VictorJuiz/thesis huggingface dataset:
Investigating necessity: essays on the role and status of metaphysical modality

Metaphysical necessity is one of contemporary philosophy’s widely-used tools for theorising. Since the 1970s, it has played central roles in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, and beyond. Throughout philosophy, it is used to formulate important theories and hypotheses, and features pivotally in various influential arguments. Due to its wide use, metaphysical necessity has a multifarious theoretical role. To take a few examples, it is expected to be the broadest objective necessity, license paradigm essentialist claims, and obey liberal principles of recombination. Nevertheless, there has never been an attempt to investigate whether the many postulates of this role and applications of metaphysical necessity are compatible, in the sense that they can all be satisfied by a single notion of necessity. The aim of this thesis is to provide such an investigation.
The Introduction outlines the themes of the thesis, and provides an overview of each individual essay. Essay One addresses certain foundational issues by criticising a popular form of scepticism towards metaphysical necessity. Essay Two investigates whether a family of natural principles of recombination can be integrated with the thesis that metaphysical necessity is the broadest objective necessity. Similarly, Essay Three studies whether paradigm portions of essentialist discourse can also be integrated with the same thesis. Essay Four draws on material from the previous essays to answer Timothy Williamson’s notorious expressive challenge to contingentist theories of modality. Finally, Essay Five provides a formal characterisation of so-called relative necessities which supports various claims and arguments made elsewhere in the thesis. Together, the essays constitute an investigation into the role and status of metaphysical necessity.

Keywords: metaphysical modality
Advisor: Williamson, T
Studd, J
Horizontal rights: an institutional approach

This Thesis develops and defends an approach to horizontal rights application, called the ‘institutional approach’. The institutional approach argues that constitutional rights ought to be applied between private parties, in situations where: (a) there exists an ‘institution’ (social, economic, or cultural), characterised by its pervasiveness and difficulty of exit (e.g., the labour market, or the family); (b) the institution creates and sustains a difference of power between the private parties; and (c) this difference in power enables one of the parties to violate the rights of the other. The Thesis is divided into two parts. Part One (Chapters One to Five) develops the theoretical and conceptual articulation of the institutional approach. Part Two (Chapters Six and Seven) applies it to two concrete legal issues, which exist across jurisdictions: the legal regulation of platform work, and of domestic relationships. The Concluding Chapter (Chapter Eight) explores the prospects of the institutional approach in contemporary constitutional adjudication.
The problem that this Thesis seeks to address is that contemporary constitutionalism is characterised by a ‘default vertical’ approach to constitutional rights. ‘Default verticality’ means that while horizontal constitutional rights are not unknown, their existence and application is deemed to be an exception, that stands in need of special justification. Although in recent years, courts and scholars have extended the application of the horizontal rights framework to certain private relations, most of these ‘departures’ from verticality remain bound to its foundational assumptions. Furthermore, in Constitutions that contain horizontal rights, courts have refrained from articulating a principled approach towards their application. Finally, accounts that do depart from default verticality and its assumptions remain incomplete in certain important ways.
The contribution of this thesis in addressing this problem, thus, is two-fold: first, it attempts to articulate a persuasive critique of the ‘default verticality’ that characterises contemporary constitutionalism, and of judicial and scholarly attempts to depart from it through various models of horizontality; and secondly, it aims to provide a fresh approach to horizontality that is both philosophically sound, and of practical utility in resolving contemporary legal issues.

Keywords: horizontal rights
constitutional law
Advisor: Fredman, S
Governance of non-bank systematically important financial institutions

