online platforms have created trading policies and are monitoring and punishing misconduct on their sites to preserve their legality and reputation. Organisations and individuals in the private sector, non-profits, and academia have been gathering, analysing, and sharing data and expertise to help Police investigations and inform the public. Cybercriminal traders have also taken advantage of others for their own financial gain and consequently decreased trust on Darknet markets, as well as unintentionally providing the Police with ways to disrupt their markets from the inside.
This exploratory research used mixed social science methods to gather complimentary quantitative and qualitative insights. Semi-structured interviews were performed with 20 experts in Police agencies, legal platforms, for-profit and non-profit organisations, and academia. The content of 200 Police and private organisation reports, news articles, blog posts, and legal platforms’ trading policies was analysed. A pilot laboratory experiment also tested the behaviour of 138 participants following trust-related policing interventions in a fictitious online marketplace.
This thesis contributes to the fields of sociology and (cyber)criminology by designing a new cyber policing classification based on the policing of online illegal drug and wildlife trades and by formulating the first ‘policing script’ summarising the activities various policing actors perform in this context, when, with whom, and how they complement each other.

Keywords: policing
cybercriminal trade
Advisor: Lusthaus, J
Varese, F
Patterns and processes of recovering large mammal communities

Despite the global biodiversity crisis, some ecosystems are showing encouraging signs of recovery, especially in Europe and North America. We do not have a clear understanding of how ecosystems recover from degraded states, of the causes and consequences of such recovery, or of how emerging species interactions affect and are affected by ecological processes. In this thesis, I investigate the patterns and processes emerging from recovering ecosystems by analysing population dynamics, species interactions and animal movement.
I explore the spatiotemporal trends of an expanding large mammal community in the Alps and investigate predator-prey interactions between wolves and their main prey. I assess the permeability of the Alpine landscape for recovering populations, by analysing the impact of natural and anthropogenic factors on the movement of a partially migratory ungulate. Studying species interactions in a dynamic and recovering system such as the Alps is challenging. I therefore focus on the Yellowstone ecosystem to analyse the impact of wolf predation on their prey and on other ecological processes. I develop a mechanistic, bio-energetic model of the vegetation-elk-wolf system, to study how energy acquired through resources flows across trophic levels influencing population dynamics and interactions. I then use this model to study how ecological and evolutionary change can affect complex tri-trophic systems.
I show that large mammal communities can recover relatively quickly in the right environment, and with the support of conservation and favourable environmental legislation. Nonetheless, humans can still have a significant impact on animal populations by affecting their movement patterns and habitat use. In the Alps, I could not detect an impact of wolf predation on prey populations because the recovery process is still ongoing and the system is highly dynamic. In Yellowstone, on the other hand, I show that wolf predation can have significant effects on the ecosystem, and that complex trophic interactions can respond in unexpected ways to ecological and evolutionary change.
My thesis offers advances for investigating complex terrestrial systems, for predicting the potential impacts of environmental change on ecosystems, and for informing future policy and landscape management decisions.

Keywords: roe deer
trentino
predator-prey interactions
wolf
ungulates
carnivores
bio-energetic models
step selection analysis
nature recovery
trophic interactions
integral projection models
trophic cascades
Yellowstone National Park
animal movement
migration
Advisor: Cagnacci, F
Coulson, T
Finite-frequency tomography using regional P-waves, with application to the western Pacific upper mantle

