Henk Maier's we are playing relatives : a survey of Malay writing

Four scholars and about fifteen other participants gathered at Monash University on 7 June 2007 to discuss Henk Maier's 'We are playing relatives: a survey of Malay writing' (KITLV Press, Leiden, 2004).

Legal relations of collectives : belated insights from Hohfeld

Collectives and their interrelations are central to international law. Legal relations between collectives can be analysed with reference to the classic account of Hohfeld without reducing those collectives to mere aggregates of individuals and without recourse to the legal fiction of treating the collective, for example the state, as a quasi-individual. The rights of collectives have been widely if not conclusively explored within international law, but Hohfeld’s ‘field’ approach to legal relations enables the scrutiny of the range of relations, including immunities, liberties, powers, and disabilities, as well as claim-rights and the corresponding obligations in others. The main substantive topics for discussion are the legal relations of collective entities such as peoples and minorities, and closely related matters such as self-determination. Applying Hohfeldian analysis to international law highlights the centrality of international collective entities of which the state represents only one variety. The approach described here therefore takes account of the dethroning of the state within contemporary international law and contributes to the theorization of that development. Nearly one hundred years after its
first appearance, Hohfeld’s analytic scheme continues to generate insights for international law.

The sword and the pen in the pre-modern Arabic heritage : a literacy representation of an important historical relationship

The so-called "literary debate" in Greek, Latin and many Near Eastern
languages is a well-developed genre. In his 1987 article, Geert Jan van Gelder surveyed its background more than adequately, 1 and very few details of that paper need to be repeated here. He assessed thoroughly the historical contribution of numerous poets to the relationship between "the sword and the pen," and also analyzed various aspects of this relationship in a few prose texts.

The platelet glycoprotein Ia/IIa gene polymorphism C807T/G873A: a novel risk factor for retinal vein occlusion

Retinal vein occlusion (RVO) is associated with hyperhomocysteinaemia and the antiphospholipid syndrome—disorders known to contribute to both arterial and venous thrombosis. In both of these conditions and RVO, platelet activation occurs. Aspirin, not warfarin, is the most effective antithrombotic agent in RVO and, taken together, these observations suggest an important role for platelets in this common ocular thrombotic condition. Platelet glycoprotein Ia/IIa (GpIa/IIa) is an adhesion molecule mediating platelet–collagen interactions and is key to the initiation of thrombosis. Recently, the cellular density of this molecule was shown to be determined by two silent, linked polymorphisms (C807T/G873A) within the GpIa/IIa gene. There is evidence that some of the resulting genotypes are associated with thrombo-embolic disease. This study therefore aimed to establish the prevalence of the GpIa/IIa polymorphisms and the three commonest hereditary thrombophilic disorders (prothrombin gene G20210A (PT) mutation, Factor V Leiden (FVL), and the thermolabile methylene tetrahydrofolate reductase C677T (MTHFR) mutation) in patients with RVO and normal controls. The GpIa/IIa polymorphisms and thrombophilic abnormalities were all identified using the polymerase chain reaction.

Our results show that the frequency of the GpIa/IIa polymorphisms was similar in our normal control population to previously published series. Patients with RVO, however, had only a 10% (4/40) frequency of the lowest risk subtype (CC/GG) compared to 37.5% (15/40) in the control group—P 0.0039. The incidence of the PT, FVL, and MTHFR thrombophilic mutations was not different between the two groups, but interestingly none of the 7/40 RVO cases with a PT, FVL, or MTHFR mutation had the low-risk GpIa/IIa genotype while all but one of the controls did—P<0.05. Thus, 17.5% of RVO patients harboured more than one prothrombotic abnormality. The principal difference between the RVO and control group was the very high incidence of the intermediate-risk GpIa/IIa subtype (CT/GA)—82.5 vs 50%, P<0.05.

These results suggest a major role for GpIa/IIa polymorphisms in the pathogenesis of RVO.

Missionary Albert Kruyt and colonial modernity in the Dutch East Indies

Intense debates emerged in the Dutch East Indies during the course of the third decade of the twentieth century concerning the role of missionaries in the development of the Outer Islands of the Indonesian archipelago. Ostensibly concerning “native welfare”, disagreement fundamentally reflected underlying fractures within the Dutch nation, projected through its “colonial mission” concerning the nature of modernity. While the main focus appeared to be a disagreement concerning the goals of mission and government agencies, it would be too simplistic to characterise the debate as one between adherents of a secular versus a religious world view. This paper considers the question of “missions and modernity” in the context of this debate about “native development” in the Dutch East Indies through the prism of the Poso mission in Central Sulawesi, headed by missionary Albert Kruyt, one of the foremost missionaries of his day.

Race, history, and the Australian faith missions

In 1901, the parliament of the new Commonwealth of Australia passed a series of laws designed, in the words of the Prime Minister Edmund Barton, “to make a legislative declaration of our racial identity”. An Act to expel the large Pacific Islander community in North Queensland was followed by a law restricting further immigration to applicants who could pass a literacy test in a European language. In 1902, under the Commonwealth Franchise Act, “all natives of Asia and Africa” as well as Aboriginal people were explicitly denied the right to vote in federal elections. The “White Australia policy”, enshrined in these laws, was almost universally supported by Australian politicians, with only two members of parliament speaking against the restriction of immigration on racial grounds.

Animal migration : linking models and data beyond taxonomic limits

An international workshop on animal migration was held at the Lorentz Center in Leiden, The Netherlands, 2–6 March 2009, bringing together leading theoreticians and empiricists from the major migratory taxa, aiming at the identification of cutting-edge questions in migration research that cross taxonomic borders.

A robust solution to the stereo-vision-based simultaneous localization and mapping problem with steady and moving landmarks

The problem of visual simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) is examined in this paper using recently developed ideas and algorithms from modern robust control and estimation theory. A nonlinear model for a stereo-vision-based sensor is derived that leads to nonlinear measurements of the landmark coordinates along with optical flow-based measurements of the relative robot-landmark velocity. Using a novel analytical measurement transformation, the nonlinear SLAM problem is converted into the linear domain and solved using a robust linear filter. Actually, the linear filter is guaranteed stable and the SLAM state estimation error is bounded within an ellipsoidal set. A mathematically rigorous stability proof is given that holds true even when the landmarks move in accordance with an unknown control input. No similar results are available for the commonly employed extended Kalman filter, which is known to exhibit divergence and inconsistency characteristics in practice. A number of illustrative examples are given using both simulated and real vision data that further validate the proposed method.