This thesis identifies the circumstances under which corporate governance regulation can help gain traction to minimise systemic risk. Systemic risk is the risk that local losses spread through the financial system and badly affect the financial system and the real economy. Excessive risk-taking by financial institutions can contribute to such systemic risk. Prudential regulation and supervision of financial institutions leave corporate decision-makers with room for discretion to increase or decrease systemic risk. The incentives of these decision-makers are not necessarily aligned with minimising systemic risk. The thesis shows that this problem exists across different business models. More specifically, it identifies perverse incentives in the case of systemically important banks, CCPs, mutual funds, and hedge funds. The need for corporate governance regulation therefore lies in the inherent incompleteness of prudential regulation and supervision. Corporate governance regulation can help fill this gap by regulating the environment within which choices are made within these types of institutions.
The analysis has three steps. First, it characterises the systemic importance of financial-sector activities carried on outside the context of ‘banks’. The governance literature so far has focused on the ‘systemic externalities’ created by banks. However, our analysis shows that other non-bank SIFIs generate similar systemic externalities with socially harmful consequences. These systemic externalities are not considered by SIFIs when taking business decisions. In a second step, the thesis shows that prudential regulation and supervision are incomplete and leave room for governance regulation to fill in the gaps. The final step shows that a corporate governance framework focused solely on the interests of shareholders will have negative consequences for systemic stability. Given such divergence between the decision-makers’ and society’s interests, corporate governance regulation can complement the traditional prudential framework.

Keywords: asset managers
central counterparties
corporate governance
systemically important non-bank financial institutions
systemic risk
Advisor: Armour, J
Awrey, D
From molecular diagrams to material properties: investigation of data-driven tools and strategies in the field of Chemoinformatics

The field of Chemoinformatics has enabled QSAR/QSPR predictive models useful for the rapid virtual assessment of compounds or mining knowledge that may contribute towards the understanding of chemical systems. However, scepticism remains about the practical value of these approaches: models often exhibit limited predictive power, low generalisation capacity, and vague interpretability. More broadly, the field faces a general lack of consistency of results and procedures. This thesis addresses some of these challenges and explores new solutions to the field. First, standard protocols are used to explore the challenges of building chemical datasets suitable for statistical learning and understanding limitations of the predictive power of models. Here, the challenges of dataset curation and improvements to molecular structure description are explored. A library of new descriptors is built and assessed, which cleanly captures some information about crystallizability, but did not lead to measurable performance improvements of the models studied. The lack of relevant information content of some chemical datasets is reviewed, and strategies developed to increase the value of low-accuracy models: I report the generalisability and confidence tools and methodologies designed to restrict model predictions to inputs within their applicability domain. Illustrative implementations led to performance increases of up to 11% points of our predictive models. Finally, attempts are made to derive insights about structure-property relationships from chemoinformatics models. I develop a feature selection strategy which identifies the descriptors that influence a model’s predictions, and an interpretation method that identifies useful changes to a molecule to control predicted properties. Insights such as the correlation between the higher crystallization propensity of molecules and the lower volume and flexibility of molecules are identified. This work contributes towards the motivation and development of general-purpose open-source solutions which are key to add consistency in the field, increasing trust, and leveraging QSPR models to their full potential.

Keywords: Cheminformatics
Machine Learning
Statistical Learning
Data Science
Computational Chemistry
Advisor: Cooper, RI
McCabe, P
Internet users as vulnerable and at-risk human subjects: reviewing research ethics Law for technical internet research

Computer science research is subjected to similar research ethics reviews as other research disciplines. However, the nature of computer science research, especially on the Internet, is vastly different from other forms of research. Many data points are the end devices owned and operated by human Internet users, though they are often not considered as being human subjects. This thesis addresses the nature of computer science research, and examines the extent to which the ethics of care might be a useful model to assess the ethics of computer science research. This responds the nature of data subjects as being relatively vulnerable humans who do not understand how their informational environment is changed due to research conducted on their devices and the networks to which they connect.

Keywords: Ethics of care
Computer science ethics
Research ethics
Internet users
Advisor: Nash, V
Wright, J
A monograph of the neotropical tree Dipteryx odorata (Aubl.) Willd.

A monograph of the species Dipteryx odorata has been created for this dissertation. Different sources were consulted to determine the distribution natural, were it has a potential for a long history of use and were it is cultivated. The Description is given for the genus of Dipteryx and D. odorata. The species is mistaken for different species a list of this information was compiled. The relevant ecological data and uses of the timber and seeds of D. odorata was complied. Finally the wood characteristics were examined for the D. odorata and samples provided for other genera that were cited to have the same common or trade name as D. odorata.

