Baigiamajame darbe analizuojamos Teismo nagrinėtų ginčų dėl kontinentinio šelfo delimitavimo priimtų sprendimų nuostatos, kuriose išaiškintos pagrindinės delimitavimo taisyklės. Kadangi 1958 m. Konvencija dėl kontinentinio šelfo bei 1982 m. Jūrų teisės konvencija numato tik abstrakčius kontinentinio šelfo delimitavimo principus, teismo sprendimuose pateikiamas šių principų turinys. Darbe analizuojama, kurios teisės normos yra reikšmingiausios delimituojant kontinentinį šelfą, akcentuojami jų nustatymo kriterijai, reikšmingos aplinkybės bei šių normų taikymo ypatumai. Antroje darbo dalyje nustatytos taisyklės taikomos konkrečios srities – Egėjo jūros kontinentinio šelfo delimitavimui, siekiant išsiaiškinti, kokie sunkumai kyla praktiškai įgyvendinant Teismo sprendimuose išaiškintas normas. Atsižvelgiant į iškeltą tikslą bei uždavinius, nustatyta, kad Teismas sprendimuose apibrėžė pagrindines teisės normas, reglamentuojančias kontinentinio šelfo delimitavimą. Tačiau dėl skirtingų faktinių aplinkybių, dažnai pasitaiko jų taikymo išimčių. Teismo sprendimuose pasigesta detalesnių kriterijų, kurias remiantis būtų nustatoma salų įtaka kontinentinio šelfo delimitavimui, kriterijų, kuriais vadovaujantis būtų išskiriamos pagrindinių delimitavimo taisyklių išimtys. Dėl to kyla sunkumų, kai šias teisės normas reikia pritaikyti konkrečiai situacijai. Tikėtina, kad visus šiuos neaiškumus užpildys vėlesnė Teismo praktika. / This thesis investigates provisions of Court-analysed disputes regarding continental shelf delimitation made decisions, where the main rules of delimitation are being explained. As main international conventions - 1958 Convention on the Continental Shelf and 1982 Law of the Sea Convention - cover general principles of continental shelf delimitations only, the court decisions are accompanied with the content of these principles. This work analyses which rules of law are the most important when delimitating continental shelf, emphasising criteria used to establish them, influential circumstances and peculiarities of their application. In the second part of the thesis the rules identified are being applied to a particular case of continental shelf delimitation in the Aegean Sea, aiming to determine potential problems that may arise trying to apply the court-specified rules of law in practice. With reference to the set objective and tasks it was established that the Court in its decisions has defined legal standards regulating the delimitation of the continental shelf. However, due to different factual circumstances, exceptions with regard to application thereof are rather frequent. The Court decisions were found to be lacking more detailed criteria which would serve as a basis for the determination of islands’ influence on the delimitation of the continental shelf, as well as criteria which would help to identify the exceptions to the main delimitation rules. Therefore... [to full text]

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The southern Campos Basin comprises syn- and post-rift strata characterised by thick and extensive units of non-marine limestones. These carbonate platforms are scientifically significant due to their unusual palaeoenvironmental setting, and the complexity of the factors controlling their accumulation. They are of economic importance due to discoveries of giant hydrocarbon accumulations in these non-marine carbonate rocks. 3D seismic interpretations show an oblique extensional rifting system that formed a series of graben, half-graben, accommodation zones and horsts oriented NESW to NNE-SSW. The area is subdivided into three tectonic domains based on structural style, stretching factors and subsidence rates. The structural template of the syn-rift exerts a strong influence on depositional patterns. Core logging and thin-section work together with FMI and sidewall core data indicate proximal to more distal lacustrine carbonate deposits with fluvio-deltaic clastics in marginal areas. The dominant carbonate facies are molluscan rudstones and floatstones and a taphonomic analysis (taphofacies) of the cored intervals and exposure surfaces indicate accumulation in shallowing-upward cycles in response to changes in lake level. Microbialite facies, Aptian in age, appear to occur in the most distal locations in restricted palaeoenvironmental conditions. Facies models are presented for the skeletal, mollusc-rich deposits of the Barremian Coqueiros Formation and the overlying microbialite-rich Aptian Macabu Formation. The deposits are stacked in a hierarchical arrangement of four levels of cyclicity ranging from the entire rift basin fill to metre-scale cycles. Controls on formation of these cycles include structural setting, climate and lacustrine margin progradation. Different types of carbonate platform form in the different basinal settings and include footwall areas of fault-blocks, accommodation zones and buried horst blocks. The southern Campos Basin evolves from an initial alkali lake (Barremian) to a main phase of syn-rift, brackish lake conditions. The post-rift succession (Aptian) is characterised by both brackish and hypersaline conditions.

