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The Framework is the Message: Legal and Ethical Implications of ChatGPT
Full text linkThe rapid rise of generative AI represents a palpable paradigm shift: models like GPT-3 (and its subsequent iterations), DALL-E, and AlphaCode are becoming foundation models for many other AI-based applications. Foundation models may be used for many different tasks with minimal modification and are positioned to replace task-specific models of AI. This holds tremendous promise in society such as advancing scientific research, rethinking education and training, and creating new types of art and expression. At the same time, however, generative AI has its dark side such as accuracy risk, the threat of large-scale unemployment, potential security vulnerabilities, and AI misbehaviour such sexism, racism, and other bias. In response, governments around the world are working diligently to address potential harms stemming from this next generation AI. This is in addition to the alreadydeveloping regulatory landscape on the use of AI, which, depending on the jurisdiction, takes either a prescriptive legislative approach or a principles-focused tactic. While some aspects of these approaches may be relevant for foundation models, it is not clear how much responsibility will fall to foundation model providers as opposed to applications or even end-users. Drawing on Benedict Kingsbury’s recent work on ‘‘thinking infrastructurally” in the context of international law, this article will explore how thinking infrastructurally might help in the development of law and policy and also the ethics of AI with the emergence of foundation models, specifically focusing on ChatGPT.
L’essor rapide de l’IA générative représente un changement de paradigme palpable : des modèles comme GPT-3 (et ses itérations ultérieures), DALL-E et AlphaCode deviennent des modèles de base pour de nombreuses autres applications basées sur l’IA. Les modèles de base peuvent être utilisés pour de nombreuses tâches différentes avec un minimum de modifications et sont positionnés pour remplacer les modèles d’IA spécifiques à des tâches. Cela est extrêmement prometteur pour la société, notamment en faisant progresser la recherche scientifique, en repensant l’éducation et la formation, et en créant de nouveaux types d’art et d’expression. Dans le même temps, cependant, l’IA générative présente ses côtés sombres, tels que le risque d’inexactitude, la menace d’un chômage à grande échelle, les vulnérabilités potentielles en matière de sécurité, et les mauvais comportements de l’IA tels que le sexisme, le racisme et d’autres préjugés. En réponse, les gouvernements du monde entier travaillent avec diligence pour remédier aux dommages potentiels découlant de cette IA de nouvelle génération. Cela s’ajoute au paysage réglementaire déjà en développement sur l’utilisation de l’IA, qui, selon la juridiction, adopte soit une approche législative prescriptive, soit une tactique axée sur les principes. Bien que certains aspects de ces approches puissent être pertinents pour les modèles de base, il n’est pas clair dans quelle mesure la responsabilité incombera aux fournisseurs de modèles de base par rapport aux applications ou même aux utilisateurs finaux. S’appuyant sur les travaux récents de Benedict Kingsbury sur la « pensée infrastructurelle » dans le contexte du droit international, cet article explorera comment la pensée infrastructurelle pourrait contribuer au développement du droit, des politiques et de l’éthique de l’IA avec l’émergence des modèles de fondation, en se concentrant spécifiquement sur ChatGPT
Representation without Taxation? A Historical Review of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Municipal System and Quasi-Municipal Structures
Full text linkNewfoundland and Labrador is unique among Canadian provinces in its municipallevel governmental structures, and in particular, its substantial lack thereof. The province does not have a system of counties or an operating form of regional government. Many areas of the province operate without a formal municipal government and avoid property taxation by operating on a limited fee-for-service model of local government, or in some cases a total lack of sub-provincial government. Tens of thousands of residents live within this tax-free model today. This paper explores how this anomalous situation came to be, the issues it creates in modern society and how these issues are dealt with in practice.
Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador est unique parmi les provinces canadiennes en ce qui concerne les structures gouvernementales au niveau municipal, et en particulier leur absence quasi totale. La province ne dispose pas d’un système de comtés ou d’une forme opérationnelle de gouvernement régional. De nombreuses régions de la province fonctionnent sans administration municipale officielle et évitent l’impôt foncier en appliquant un modèle limité de paiement à l’acte de l’administration locale ou, dans certains cas, une absence totale d’administration infraprovinciale. Des dizaines de milliers d’habitants vivent aujourd’hui dans le cadre de ce modèle d’exonération fiscale. Dans présent article, nous explorons la genèse de cette situation anormale, les problèmes qu’elle engendre dans la société moderne et la manière dont ces problèmes sont traités dans la pratique
Mainstreaming Porn: Sexual Integrity and the Law Online
No full textThe ubiquity of streaming sites such as Pornhub has transformed the social role of sexually explicit content today. Online porn is no longer a shady corner of the internet; it is mainstream. Its production, commodification, and consumption on data-driven online platforms has changed - and is changing - our personal relationships, social and legal systems, and sexual norms.Online porn platforms are shaping sexual desires and practices in the same way that Google and Facebook have affected social relationships and the circulation of information: porn is now consumed on data-driven platforms with algorithms designed to engage the attention of users, encourage the production of user-generated videos, and filter content. Through frank examination of mainstream content with themes of incest, intoxication, and so-called consensual rough sex, issues that play out in life and in court, Elaine Craig shows how the platformization of mainstream pornography is shaping our sexual culture in real time. Mainstreaming Porn maps a complicated web of legal culture and legal actors, from corporate lawyers and platform content regulation to the criminal, civil, and administrative contexts in which porn companies operate and the legal interpretation of sexual assault defences. All have profound implications for the promotion and protection of everyone’s sexual integrity, and especially that of women and girls.Mainstreaming Porn is an unflinching, carefully balanced perspective on a divisive topic. Without demonizing pornography or its consumption, Craig makes a powerful argument for applying legal mechanisms to corporate-owned online platforms while offering a sober evaluation of the limits of the law in governing pervasive cultural norms and social understandings of sexuality.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments ix Introducing Porn on the Platform 3 Porn Has Changed 28 Porn Platforms as Social Meaning Makers 51 Are We Living in the House That Porn Built? 76 The Problems with Incest-Themed Porn 106 Do Judges Watch Porn? Porn, Sadomasochism, and the So-Called Rough Sex Defence 149 What to Do about Unlawful Porn on the Platform? 191 What to Do about Lawful Porn on the Platform? 224
Notes 263
Index 377https://digitalcommons.schulichlaw.dal.ca/faculty_books/1119/thumbnail.jp
Anthony Rosborough: The Canadian Right to Repair
No full textJoin student editor, Charlie, for a discussion with Assistant Professor Anthony Rosborough of the Schulich School of Law and the Faculty of Computer Science at Dalhousie University. Charlie and Anthony talk about his recent article in the Berkeley Technology Law Journal, titled, “Toward a Canadian Right to Repair: Opportunities and Challenges.” The conversation underscores the importance of a right to repair for Canadians by approaching the issue through both an IP and competition lens
The Mysterious Case of the Attacks Against the Halifax Public Gardens: The Enclosure of Common Property, Public Access to Nature, and Sustainability in the City
Full text linkThis Article will first describe the “thick” textured approach and methodological tools of urban legal anthropology applicable to researching and analyzing urban contact zones, which is then applied as the Article proceeds with the case study of the Halifax Public Gardens and the tree girdling and arson incidents that took place in 2022 to 2023. To situate the category of property within Halifax and within which the Halifax Public Gardens are found in order to move further into a discussion of property access and enclosure in the city, the Article then provides a description of the categories of urban property involved in and surrounding the case study of the Gardens as well as Halifax more broadly. Through the use of this case study, the Article then explores a number of questions surrounding what the development, enclosure, and application of stringent local bylaws to a slice of urban nature such as the Public Gardens can mean within the interactions and reactions of a city’s urban denizens within such a space. Next, there is an analysis of various considerations, justifications, and