The Codex Angus (Add. MS 40 in the University of Sydney Library's Rare Books and Special Collections) is a Byzantine Gospel lectionary meant for liturgical use. The findings presented here corroborate this catalogue description. There is ample evidence of its heavy use, which indicates a public not a private setting. After a brief description of the manuscript, particularities of its content and appearance are discussed, all of which point to a small rural community, in Northern Greece, as its original owner and user. Together with introducing the codex, this article casts light on the Christian community that might have used it.

State repression of ethno-religious minorities is a widespread practice among dictatorships. Nevertheless, political science literature on the topic presents inconsistent findings regarding the causes and consequences of this phenomenon, largely due to the challenges associated with researching human rights violations in non-democratic regimes. The present systematic literature review covers theme-related articles indexed in the Web of Science database and published in English, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, or Chinese from January 1990 to December 2022 (n=169). By reviewing a wide array of theoretical frameworks, methodologies, and data collection strategies, this article identifies causes, consequences, and endogenous relationships, as well as key gaps in the literature on ethno-religious repression in non-democratic settings, providing a solid starting point for further research.

In recent years, passive motion paradigms (PMPs), derived from the equilibrium point hypothesis and impedance control, have been utilised as manipulation methods for humanoid robots and robotic manipulators. These paradigms are typically achieved by creating a kinematic chain that enables the manipulator to perform goal-directed actions without explicitly solving the inverse kinematics. This approach leverages a kinematic model constructed through the training of artificial neural networks, aligning well with principles of cybernetics and cognitive computation by enabling adaptive and flexible control. Specifically, these networks model the relationship between joint angles and end-effector positions, facilitating the computation of the Jacobian matrix. Although this method does not require an accurate robot model, traditional neural networks often suffer from drawbacks such as overfitting and inefficient training, which can compromise the accuracy of the final PMP model. In this paper, we implement the method using a deep neural network and investigate the impact of activation functions and network depth on the performance of the kinematic model. Additionally, we propose a transfer learning approach to fine-tune the pre-trained model, enabling it to be transferred to other manipulator arms with different kinematic properties. Finally, we implement and evaluate the deep neural network-based PMP on the Universal Robots, comparing it with traditional kinematic controllers and assessing its physical interaction capabilities and accuracy.

A topological space has a domain model if it is homeomorphic to the maximal point space $\mbox{Max}(P)$ of a domain $P$. Lawson proved that every Polish space $X$ has an $\omega$-domain model $P$ and for such a model $P$, $\mbox{Max}(P)$ is a $G_{\delta }$-set of the Scott space of $P$. Martin (2003) then asked whether it is true that for every $\omega$-domain $Q$, $\mbox{Max}(Q)$ is $G_{\delta }$-set of the Scott space of $Q$. In this paper, we give a negative answer to Martin’s long-standing open problem by constructing a counterexample. The counterexample here actually shows that the answer is no even for $\omega$-algebraic domains. In addition, we also construct an $\omega$-ideal domain $\widetilde{Q}$ for the constructed $Q$ such that their maximal point spaces are homeomorphic. Therefore, $\textrm{Max}(Q)$ is a $G_\delta$-set of the Scott space of the new model $\widetilde{Q}$ .

Station-keeping control is a critical technology for stratospheric aerostats. For those aerostats that utilise wind field environments to achieve trajectory control, the station-keeping capability of a single aerostat is inherently limited. This limitation can lead to instances of the aerostat flying outside the designated task area, thereby diminishing the effectiveness of station-keeping control. To ensure continuous monitoring of the restricted area for long endurance, dynamic adjustments and cooperative coverage among multiple aerostats are necessary. This paper introduces an optimal coverage algorithm based on Voronoi diagrams and presents a formation control method for stratospheric aerostats that employs the virtual force method and the ${A^{\rm{*}}}$ algorithm, respectively. In a real wind field environment, ten aerostats are deployed to optimally cover the restricted area. Simulation results indicate that the coverage rate of the stratospheric aerostats within the restricted area can exceed 70%, while the network connectivity rate among the aerostats can reach 80% following guidance control during return flights. Furthermore, the stratospheric aerostats that flying out of the restricted area can return through path planning and optimal coverage algorithm, and the networking connectivity rate between aerostats is higher than that using the virtual force method.