This thesis examines the sources and method used by Sir James Dalrymple, 1st Viscount Stair, when writing and revising his seminal work, the Institutions of the Law of Scotland (1681). In doing so, it focuses particularly on Stair’s titles on the law of obligations. The thesis shows how Stair used learned authority and continental legal treatises. It demonstrates that Stair relied particularly upon Hugo Grotius’ De jure belli ac pacis (1625), Petrus Gudelinus’ De jure novissimo (1620), and Arnoldus Vinnius’ Commentarius academicus et forensis (1642), and, to a lesser extent, Vinnius’ Jurisprudentia contracta (1624-1631) and Arnoldus Corvinus’ Digesta per aphorismos (1642). It establishes when, in the process of writing and later revising the Institutions, Stair first used and when he returned to these continental legal treatises. It explains Stair’s pattern of borrowing from these treatises, and shows how his method and pattern of borrowing changed as he revised the Institutions. It establishes Stair’s purpose in consulting each of these works and how he was influenced by them. Overall, the thesis explains Stair’s method of writing and his use of sources and authorities, places his work in the context of continental jurisprudence, and thus significantly enhances current understanding of Stair’s Institutions.

One of the central purposes of the international law of the sea is to define various maritime zones, their extent and limits. One of these zones is the continental shelf. The continental shelf in modern international law has two aspects: The continental shelf within 200 nautical miles from the shore of coastal States and the continental shelf beyond that limit. The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea provides that information on the limits of the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles shall be submitted by the coastal State to a scientific and technical commission, namely the Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf. The Commission is responsible for making recommendations to coastal States on matters related to the establishment of the outer limits of their continental shelves beyond 200 nautical miles. If the limits of the shelf established by a coastal State are on the basis of the recommendations, they are final and binding. The establishment of the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles has two main features: The establishment of the boundary line between the continental shelf and the international seabed area and the establishment of the boundary between the continental shelf of adjacent or opposite coastal States. Many questions concerning the relationship between these procedures have been left unanswered as well as the relationship between the Commission and international courts and tribunals. This thesis analyses the role of coastal States, the Commission and international courts and tribunals in the establishment of the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles and the interplay between them. It explores how the various sources of international law have contributed to the establishment of the current legal framework. The thesis explores the differences between the delineation and delimitation of the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles. It demonstrates that the role of the Commission is to curtail extravagant claims to the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles and protect the territorial scope of the international seabed area. It also shows that the role of international courts and tribunals in this field is essentially the same as their role in other types of disputes. It explains that the establishment of the boundary line between the continental shelf and the international seabed area and the establishment of the boundary between the continental shelf of adjacent or opposite coastal States is a separate process. Furthermore, it clarifies that the three-stage boundary delimitation method is applicable beyond 200 nautical miles. It also displays that no special rule of customary international law has evolved that is solely applicable to delimitations regarding the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles. The thesis addresses the interaction of the various mechanisms within the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea concerning the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles. Its main conclusion is that despite the possibility for tension to arise the relationship between the institutions is clear and precise and they together form a coherent system where each separate institution plays its own part in a larger process.

