Muzzled and mad Canadian scientists

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The Silence of the Labs

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) aired an episode of The Fifth Estate on Friday night. I taped it and watched it yesterday between curling matches and the Canadian figure skating championships.¹

The Fifth Estate program documents the shutting down of various government labs by the Conservative government of Stephen Harper. The title says it all: Silence of the Labs. Follow the link and you can watch the entire program. I highly recommend that you watch the first two minutes to get the gist of what's happening in Canada.

Here's part of the summary that appears on the CBC website ...

Scientists across the country are expressing growing alarm that federal cutbacks to research programs monitoring areas that range from climate change and ocean habitats to public health will deprive Canadians of crucial information.

"What’s important is the scale of the assault on knowledge, and on our ability to know about ourselves and to advance our understanding of our world," said James Turk, executive director of the Canadian Association of University Teachers.

In the past five years the federal government has dismissed more than 2,000 scientists, and hundreds of programs and world-renowned research facilities have lost their funding. Programs that monitored things such as smoke stack emissions, food inspections, oil spills, water quality and climate change have been drastically cut or shut down.

The fifth estate requested interviews with two senior bureaucrats and four cabinet ministers with responsibility for resources, the environment and science. All of those requests were denied.

On Tuesday, the fifth estate received a statement from the office of Greg Rickford, Minister of State for Science and Technology, and the Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario.

"Our government has made record investments in science," it stated. "We are working to strengthen partnerships to get more ideas from the lab to the marketplace and increase our wealth of knowledge. Research is vibrant and flourishing right across the country."

But members of the scientific community disagree. CBC’s the fifth estate spoke to scientists across the country who are concerned that Canadians will suffer if their elected leaders have to make policy decisions without the benefit of independent, fact-based science.

The CBC is a crown corporation. That means it has to report to a branch of the government and some its Board of Directors are government appointees. A lot of its funding comes from the Federal Government.

You probably won't be surprised to learn that the CBC is also under attack from the Harper government. I don't think that pressure is going to diminish once Conservative MPs see this program.

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[Photo Credit: I took this picture during a protest on Parliament Hill in July 2012. There are videos in the Fifth Estate program but I didn't see any glimpses of me of any of my friends.]

1. So many exciting things on television—one has to have priorities. I don't watch the Leafs any more.

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Canada is destroying a generation of scientists

My department is in a Faculty of Medicine and the main source of research funding for biomedical sciences in Canada is the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR). The current Conservative Government has been consistently underfunding CIHR over the past six years so that the number of grants available for basic research (e.g. biochemistry and molecular biology) has been falling.

This is the time of the year when my colleagues hear the results of the latest grant competitions. It's been a sad couple of days because four labs failed to get funding for their main research projects. Eight other labs failed to get additional funding for ongoing projects that were not part of their main grant.

What does this mean? Let's think about the consequences for labs that lose their grants. In the short term, the lab will survive until the next application deadline but it means that the Professor running the lab can't take on any new graduate students or post-docs no matter how brilliant they might be. In some cases, the department, or the university, might have to provide "bridging" funds in order to pay the salaries and stipends of people in the lab. If the Professor manages to get the grant back in the next competition then a recovery is possible but a lot of damage has already been done.

However, in many cases the second or third attempts to recover funding are not successful and the lab must shut down. That's the situation we face in our department with several active research groups that have disappeared or are about to disappear.

The first people to be let go are the post-docs who are funded from the grant. They have to scramble to find a new position and this isn't easy. It could be the end of their career.

The most expensive people in the lab are the research technicians ($50-60,000 per year¹). They have to be put on notice and they will be fired. These are scientists with advanced degrees who are the heart and soul of a research lab. They are mostly women in mid-career. Many of them will never find another position that pays as well.

Graduate students who are close to finishing can usually be helped but those at the beginning of their studies have to switch to another lab and start a new project. This may not be possible.