Keywords: legumes
dipteryx odorata
monograph
Latin America
trees
neotropical tree
Numerical methods for non-standard McKean--Vlasov type equations

In this thesis, we consider numerical aspects concerning the simulation and strong approximation of solutions to McKean--Vlasov SDEs and interacting particle systems under non-standard assumptions, as well as numerical schemes for a broad class of mean-field control problems. First, we introduce novel adaptive time-stepping schemes and tamed Milstein schemes with the aim to achieve stable and strongly convergent discrete-time approximations to McKean--Vlasov equations and associated particle systems, where the drift and diffusion coefficients are allowed to grow super-linearly. The performance of the proposed time-stepping schemes is intensively investigated for various examples, including important models from neuroscience. Next, we study numerical schemes, as well as strong well-posedness, for a class of one-dimensional McKean--Vlasov SDEs with drifts that have a finite number of spatial discontinuities. We propose a transformation technique in combination with a fixed-point argument to show strong existence and uniqueness results. Further, we discuss different particle approximation methods and time-stepping schemes for such McKean--Vlasov equations and prove strong convergence results in the number of particles and time-steps, and provide numerical tests for models appearing in neuroscience and systemic risk. Finally, we develop a novel algorithm to obtain approximations of optimal feedback controls for control problems where the controlled state process is of McKean--Vlasov type. Here, we will employ deep-learning methods to solve these problems relying on a suitable formulation based on partial differential equations. An intensive numerical study of the proposed method is performed for high-dimensional mean-field Cucker--Smale models.

Keywords: Numerical approximations
Mean-field control problems
Particle Systems
McKean-Vlasov SDEs
Advisor: Reisinger, C
Risk bounds for improper prediction procedures

Statistical Learning Theory studies the problem of learning an unknown relationship between observed input-output pairs sampled independently from some unknown and arbitrary probability distribution. The quality of the inferred relationship is judged by its excess risk -- a measure of prediction capability on unseen data compared to the best predictor in some predefined reference class of functions. A learning procedure is said to be improper if it is allowed to output a prediction rule outside the chosen reference class. This thesis presents four contributions to analyzing the prediction performance of improper learning algorithms.
Our first result contributes to developing the mathematical machinery suitable for the analysis of improper learning procedures. We obtain exponential-tail excess risk bounds in terms of offset Rademacher complexity for which only in-expectation guarantees were previously obtained.
Our second result shows that offset Rademacher complexity yields upper bounds on the excess risk of iterative regularization schemes characterized by mirror descent algorithms. Moreover, by providing a unified analysis, our proposed proof technique circumvents the limitations of some previous analyses tailored to exploit the exact form of specific iterative schemes.
Our third contribution concerns the analysis of the constrained linear least squares algorithm. We find that this classical and widely studied statistical estimator is suboptimal, with dimension-dependent excess risk improvements offered via known improper procedures.
In our fourth contribution, we investigate improperness in the linear regression problem with the squared loss, without imposing any assumptions on the distribution of the covariates and imposing a minimal assumption on the conditional distribution of the response variable. We first establish the in-expectation optimality of the truncated least squares estimator and then, we show that it can fail with constant probability. We conclude by proposing a deviation-optimal procedure. The considered setup admits heavy-tailed distributions while falling outside the scope of the typically studied procedures for heavy-tailed linear regression.

Keywords: linear prediction
local Rademacher complexities
improper prediction
iterative regularization
robustness
distribution-free regression
concentration
linear regression
Advisor: Kanade, V
Rebeschini, P
The rules of standing of the European Union: a contextual understanding

This thesis looks at the context surrounding the EU standing rules for the individual applicant. It seeks to build upon the extensive academic literature on this topic, by further exploring how far this context can explain and justify the approach taken towards the rules themselves, which have generally been considered to be restrictive in character. The analysis is conducted by reference to a selection of factors which represent part of the wider constitutional context.
The central arguments of this thesis are as follows: first, it is argued that that certain factors of the context (namely the underlying judicial strategy and the role of privileged applicants) go some way towards explaining the narrow approach taken. They also have some capacity (to a limited extent) to qualify one’s perception of the rules’ restrictive impact. This is outlined in Chapter Two. Then in the first part of Chapter Three, I consider the justificatory potential of these factors, exploring how far these elements are able to change the analysis as to whether or not the rules can be justified. It is argued that when they are judged against the standard of effective judicial protection as it emerges from some of the relevant cases then a possible, qualified justification can emerge. However, any such position is qualified by virtue of the various substantive and methodological difficulties with this approach.
Secondly, this thesis contends that when we look at the standard of practical access to justice, the rules remain unjustifiable (even when we see them with the benefit of the contextual factors identified); in this sense they remain ‘overly narrow’. Consequently, the final part of Chapter Three offers some qualified avenues of reform for amending this context and improving the practical impact of these standing rules for the individual applicant.