Holocene shoreline sequences and associated shelf stratigraphy are described from a high gradient, high wave energy shelf offshore the central KwaZulu-Natal and northern KwaZulu-Natal coastlines. These are examined using high resolution single-channel seismic and multibeam bathymetric means in order to describe the shallow stratigraphy and seafloor geomorphology of each area. The development and preservation of two distinct planform shorelines at -100 m (northern KwaZulu-Natal) and -60 m (northern KwaZulu-Natal and central KwaZulu-Natal) is described. The shallow seismic stratigraphy of northern KwaZulu-Natal comprises three seismic units (Units 1-3) corresponding to calcarenite barriers (Unit 1), back barrier lagoonal sediments (Unit 2) and the contemporary highstand sediment wedge (Unit 3). At intervening depths between each shoreline the shelf is characterised by erosional surfaces that reflect ravinement processes during periods of slowly rising sea level. Where shorelines are not preserved, areas of scarping in the ravinement surface at depths coincident to adjoining shorelines are apparent. These areas represent rocky headlands that separated the sandy coastal compartments where the shorelines formed and are a function of the high gradient. In central KwaZulu-Natal where the shelf is notably wider and gentler, shoreline building was more intense. Five major seismic units are identified (Units 1-5) with several subsidiary facies. The formation of the -60 m barrier complex (Unit 2) in central KwaZulu-Natal was accompanied by the simultaneous formation of a back-barrier system comprising lake-lagoon depressions (Unit 3) and parabolic dune fields aligned to the local aeolian transport direction, formed on a widened coastal plain. On the seaward margins of the barrier, gully and shore platform features developed coevally with the barrier system. Several relict weathering features (Unit 4) are associated with the barrier and reflect similar processes observed in contemporary aeolianite/beachrock outcrops on the adjacent coastline. The two submerged shoreline sequences observed are attributed to century to millennial scale periods of stasis during which shoreline equilibrium forms developed and early diagenesis of beachrock and aeolianite occurred. These extensive phases of shoreline development are thought to have occurred during periods of stillstand or slowstand associated with the Bølling-Allerod Interstadial (~14.5 ka BP) and the Younger Dryas Cold Period (~12.7-11.6 Ka BP). Shoreline preservation in such an environment is considered unlikely as a result of intense ravinement during shoreline translation, coupled with the high energy setting of the KwaZulu-Natal shelf. Preservation of both the 100 m and 60 m shorelines occurred via overstepping where preservation was promoted by particularly rapid bouts of relative sea-level rise associated with meltwater pulses 1A and 1B (MWP-1A and -1B). This was aided by early cementation of the shoreline forms during stillstand. Differences in shelf setting have led to variations in the style of barrier preservation and associated transgressive stratigraphies between the central KwaZulu-Natal and northern KwaZulu-Natal shelves. The main differences include a much thicker post-transgressive sediment drape, higher degrees of transgressive ravinement and an overall simplified transgressive system’s tract (TST) architecture on the steeper and narrower continental shelf of northern KwaZulu-Natal. In comparison, the central KwaZulu-Natal shelf’s 60 m shoreline complex reflects more complicated equilibrium shoreline facets, large compound dune fields formed in the hinterland of the shoreline complex, higher degrees of preservation and a more complicated transgressive stratigraphy. / Thesis (M.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, 2013.

This thesis analyzes Martin Heidegger's early interpretation of Aristotelian concepts. The goal is to acquire an increased understanding of the ideas underlying Aristotle's political philosophy, as well as those underlying Heidegger's own later philosophy. The investigation begins with a critique of Kantian logic and the assumptions which underlie it, which are ultimately traced back to Aristotle. The passages that pertain to Kant's interpretation are assessed by Heidegger, who concludes that it is speaking, not explicit definition, that grounds possibility for life in a human sense. To demonstrate Heidegger's argument, the thesis transitions into an assessment of the Greek view of life and the way it influences Aristotle's investigation of the human being. The goal of the first three chapters is ultimately to demonstrate the manner in which speaking allows for a unique way of being in the world for the human being, a way of being that makes ethical disposition and thus moral excellence possible. Beginning in Chapter 4, the thesis discusses the Aristotelian concept of ends and endhood, ultimately outlining the manner in which Aristotle goes about his investigation in the Nicomachean Ethics which serves to re-emphasize the interpretation set forth in the first half of the thesis. After giving an account of eudaimonia, the thesis discusses rhetoric and politics in chapter five, since it is demonstrated that an ethical disposition cannot be acquired without both being and conversing with other people in a community. A brief account of Aristotle's conclusions in the Politics and Rhetoric follows, and the thesis concludes with an outline of the web of ideas that Heidegger has set forth in his interpretation. The thesis also provides an in-depth interpretation of key passages from the Metaphysics, Politics, Rhetoric, De Anima and Nicomachean Ethics which ultimately serve as examples of Heidegger's unique manner of interpretation to the reader.

This thesis covers the uncertainty of empirical prediction. As opposed to objectivity, I will discuss the practicality of statistics. Practicality defined as "useful" in an unbiased sense, in relation to something in the external world that we care about. We want our model of prediction to give us unbiased inference whilst also being able to speak about something we care about. For the reasons explained, the inherent uncertainty of statistics undermines the unbiased inference for many methods. Bayesian Statistics, by valuing hypotheses is more plausible but ultimately cannot arrive at an unbiased inference. I posit the value theory of money as a concept that might be able to allow us to derive unbiased inferences from while still being something we care about. However, money is of instrumental value, ultimately being worth less than an object of “transcendental value.” Which I define as something that is worth more than money since money’s purpose is to help us achieve “transcendental value” under the value theory. Ultimately, as long as an individual has faith in a given hypothesis it will be worth more than any hypothesis valued with money. From there we undermine statistic’s practicality as it seems as though without the concept of money we have no manner of valuing hypotheses unbiasedly, and uncertainty undermines the “objective” inferences we might have been able to make.