Our research labs have two or three undergraduate students doing research projects as part of their degree requirements. As we lose more and more active labs, we also lose the ability to train undergraduates. We also hire undergraduate to work in labs over the summer and this provides invaluable experience in preparation for graduate school. If you don't have a funded lab you can't hire students. If you lose part of your funding, the easiest way to save money is not to hire anyone.

The groups that are losing their grants are the backbone of Canadian research infrastructure. The typical lab has three or four graduate students, a post-doc, and a research technician (research associate, lab manager). It takes about $150,000 per year to sustain such a lab. The Professor who runs the lab is usually between 30 and 40 years old (mid-career). The lab is producing several papers a year in respectable journals. These labs would easily have been funded a decade ago when the success rate on grant applications was 25% but now that it's down to 15% they are being cut out of the system.

Even those labs that are still funded are affected when a colleague loses a grant. That's because there's a lot of sharing of equipment and resources and expertise. We can foresee a time when the department falls below a critical mass of active research labs and when that happens everyone will lose their grants. Morale is already at an all-time low. Students and faculty are more worried about survival than science.

A generation of mid-career scientists is being destroyed by the policies of the Canadian government. Graduate students, post-docs, technicians, and undergraduates are being affected. It might take another generation to recover if funding were to return to appropriate levels. We might never recover if something isn't done soon.

Here at the University of Toronto we used to talk about becoming a world-class research centre. We don't talk about that very much any more.

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1. Salary plus benefits.

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What do you think of Brian Pallister's statement?

Brian Pallister is the leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Manitoba. Here's a statement he made the other day. I'm not particularly offended by what he say about atheists. I think it demonstrates that he is really stupid and probably should have kept his mouth shut but that's actually good for secularism, no? It's pretty clear that he doesn't know any atheists, or, even more likely, none of of the atheists he knows want to tell him that they are nonbelievers.

… I wanted to wish everyone a really really Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, all the holiday… all you infidel atheists out there, I want to wish you the very best, also. I don’t know what you celebrate during the holiday season — I myself celebrate the birth of Christ — but it’s your choice, and I respect your choice. If you wish to celebrate nothing and just get together with friends, that’s good, too. All the best.

(I think I understand why his parents gave their farm to his brother. )

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[Hat Tip: Friendly Atheist]

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The Green Party (of Canada) vs Science

The Green Party of Canada is led by Elizabeth May who has a seat in parliament. The Green Party (of Canada) advocates many positions that are anti-science [Do Not Vote for the Anti-Science Green Party].

The National Post is a major Canadian newspaper that leans to the right so it has never been a friend on the Green Party. In spite of this bias, they got something right when they wrote, Elizabeth May’s Party of Science seems to support a lot of unscientific public policies.

The article was written by Tristin Hopper. Here's what he says in the opening paragraphs.

Two months ago in Halifax, Green Party leader Elizabeth May appeared at a Stand Up For Science rally; one of many demonstrations held across the country to protest, among other things, a Canada-wide “muzzling” of government scientists.

“You may not like the opinions you get from science, but you have to listen to science,” Ms. May told Halifax radio.

Only a week before, however, Ms. May had been at a town hall meeting in her Saanich, B.C. riding telling her constituents not to trust federal science — albeit from a different agency than the ones being defended on the streets of Halifax.

“Agriculture Canada is increasingly a corporate model for profits, for Monsanto and Cargill, and certainly not to help farmers and certainly not to ensure safe food for Canadians,” said Ms. May.

The point needs emphasis. There's really no serious scientific debate over the safety of GM food. It is safe to eat. That does not mean that every single scientific paper that has ever been published proves that GM food is safe. You can always find some paper somewhere that backs up your preferred view of a scientific issue. Most Sandwalk readers know that real science is determined by the consensus views of the experts in the field and not by the rogue scientists who disagree. If you've been reading my blog, you will also know that in any debate that involves science both sides have to appear to have science on their side because, if you don't have science on your side in the 21st century, you've lost the debate.

Here's how Michael Kruse puts it. (He is quoted in the National Post article.)