problems engaged when determining governance frameworks, structures, and degrees of urban common and public property access and use restrictions. Here, the Article draws on the right to the city and the notion of the urban commons alongside a discussion of urban “contact zones;” spatiotemporal (in)equality and the “time zoning” of use and access to urban common and public space; property and “belonging;” and processes of “disembedding” that can be implicated by degrees of horizontal versus vertical urban governance frameworks. Finally, the Article moves from the Halifax Public Gardens case study to briefly offer the broader context of other concurrent local conflicts and interventions with regard to parks, people, and access in Halifax in terms of the proliferation of encampments in parks fueled by the housing crises taking place in Halifax as well as other cities across Canada and North America. While property in Halifax remains situated within a dominant structuring logic and colonial infrastructure of property, property relations, access to property, property enclosure, and forms of property, this Article will specifically narrow in on questions surrounding the structure and legitimacy of these existing dominant forms of urban public and common property
Learning in Lockdown: Assessing the Impact of Online Legal Education on the Development of Professional Competencies and Identity
Full text linkWe administered a survey to law students at three Canadian law schools in the Atlantic region at the end of the Fall 2020 term. The survey asked students to compare their learning of each of the Federation of Law Societies of Canada (FLSC)-mandated competencies, as well as several others taken from the Law Society of New Brunswick (LSNB) competency profile, in the Fall 2020 (online) term versus previous terms of study. The survey also solicited testimonies on students’ socialization into the legal community during their unexpected online law school experience. Our data sheds lights on which competencies, among those deemed essential for law school graduates, are less likely to be adequately developed in an online instruction environment. Our analysis shows that online learning is not demonstrably less effective at fostering the FLSC-mandated competencies. Socialization into the legal community was the aspect of the typical law school experience most hindered by the online modality of instruction. While the Fall 2020 term was a difficult experience for many students, we also found that a sizeable minority of students thrived in the online environment, even with the temporary and emergency nature of the online law school experience in Fall 2020 and the pandemic-related public health restrictions during this period. Our findings are consistent with other studies conducted on law students during and before the pandemic outside of Canada.
Nous avons mené une enquête auprès des étudiants en droit de trois facultés de droit canadiennes de la région de l’Atlantique à la fin de la session d’automne 2020. L’enquête demandait aux étudiants de comparer leur apprentissage de chacune des compétences exigées par la Fédération des ordres professionnels de juristes du Canada (FOPJC), ainsi que de plusieurs autres compétences tirées du profil de compétences du Barreau du Nouveau-Brunswick, au cours de la session d’automne 2020 (en ligne) par rapport aux sessions d’études précédentes. L’enquête a également sollicité des témoignages sur la socialisation des étudiants dans la communauté juridique au cours de leur expérience inattendue de l’école de droit en ligne. Nos données mettent en lumière les compétences qui, parmi celles jugées essentielles pour les diplômés des facultés de droit, sont moins susceptibles d’être développées de manière adéquate dans un environnement d’enseignement en ligne. Notre analyse montre que l’apprentissage en ligne n’est pas manifestement moins efficace pour favoriser les compétences exigées par la FOPJC. La socialisation au sein de la communauté juridique est l’aspect de l’expérience typique de l’école de droit qui a été le plus entravé par la modalité d’enseignement en ligne. Bien que la session d’automne 2020 ait été une expérience difficile pour de nombreux étudiants, nous avons également constaté qu’une minorité importante de ceux-ci s’est épanouie dans l’environnement en ligne, malgré la nature temporaire et urgente de l’expérience de la faculté de droit en ligne à l’automne 2020 et les restrictions en matière de santé publique liées à la pandémie pendant cette période. Nos conclusions sont cohérentes avec d’autres études menées auprès des étudiants en droit pendant et avant la pandémie à l’extérieur du Canada
Stage and discharge prediction from documentary time-lapse imagery