Exposed on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, the Jurassic Bonanza arc is believed to represent the southerly continuation of the Talkeetna arc. Small bodies of mafic and ultramafic cumulates within deeper plutonic levels of the arc constrain the fractionation pathways leading from high-MgO basalt to andesite-dacite compositions. The removal of amphibole from the most primitive non-cumulate compositions controls the compositions of mafic plutons and volcanics until the onset of plagioclase crystallization. This removal is accomplished by the intercumulus crystallization of large amphibole oikocrysts in primitive olivine hornblendite cumulates. Experimental hornblende compositions that crystallize from high-MgO basalts similar to primitive basalts from the Bonanza arc show a good correlation between octahedral Al in hornblende and pressure, and provide a means of estimating crystallization pressures during differentiation of primitive arc basalt. Application of an empirical barometer derived from experimental amphibole data (P = Al(6)/0.056 – 0.143; r2 = 0.923) to natural hornblendes from this study suggests that crystallization of primitive basalts took place at 470-880 MPa. Two-pyroxene thermometry gives a result of 1058 +/- 91 ºC for the only olivine hornblendite sample with both pyroxenes. Lever rule calculations require the removal of 30-45 % hornblende from the most primitive basalt compositions to generate basaltic andesite, and a further 48% crystallization of hornblende gabbro to generate dacitic compositions. Hornblende removal is more efficient at generating intermediate compositions than anhydrous gabbroic fractionating assemblages, which require up to 70% crystallization to reach basaltic andesite from similar starting compositions. There are no magmatic analogues to bulk continental crust in the Bonanza arc; no amount of delamination of ultramafic cumulates will push the bulk arc composition to high-Mg# andesite. Garnet removal appears to be a key factor in producing bulk continental crust.

The purpose of this study was to develop a methodology to analyse ROV video and scanning-sonar data to document the abundance and distribution of epi-benthic megafauna on the continental slope off Vancouver Island and to quantify the impact of trawling on these megafaunal assemblages. Impacts of bottom trawling on deep-sea ecosystems vary depending on habitat types and species present. Environmental factors such as depth, dissolved oxygen concentration, substratum type, and bottom roughness also affect the diversity and composition of benthic communities. We studied two transects (30km and 12km long) on the upper continental slope off Vancouver Island, BC, Canada, that included areas of seafloor with visible trawl marks. Our study area was also located in an oxygen minimum zone with very low bottom water dissolved oxygen concentrations in its core (600m-1000m). The main target for bottom trawling fisheries in this area is the longspine thornyhead (Sebastolobus altivelis). Field data were collected using the ROV ROPOS equipped with a 3CCD video camera and high-resolution scanning sonar. Megafaunal composition/abundance and bottom characteristic information were extracted from video imagery and assembled using a custom-designed MS Access database. The same database was used to compile information on trawl-door marks detected in recorded sonar imagery. The sonar surveyed a 50m radius around the submersible during transects, providing a broader view of evidence of trawling in the area than video. This thesis reports on relationships between environmental variables and faunal abundance, diversity and species distribution. Following the video and sonar analysis, diversity patterns and general species distribution for both transects were determined. Relationships of community structure to depth and trawling intensity were investigated using the hierarchical clusters technique to identify similarities in the megafauna assemblages between stations . Finally, spatial structures in the megafaunal community and their associated environmental variables were examined using the Principal Coordinates Neighbour Matrices (PCNM) and redundancy analysis tests. Differences in total abundance, species composition and distribution, and species diversity were detected between the high and low trawling intensity areas. One of the main highlights of our results was the dominance of ophiuroids and holothurians along most of the transect, except for the highly trawled area. Spatial structures were identified in the megafaunal community, showing a strong influence of bottom trawling intensity and, to a lesser extent, depth. Nearby water column measurements of dissolved oxygen concentrations suggest that depth might be associated with dissolved oxygen levels, but in situ oxygen data were not available during the ROV surveys. A deeper understanding of in situ oxygen levels would help clarify the role of this factor in shaping megafauna assemblages and its interaction with trawling. / Graduate