“I really think the Green Party is just doing the same things everybody else does, which is to make up an idea that matches with your ideology, and then go looking for evidence to support it,” said Michael Kruse, chair of Bad Science Watch, a non-profit devoted to rooting out false science in public policy.

Michael has it right. The Green Party is doing exactly what a long list of groups do when their favorite beliefs aren't supported by the scientific consensus. They cherry-pick. Then they make up conspiracy theories to explain why climatologists, evolutionary biologists, nutritional scientists etc. are misleading the general public about the real science in their field.

In a July essay, Aaron Larsen, a Canadian-born Harvard post-doctoral fellow publicly called out the Green Party—his preferred choice at the ballot box—for its platform declaring that genetically-engineered crops are a “potentially serious threat to human health and the health of natural ecosystems.”

“Just to be clear, there has never been a single reputable, peer-reviewed study that has found any link between the consumption of genetically modified foods and adverse health effects,” he wrote.

That's why the Green Party is anti-science. There are many other examples of Green Party policies that are anti-science. You should not vote for the Green Party if you value science. I hate to think what might happen to science if it ever became the governing party of Canada.

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[Hat Tip: Canadain Atheist]

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They're Firing Cannons Across the Street!

Today is November 11th and the cannons started blasting at 11am in Queen's Park just across the street from the building where my office is located. It's a day when we should remember the horrors of war and the waste of lives, both civilian and military. It's a day when we should resolve never to let army generals run the world. It's a day to reflect on the many times that we failed to keep the peace and the terrible cost of those mistakes.

So how do we celebrate peace and remember the evils of armies, guns, and bombs? In Toronto we do it by a public display of soldiers dressed in their finest uniforms bedecked with medals. And the army brings its cannons. It's all very glorious.

I long for the day when we don't even have an army and all the cannons are rusting in some junk heap. That will be the day when we have truly learned about the evils of war and the purpose of November 11th.

I agree with PZ Myers when he asks Who deserves honor?

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On Preparing Students for the 21st Century

Yesterday I attended a meeting organized by the Ontario Ministry of Education. The theme was From Great to Excellent: The Next Phase in Ontario's Education Strategy. The idea was to promote widespread consultation before the Ontario government releases its new plan for education reform next year.

I was attending on behalf of my friend Chris DiCarlo who had to be out of town. He (and I) are promoting the concept of critical thinking; specifically, the idea that it needs to be explicitly taught in a high school philosophy course.

The Minister of Education (Liz Sandals) and several of the senior members of her ministry were there. They told us that today's students are facing unprecedented changes and that the Ontario education system has to change in order to cope. They were mostly thinking about technological change and the possibility that today's students would have new types of jobs and careers.

I'm certain that we can improve our education system but I'm not sure it's helpful, or even correct, to focus on the idea that the next generation will have to cope with situations we never faced in the past. If we could show that our existing education system did a pretty good job of preparing students for change then maybe we should turn our attention to problems other than job training and technological innovation?

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The Quebec National Assembly Crucifix Belongs in a Museum

I'm indebted to Veronica for telling me about this petition. I stole the title of her post: La Place du Crucifix de l’Assemblée Nationale Est dans un Musée.

Sign this petition if you think the crucifix should be removed from the Quebec National Assembly.

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Canada and Ontario Will Celebrate Pope John Paul II Day

The House of Commons in Canada has passed a bill declaring that Canada will celebrate Pope John Paul II Day on April 2nd every year [An Act to establish Pope John Paul II Day]. It was a private member's bill introduced by Conservative Wladyslaw Lizon (Mississauga East—Cooksville). Lizon is Polish, which partly explains his admiration for the former Pope. Read what Veronica Abbass has to say about this: Tommy Douglas versus Karol Wojtyła.

Meanwhile, in Ontario, a similar bill was passed by the provincial legislature [see Blindsided on Canadian Atheist].

It's tempting to dismiss both these bills as trivial. After all, nobody really expects either government to make a big fuss about it next April 2nd. Its also tempting make excuses by recognizing that few MPs or MPPs could risk speaking out against them.

