Solving One-Side Polarization: Supreme Court Polarization and Politicization in Israel and the U.S.

The Israeli Supreme Court has become increasingly polarized between liberal and conservative judges. This phenomenon is relatively new to the Israeli Supreme Court and follows the much older and more well-known example of the U.S. Supreme Court. This article surveys both U.S. and Israeli court polarization and shows the history, reasons, and special features of polarization of both courts, including the important differences between them. It also adds a distinction to existing literature on court polarization—the distinction between court polarization and politicization, and especially the distinction between “regular” polarization and “one-side” polarization. Regular court polarization happens when the court is divided roughly equally between the two main political contenders (usually between right and left). One-side polarization happens when there is a clear advantage to one side of the political map in the make-up of the court. The current U.S. Supreme Court, with six conservative justices and only three liberal justices, is an example of one-side court polarization that is tilted to the right. The current Israeli Supreme Court (as of the writing of these lines) is an example for one-side court polarization tilted to the left; there are 10 liberal judges and only five conservative judges on the court. The article’s main argument is that one-side court polarization presents a particularly vexing problem for the legitimacy of the court, even more so than “regular” polarization. The article concludes with a survey of possible solutions to help Israel retract itself from one-side court polarization.

Near-infrared Studies of Nova V1674 Herculis: A Shocking Record Breaker

We present near-infrared spectroscopy of Nova Herculis 2021 (V1674 Her), obtained over the first 70 days of its evolution. This fastest nova on record displays a rich emission line spectrum, including strong coronal line emission with complex structures. The hydrogen line fluxes, combined with a distance of 4.7 − 1.0 + 1.3 kpc, give an upper limit to the hydrogen ejected mass of M ej = 1.4 − 1.2 + 0.8 × 10 − 3 M ⊙. The coronal lines appeared at day 11.5, the earliest onset yet observed for any classical nova, before there was an obvious source of ionizing radiation. We argue that the gas cannot be photoionized, at least in the earliest phase, and must be shocked. Its temperature is estimated to be 105.57±0.05 K on day 11.5. Tentative analysis indicates a solar abundance of aluminum and an underabundance of calcium, relative to silicon, with respect to solar values in the ejecta. Further, we show that the vexing problem of whether collisional ionization or photoionization is responsible for coronal emission in classical novae can be resolved by correlating the temporal sequence in which the X-ray supersoft phase and the near-infrared coronal line emission appear.

Can Blockchain Solve the Hold-up Problem in Contracts?

A vexing problem in contract law is modification. Two parties sign a contract but before they fully perform, they modify the contract. Should courts enforce the modified agreement? A private remedy is for the parties to write a contract that is robust to hold-up or that makes the facts relevant to modification verifiable. Provisions accomplishing these ends are renegotiation-design and revelation mechanisms. But implementing them requires commitment power. Conventional contract technologies to ensure commitment – liquidated damages – are disfavored by courts and themselves subject to renegotiation. Smart contracts written on blockchain ledgers offer a solution. We explain the basic economics and legal relevance of these technologies, and we argue that they can implement liquidated damages without courts. We address the hurdles courts may impose to use of smart contracts on blockchain and show that sophisticated parties' ex ante commitment to them may lead courts to allow their use as pre-commitment devices.

Distinct Advantages of Circumferential Notch Tensile (CNT) Testing in the Determination of a Threshold for Stress Corrosion Cracking (KISCC)

Stress corrosion cracking (SCC) is a vexing problem for load-bearing equipment operating in a corrosive environment in various industries, such as aerospace, chemical and mineral processing, civil structures, bioimplants, energy generation etc. For safe operation, effective maintenance and life prediction of such equipment, reliable design data on SCC (such as threshold stress intensity for SCC, i.e., KISCC) are invaluable. Generating reliable KISCC data invariably requires a large number of tests. Traditional techniques can be prohibitively expensive. This article reviews the determination of KISCC using the circumferential notch tensile (CNT) technique, the validation of the technique and its application to a few industrially relevant scenarios. The CNT technique is a relatively recent and considerably inexpensive approach for the determination of KISCC when compared to traditional techniques, viz., double-cantilever beam (DCB) and compact tension (CT) that may be fraught with prohibitive complexities. As established through this article, the CNT technique circumvents some critical limitations of the traditional techniques.