Keywords: Law
Standing Rules
European Union Law
Advisor: Goudkamp, J
Young, A
Some aspects of Ottoman rule in Syria in the second half of the nineteenth century : reforms, Islam and Caliphate

The central theme of this thesis is the impact on Syria of the acts and policies of the Tanzimat period especially after 1860. But in order to understand the background of those policies it was necessary to shed fresh light on the social and political outlook of those bureaucrats who stood at the head of the state at the time of the Tanzimat period and on certain currents of thought which emerged curing that period.
It appears that the basic question which busied Ottoman Muslims was the moral and legal basis of the state. Under the impact of the teachings of the Naqshbandi and possibly other orthodox orders, the causes of the decline of the state and of the degeneration of Muslim society were attributed to a disregard of shari‘a rules and to the rise of arbitrary government, In Istanbul and the Asiatic provinces a strong tendency emerged to restore the supremacy of the shari‘a in society and state and to end arbitrary rule. The reforms in their early period (1826-1854) seem to have been undertaken with this object in mind. About the same time it appears that the title of Caliph as applied to the sultan began to assume a new importance with emphasis upon the sultan being a just and shari‘a abiding ruler.
Continued in thesis

Keywords: Religion and state
Syria
Ottoman rule
Turks
Tanzimat
19th century
Caliphate
nineteenth century
Islam
London overseas-merchant groups at the end of the seventeenth century and the moves against the East India Company

This thesis seeks to examine the circumstances of the London mercantile community in the crisis of the 1690's and to relate the contrasting experience of groups within it to the attack on the Last India company. This latter issue is taken as a convenient focus towards which all investigations of the mercantile community contained here converge - either directly or indirectly.
The results throw light on the paradox of how the great institutions of the eighteenth-century city -namely the Bank of England and the East India Company - were either founded, as in the former case, or much extended, as in the latter case, during a decade of crisis, Thus while focusing ultimately on the attack on the East India Company, no opportunity is missed to point out how crucial was the role played by the London mercantile community in enabling England to survive to the modest victory at Ryswick.
In defining the circumstances of the London mercantile community during the 1690's, new statistical series have been constructed from fiscal sources, and from figures culled from port books, to present for the first time a quantitative measure of both the extent and the chronology of the crisis of the decade. To these figures are added the “Hallage' receipts of the London cloth markets which supply an invaluable indicator of activity in the country's largest single market.
Continued in thesis ...

Keywords: overseas-merchant groups
merchants
London
commerce
England
seventeenth century
17th century
Optical control of neocortical circuits to probe how connectivity influences behavioural salience.

The brains of higher organisms are composed of anatomically and functionally distinct regions performing specialised tasks. However, individual regions do not operate in isolation. Hence, the orchestration of complex behaviours requires communication between brain regions and reliable transmission of information between them. In this thesis I explore how we can study this process directly by generating neural activity that propagates between brain regions and drives behaviour, allowing me to assess how populations of neurons in sensory cortex act in concert to transmit information. I achieved this by imaging two hierarchically organised and densely interconnected regions, the primary and secondary somatosensory cortex (S1 and S2) in mice while performing two-photon photostimulation of S1 neurons and assigning behavioural salience to the photostimulation. I found that the probability of perception is determined by both the variance of the S1 network and the strength of the photostimulation. Conceptually this means that maximising the signal-to-noise ratio of an incoming stimulus is critical to its continued propagation downstream. Further, I show that propagated, behaviourally salient activity elicits balanced, persistent and generalised activation of the downstream region, consistent with inhibitory stabilised network models with dense recurrent connectivity. Hence, my work adds to existing understanding of cortical function by identifying how population activity is formatted to ensure robust transmission of information, allowing specialised brain regions to communicate and coordinate behaviour.

Keywords: Optogenetics
two-photon
Secondary somatosensory
somatosensory
Cortex
behaviour
Advisor: Packer, A