No full textImagery from fixed, ground-based cameras is rich in qualitative and quantitative information that can improve stream discharge monitoring. For instance, time-lapse imagery may be valuable for filling data gaps when sensors fail and/or during lapses in funding for monitoring programs. In this study, we used a large image archive (>40,000 images from 2012 to 2019) from a fixed, ground-based camera that is part of a documentary watershed imaging project (https://plattebasintimelapse.com/). Scalar image features were extracted from daylight images taken at one-hour intervals. The image features were fused with United States Geological Survey stage and discharge data as response variables from the site. Predictions of stage and discharge for simulated year-long data gaps (2015, 2016, and 2017 water years) were generated from Multi-layer Perceptron, Random Forest Regression, and Support Vector Regression models. A Kalman filter was applied to the predictions to remove noise. Error metrics were calculated, including Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE) and an alternative threshold-based performance metric that accounted for seasonal runoff. NSE for the year-long gap predictions ranged from 0.63 to 0.90 for discharge and 0.47 to 0.90 for stage, with greater errors in 2016 when stream discharge during the gap period greatly exceeded discharge during the training periods. Importantly, and in contrast to gap-filling methods that do not use imagery, the high discharge conditions in 2016 could be visually (qualitatively) verified from the image data. Half-year test sets were created for 2016 to include higher discharges in the training sets, thus improving model performance. While additional machine learning algorithms and tuning parameters for selected models should be tested further, this study demonstrates the potential value of ground-based time-lapse images for filling large gaps in hydrologic time series data. Cameras dedicated for hydrologic sensing, including nighttime imagery, could further improve results.The authors are grateful to the Platte Basin Timelapse project for providing the imagery used in this research. This research was supported by the U.S. Department of Agriculture—National Institute of Food and Agriculture NEB-21-177 (Hatch Project 1015698 to TG). Additional student support was provided by the University of Nebraska Research Council through a Grant-in-Aid grant funded through a gift from the John C. and Nettie V. David Memorial Trust Fund (to TG). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript
Enhanced removal of ultratrace levels of gold from wastewater using sulfur-rich covalent organic frameworks
No full textIn view of the increasing global demand and consumption of gold, there is a growing need and effort to extract gold from alternative sources besides conventional mining, e.g., from water. This drive is mainly due to the potential benefits for the economy and the environment as these sources contain large quantities of the precious metal that can be utilized. Wastewater is one of these valuable sources in which the gold concentration can be in the ppb range. However, the effective selective recovery and recycling of ultratrace amounts of this metal remain a challenge. In this article, we describe the development of a covalent imine based organic framework with pores containing thioanisole functional groups (TTASDFPs) formed by the condensation of a triazine-based triamine and an aromatic dialdehyde. The sulfur-functionalized pores served as effective chelating agents to bind Au3+ ions, as evidenced by the uptake of more than 99% of the 9 ppm Au3+ solution within 2 min. This is relatively fast kinetics compared with other adsorbents reported for gold adsorption. TTASDFP also showed a high removal capacity of 245 mg·g−1 and a clear selectivity toward gold ions. More importantly, the material can capture gold at concentrations as low as 1 ppb.This work was supported by New York University Abu Dhabi and the NYUAD Water Research Center, funded by Tamkeen under the NYUAD Research Institute Award (Project CG007). We thank NYUAD for their generous support for the research program. We also thank Sandooq Al Watan (Grant No. SWARD-S22-014; Project ID, PRJ-SWARD-628) for their generous support. The research work was carried out by using the Core Technology Platform resources at NYUAD. We acknowledge Graphic Designer Aisha Jrad, who made the abstract and Table of Contents (TOC) artwork of the manuscript ([email protected])
Supported Decision Making: A Rapid Scoping Review of Literature on Best Practices
No full textThe purpose of this rapid scoping review is to identify principles and best (or “good” ) practices from an emerging academic literature on operationalizing supported decision making. It was produced as part of a suite of materials created by the IIDEAS Network -- an Inclusive, Interdisciplinary Decision-making Empowerment, Advocacy and Support Network composed of interdisciplinary academics working in disability studies, education, law, sociology, health/medicine and theatre, and others engaged in related community-based education, art/drama and advocacy, including two lived experience experts labeled/with intellectual disabilitie
Bobby and Eddie Galvan at Jazz Festival
No full textBobby and Eddie Galvan at on stage playing at the Jazz Festiva