The Synergistic but Troubled Relationship Between Psychotherapy Science and Practice: Moving Forward

How to foster the integration of science (especially empirical research) and practice has been a vexing problem since the beginnings of counseling psychology and other applied fields. We propose that the basis for this problem is the very different, even contradictory, demands of empirical research and practice, and the resulting ways of being research scientists and practitioners. Focusing on psychotherapy, we posit seven such demands/pulls and ways of being and seven tactics for strengthening integration. Clinically relevant research on the therapeutic relationship and therapist skills/interventions conducted at the Maryland Psychotherapy Clinic and Research Lab is summarized. We emphasize that for science and practice to be mutually facilitative, the field will need to pay close and ongoing attention to ways of strengthening integration.

A Method for Checking Recombinant Protein Quality to Troubleshoot for Discordant Immunoassays

Discordant results of recombinant protein-based enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISA) and other antigen detection tests are a common and vexing problem in scientific research and clinical laboratories. The reproducibility of immunoassays based on antibody specificity can be adversely affected by cryptic changes in the composition of the analyte (e.g., the protein antigen). By use of sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and mass spectrometry analyses, we found varying levels of purity and the extent of post-translational modifications (PTMs), particularly of N-linked glycosylation and phosphorylation, among varied lots of recombinant glucose-regulated protein 78 (GRP78) expressed in Escherichia coli. We expect these lot-to-lot variabilities of both purity and PTMs led to inconsistent results stemming from ELISA assays that measured GRP78 autoantibody levels in patient plasma specimens. We present these analyses to draw readers attention to a potentially common, yet seldom appreciated problem, in laboratory assays using recombinant proteins as antigens for antibody detection, and propose a workflow to detect and troubleshoot for this typical problem.

Aha! under pressure: Is the Aha! experience constrained by cognitive load?

The Aha! moment‒ the sudden insight sometimes reached when solving a vexing problem‒ entails a different problem-solving experience than solution retrieval reached by an analytical, multistep strategy (i.e., non-insight). To date, the (un)conscious nature of insight remains debated. We addressed this by studying insight under cognitive load. If insight and non-insight problem solving rely on conscious, effortful processes, they should both be influenced by a concurrent cognitive load. However, if unconscious processes characterize insight, cognitive load might not affect it at all. Using a dual-task paradigm, young, healthy adults (N = 106) solved 70 word puzzles under different cognitive loads. We confirmed that insight solutions were more often correct and received higher solution confidence. Importantly, as cognitive load increased, non-insight solutions became less frequent and required more solution time, whereas insightful ones remained mostly unaffected. This implies that insight problem solving did not compete for limited cognitive resources.

Well-Being Therapy for Depressive Symptoms in Chronic Migraine: A Case Report

Depression in chronic migraine is a common and vexing problem. Stress-oriented psychotherapies showed to improve depressive symptoms but not to affect migraine disability or attacks. Well-Being Therapy (WBT) is a short-term psychotherapy intervention based on promoting well-being and optimizing functioning, which showed to be effective in the treatment of residual depressive symptoms and chronic pain. This single case describes an account of successful WBT for a case of chronic migraine with depressive symptoms. The patient is a 37-year old employed, engaged, Caucasian heterosexual woman who had chronic migraine without aura and depressive symptoms and received eight WBT sessions. Number of migraine attacks, migraine disability, and psychological variables were assessed at baseline, at sessions 4 and 8 of WBT, and at 3-month follow-up. At session 8 of WBT, a decrease in number of migraine attacks and migraine disability was observed together with an improvement on depressive symptoms as well as an increase of well-being and euthymia. The positive effects of WBT were maintained at 3-month follow-up. WBT may be a promising intervention for chronic migraine patients with depressive symptoms.