Procedural justice considerations have long justified both the instrumental and intrinsic value of effective participation among court users, where ideals of impartiality, dignity and fairness remain pre-eminent. However, recent developments in socio-legal research as well as legal policy and practice point to an inchoate normative reframing of the law beyond procedural justice grounds, based on what we call the humanising imperative for effective participation. We utilise the philosophy of Hume to elucidate its distinctive features, namely the significance of partiality and the virtues of humanity. The paper further explores the putative enactment of the humanising imperative in three court settings in England and Wales – the Court of Protection, criminal courts and inquests – that indicates the precarity of this orientation in relation to procedural justice principles.

In the present study, we combine southern multilingualisms and linguistic governmentality frameworks to analyze the dominant framings of multilingualism in Pakistan and the subject positions they entail. Using critical policy studies and narrative analysis, we draw upon official policy documents (n = 6) and university students’ narratives (n = 2). Our analysis suggests that the dominant framings of multilingualism in Pakistan are informed by (post)colonial and neoliberal ideologies centered on bounded notions of language and commodification of linguistic competencies. They are characterized by hierarchization of named languages and their functions in relation to their political and economic value, otherization of indigenous languages, and compartmentalization of students’ linguistic competencies into economically privileged languages. These framings entailed subject positions that gradually erased their (students’) multilingual identities and instead morphed them into plurimonolingual subjects of/for the state and the market. We also discuss implications for scholars, teachers, and policy makers in this study. (Multilingualism, southern theory, governmentality, neoliberalism, language education, language policy)

Between 1814 and 1826 four members of the family of Jane Talbot and her cousin William Henry Fox Talbot had an active and varied interest in the study of mosses, which included the collecting, drawing and naming of specimens. This article explores the textures of their developing practice of learning natural history, and considers their activities within the framework of the circulation of knowledge, their reading and skill development, and the networks that supported them. Their social status and connections provided access to the expertise of numerous British botanists, including Lewis Weston Dillwyn, William Jackson Hooker, and James Dalton, placing the family as a locus of knowledge (re)production and transmission. This work illustrates the pedagogical practices of an elite group as they engaged with botany in a domestic setting, and makes suggestions as to their motivations and stimulations, as well as the conditions that maintained or diminished their interest. At a time when mosses were little-studied even by professed botanists, it demonstrates how a family group including many young women filled their leisure pursuits with these small plants, and reveals how an extended family with no previous expertise in formal botany could be actors in early nineteenth-century knowledge exchange.

By 1849 the kindergarten spread across the German Confederation as an alternative space of revolutionary politics and protest. I argue that the kindergarten worked alongside the barricade as a key location to protest traditional forms of state and religious authority and cultivate a new humanity that centered on women's gendered labor and children's education. For the founder of the kindergarten Friedrich Fröbel and his supporters, the classroom was a garden for the future in which educators and children alike could “perform utopia.” For female revolutionaries, the kindergarten provided a forum to make political claims in ways not open elsewhere. This article provides insight not only into the history of Central Europe in the Age of Revolutions, but also into the histories of emotions, gender, and education. I argue that historians should examine how ideas of “utopian hope” have been utilized in moments of upheaval to create new spaces of opposition.

The exponential growth of cross-border data flows and fragmented national and regional data protection standards have intensified regulatory challenges in global trade. The effects of regulatory divergence are amplified by a lack of transparency, potentially masking discriminatory practices. Article VII of the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) offers a framework for recognition agreements to bridge these gaps but is not utilized in practice. This paper examines the interplay between GATS Article VII and the EU data adequacy decisions – currently the most comprehensive bilateral framework for assessing compatibility between data protection regimes among other WTO members. It argues that data adequacy frameworks qualify as recognition agreements/arrangements under GATS, offering potential to reduce the trade effects of differences in data protection laws globally while safeguarding regulatory autonomy. A roadmap for leveraging Article VII to advance international alignment is developed to help realize the dual goals of enhancing global cooperation and strengthening privacy protection.