This thesis aims to present the data measurement process, waveform modelling, full waveform sensitivity measurements, and inversion workflow, required to produce a P-wave tomography of the upper mantle, including the mantle transition zone, down to 1000km depth.
Improved seismic velocity models are needed: many tomography models do not include regional travel-time datasets. This is because the first arrivals identified in travel-time datasbases are not enough on their own to seismically sample the mantle transition zone. Sharp velocity gradients at the top (410km) and bottom (660km) of the mantle transition zone induce triplications in body waves. This means that there is more than one possible path between source and receiver for a given waveform: these can range from a topside reflection off the 410km discontinuity, through to refraction at the base of the 660km discontinuity. It is therefore difficult to attribute the first arrival time in a body waveform to its true path in an automated manner, as needed for tomography. This is heightened by discrepancies between the assumed reference background model for data processing and inversion, with respect to the true background model: therefore, seismic travel-times must be measured relative to synthetic data based on full waveform modelling. A limited number of regional body wave velocity models based on the full seismic waveform exist, which can provide sufficient seismic illumination of the mantle transition zone, a known barrier for subducting oceanic lithosphere.
In this study I present JEABOX, a P-wave tomography of the western Pacific upper mantle, using the joint inversion of existing teleseismic P-wave travel times based on multifrequency cross-correlation, with regional P-wave measurements between 14-30 degrees epicentral distance. I calculate Born sensitivity kernels for these latter triplicated data using the MC Kernel software based on the spectral element solver, Axisem. I showcase the integration of these novel triplicated data and their sensitivity kernels into a tried-and-tested finite-frequency tomography workflow, to perform joint inversion of teleseismic data and Dahlen kernels with regional travel-times and MC Kernels, to produce a hybridised P-wave velocity model based on Axisem, the first tomography of its kind.
The resulting model corroborates several major seismic structures observed across western Pacific subduction zones in previous studies, including what appears to be slab stagnation beneath the Kuril and Japan trenches, and steep subduction under the Izu-Bonin trench. In the southern hemisphere, seismic signatures imply protracted subduction beneath the Sunda-Java trench under Borneo and surrounding area. Future work will tectonically interpret the JEABOX model in full.

Keywords: Seismology
Axisem
Geophysics
Seismic Inversion
Full waveform
Tomography
Sensitivity Kernels
MC Kernel
P-waves
western Pacific
Triplications
Subduction
Upper Mantle
Advisor: Sigloch, K
Nissen-Meyer, T
Practical Bayesian optimisation for hyperparameter tuning

Advances in machine learning have had, and continue to have, a profound effect on scientific research and industrial activities. We are able to uncover insights contained within large troves of data and develop models to solve problems that seemed infeasible until recently. Before we can train a model, we have to define high-level properties, also known as the model’s hyperparameters. Examples include the architecture of a neural network, the class and parameters of a stochastic optimisation algorithm, the number of trees in a random forest or the kernel in a Gaussian process. One of the key challenges in developing good machine learning models is choosing good values for these hyperparameters.
Evaluating the quality of a set of hyperparameters is usually computationally costly, as it requires us to first train a model specified by the hyperparameters before we can evaluate a score. The computational costs of scoring a configuration means that we want to perform this hyperparameter search with as few trials as possible. Bayesian optimisation (BO) is a general-purpose efficient global optimisation technique that has proven to be remarkably effective for many expensive optimisation tasks, including hyperparameter tuning. This thesis brings together multiple contributions aimed at making BO more practically applicable, focussing on uncertain-input measurements as well as model hyperparameter tuning.
The case of data with input noise is relevant when we are modelling (or finding extremal values of) a quantity defined on a spatial grid. We undertake a comparative study evaluating existing uncertain-input GP methods, and develop a novel approach based on the unscented transform that outperforms existing uncertain-input methods. We then address the question of parallelising BO to make optimal use of available computing resources. We develop a novel class of methods for asynchronous parallel BO, and demonstrate empirically the benefits of our approach, as well as more generally showing the advantages of asynchronous over synchronous BO.
Finally, we propose a new framework for dealing with a mixture of categorical and continuous hyperparameters. With few exceptions, model hyperparameters consist of both categorical and continuous variables, but BO approaches have mainly focussed on continuous search spaces. We present a novel framework that combines multi-armed bandits with continuous BO methods and leverages each of their strengths to achieve state-of-the-art performance on real-world optimisation tasks.

Keywords: Hyperparameter tuning
Bayesian optimisation
Machine learning
Global search
Gaussian process
Advisor: Roberts, S
Osborne, M