| Blockchain: From Cryptocurrency to Data Federation |
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Vincenzo Liberatore, Ph.D. – Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science |
Friday September 20, 2019
12:30-1:30 p.m.
Dampeer Room
Kelvin Smith Library*
Case Western Reserve University
Dear Colleagues:
The first three entries on a recent google search for “blockchain” were from IBM, Deloitte, and KPMG. IBM offered to “Develop Breakthrough Aps” and KPMG to “Reshape the business landscape.” Deloitte promoted its 2019 Global Blockchain Survey summarized as, “blockchain gets down to business.” “What we’re seeing in 2019,” the authors reported, “is the continuing evolution of blockchain from a capable yet underdeveloped technology into a more refined and mature solution poised to deliver on its initial promise to disrupt. The question for executives is no longer, ‘Will blockchain work?’ but, ‘How can we make blockchain work for us?’”
As Andrew Ross Sorkin noted, this can sound like, “the latest technological revolution to those in-the-know – and what seems like the latest get-rich-quick gibberish to the average person.” What the heck is it? Blockchain was created to operate the trading of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. It is, says another consulting firm, “a decentralized ledger of all transactions across a peer-to-peer network. Using this technology, participants can confirm transactions without a need for a central clearing authority.” Such as a central bank. A shared ledger could prevent either party from fraudulently misstating accounts, ensures “consensus before a new transaction is added to the network” and “eliminates or reduces paper processes.” All managed by algorithms – and assuming everybody has the computer power to store the shared data.
If that doesn’t explain it, join us for a much more informed presentation and discussion!
All best regards,
Joe White
Luxenberg Family Professor of Public Policy and Director, Center for Policy Studies
About Our Guest
Dr. Liberatore’s research interests include real-time network control of the smart power grid of alternative energy sources, actuator and wireless sensor networks. With the support of FirstEnergy, he developed the Energy Information Dashboard (EIDA) energy market simulations as an education tool on the path from electricity generation, consumptions and markets for the smart grid. His other research interests include distributed systems, Internet computing and randomized algorithms. Dr. Liberatore served on the program committees of the Workshop on Factory Communication Systems (WFCS) and the International Conference on Mobile Data Management (MDM).
Where We Meet
The Friday Public Affairs Lunch convenes each Friday when classes are in session, from 12:30 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. Our programs are open to all and no registration is required. We usually meet in the Dampeer Room of Kelvin Smith Library.
* Kelvin Smith Library requires all entrants to show identification when entering the building, unless they have a university i.d. that they can magnetically scan. We are sorry if that seems like a hassle, but it has been Library policy for a while in response to security concerns. Please do not complain to the library staff at the entrance, who are just doing their jobs.
Parking Possibilities
The most convenient parking is the lot underneath Severance Hall. We regret that it is not free. From that lot there is an elevator up to street level (labeled as for the Thwing Center); it is less than 50 yards from that exit to the library entrance. You can get from the Severance garage to the library without going outside. Near the entry gates – just to the right if you were driving out – there is a door into a corridor. Walk down the corridor and there will be another door. Beyond that door you’ll find the entrance to an elevator which goes up to an entrance right inside the doors to Kelvin Smith Library.
Schedule of Friday Lunch Upcoming Topics and Speakers:
September 27: Social Media and Politics. With Lauren Copeland, Assistant Professor, Department of Politics and Citizenship, and Associate Director, Community Research Institute, Baldwin-Wallace University.
October 4: Hidden Costs of Waiting for Treatment: The Case of Orthopedic Surgery in Norway. With Mark Votruba, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Economics and Research Associate, Statistics Norway. ***Alternate Room: Room LL06, Lower Level, Kelvin Smith Library***
October 11: Small Steps and Giant Leaps: How Apollo 11 Shaped Understandings of Earth and Beyond. With Steven A. Hauck II, Professor and Chair, Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences. ***Alternate Room: Room LL06, Lower Level, Kelvin Smith Library***
October 18: Roe v. Wade in 2019. With B. Jessie Hill, Judge Ben C. Green Professor of Law.
October 25: Brexit Trick or Treat. With Luke Reader, Full-Time Lecturer in English.
November 1: Local News: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow. With Joseph Frolik, Executive Editor, Ideastream.
November 8: TBA. With Peter Shulman, Associate Professor of History.
November 15: Will We Ever Have Paris? The U.S. and the International Politics of Climate Change. With Matthew Hodgetts, Visiting Assistant Professor of Political Science.
November 22: The (New?) Israeli Government. With Peter J. Haas, Abba Hillel Silver Professor Emeritus of Jewish Studies.
November 29: Thanksgiving break
December 6: Papers Please: Challenging Citizenship in the United States. With Cassandra Burke Robertson, John Deaver Drinko – Baker Hostetler Professor of Law and Director, Center for Professional Ethics. |
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September 15, 2019
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Upcoming Events
Battle for the Ballot Box
Join a student panel for the 2019 CWRU Constitution Day program featuring Alora Thomas-Lundborg, J.D., Senior Staff Attorney, American Civil Liberties Union Voting Rights Project and Hans A. von Spakovsky, J.D., Senior Legal Fellow, Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, The Heritage Foundation, Monday September 16, 2019, 4:00 p.m., CWRU School of Law, Room 157, 11075 East Blvd., Cleveland, Ohio 44106. Free and open to the public. Sponsored by the Office of the President, Office of Government and Community Relations, Department of Political Science, Center for Policy Studies, and School of Law.
The USA was founded in pursuit of a more perfect union. In the Elections Clause (Art I, Section 4) and several amendments (XIV, XV, XVII, XIX, XXIII, XXIV, and XXVI), the Constitution enshrines, explicitly or implicitly, the right to vote — a political and legal journey that continues to be challenging and complex.
Though the American republic is certainly more democratic than it once was, issues such as voter ID laws, voter registration purges, and partisan gerrymandering have raised concerns about electoral fraud and discrimination against minorities. Recent Supreme Court decisions — Shelby County v. Holder (2013) and Rucho v. Common Cause (2019) — have failed to address key questions. How do states balance the integrity of elections and the individual right to vote? What role does the federal government have in preserving democracy throughout the USA?
The CWRU Student Constitution Discussion Roundtable is pleased to welcome Alora Thomas-Lundborg, J.D., and Hans von Spakowsky, J.D., to discuss critical questions on the right to vote.
The U.S. Health Policy Community: A View from Europe
A discussion with Ulrike Lepont, Ph.D., Postdoctoral Researcher, University of Montpellier, Wednesday September 18, 2019, 12:30 – 2:00 p.m., Mather House, Room 100, 11201 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, OH. Free and open to the public. Refreshments Will Be Provided. Cosponsored by the CWRU Center for Policy Studies and the Master of Public Health Program.
American health policy involves not only political institutions and their elected and appointed officials but a whole ecology of experts who produce research and proposals, promote ideas at conferences and in the press, and advise policy-makers. Ulrike LePont’s strikingly original dissertation used both documents and extensive interviews to outline how this health policy community influenced choices from 1970 – 2010. Join us as she describes the community that American analysts may take for granted because they are part of it.
Ulrike Lepont did her doctoral research in France with the groups of scholars at Université Montpellier 1 and Université Versailles-Saint-Quentin-Yvelines. Her thesis – “Shaping Policies at the State’s Margins: The role of experts in American health care reforms (1970-2010)” was approved at Montpellier in December, 2014 and in 2015 received the public policy dissertation prize from the association française de science politique. She has published articles based on this work in Revue française de science politique, Revue française de sociologie, Politix, and Gouvernement et action politique. She is now presenting her work at U.S. conferences and has papers under submission to U.S. journals.
Dr. Lepont’s further research has investigated other examples of the politics of ideas, such as the idea that health care costs can be reduced by improving quality (rather than more quality having to be paid for) and a comparison of how economists’ views changed, or did not, in France and the United States after the 2008 financial crash. She has served as a lecturer at Université de Versailles Saint Quentin, a postdoctoral researcher with French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), and as a member of the research teams for the PRINTEMPS, a joint CNRS/UVSQ project that focuses on professional worlds (such as commitments, knowledge and expertise) and how their members are socialized and build their careers. Dr. Lepont also is currently part of the ANR Desorbercy project, which focuses on how the structures of politics, economics, and finance respond and change in contexts of disorder and expert uncertainty about what to do.
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