I don't think we should settle for that. The facts are revolting. Canada has set aside a special day for a foreign despot whose religious and moral views are despised by a large number of Canadians, and rejected by most Catholics. How in the world could that happen in the 21st century?

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Get Science Right in Canada

Get Science Right

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Religious Affiliation in Canada

The results of the 2011 Canadian census are beginning to appear. Indi at Canadian Atheist has prepared a nifty pie chart showing that 63.7% of the population identifies themselves as Christians [2011 National Household Survey religion results].

In second place, at 23.9%, are those who say they have no religion. We know that many of the "nones" will not call themselves "atheists" but they might as well be.

The take-home lesson is that almost 24% of Canadians are not religious. That's up from 16.5% in 2001. Times they are a -changin.

The question on the census was ...

22. What is this person’s religion?

Indicate a specific denomination or religion even if this person is
not currently a practising member of that group.

For example, Roman Catholic, Ukrainian Catholic, United Church,
Anglican, Lutheran, Baptist, Greek Orthodox, Jewish, Islam, Buddhist,
Hindu, Sikh, etc.

Specify one denomination or religion only __________

No religion __________

I think you can see why nonbelievers may be somewhat higher than the numbers indicate.

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One Public School System in Ontario

I petition the Ontario Legislature to adopt legislation to establish a single, non-sectarian, publicly funded school system made up of English and French language school boards.

Sign the Petition.

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Chris Hadfield and Barenaked Ladies: I.S.S. (Is Somebody Singing)

Ms. Sandwalk posted this on her blog and I just had to copy it. Here's Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, the current commander of the International Space Station, singing with Ed Robertson and the Barenaked Ladies band accompanied by the Scarborough Wexford Gleeks choir .

The song was written by Chris Hadfield and Ed Robertson.

You probably have to be Canadian to appreciate this but, what the heck, I'm posting it anyway. It combines science and the Barenaked Ladies. What more could you want?

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Michele Bachmann Lies About Socialized Medicine

Michele Bachmann is an IDiot but I try to avoid commenting on the fact that she's a duly-elected congresswoman from Minnesota. If Americans want to elect someone like her to run their country then that's up to them.

People in the civilized world outside of the USA are puzzled by some of the things she says—they wonder how she can get away with such statements and still be elected. Her recent speech on "Obamacare" in Congress is a case in point. You can see it in the video below. This is the speech where she says, ""Repeal this failure [Obamacare] before it literally kills women, kills children, kills senior citizens."


Later on her spokesman, Dan Kotman, issued the following statement.

Obamacare is forcing doctors into the employ of cost-cutting hospitals, gives government the authority to determine services that will and will not be covered, has a board independent of Congress that can cut payments for care, and allows the Secretary of Health and Human Services to force all health plans to eliminate any doctor that doesn't practice medicine the government's way. The history of government-run health care systems around the world is a history of denial, delay and sadly even death.

It's one thing to attack "Obamacare" but when she attacks healthcare in Canada and all other civilized countries, that's a different issue.

Let me remind you that there's tons of data showing that people live longer in other countries and they survive cancer better. Infant mortality is lower in other countries. And this success is achieved at lower cost than health care in the USA. In other words, Michele Bachmann is dead wrong when she says that socialized medicine is a "history of death."

As I was preparing this post I stumbled across a video of Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama defending American health care in the Senate of the United States Congress. Are Americans embarrassed by speeches like this or is this typical of Americans who have been elected to the Senate? Is it the best that Alabama has to offer?

Sen. Jeff Sessions: 'So We've Got People Who Die Sooner'

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Former Canadian Senator Pat Carney Has Trouble Getting Along with Atheists

Last Sunday (March 3, 2013) CBC radio aired a discussion on "Does religion have a place in public life?" The host was Rex Murphy. You can listen to the entire thing at: Does religion have a place in public life?.

I want to draw your attention to a segment where former Canadian Senator Pat Carny talks about her esperience with atheists. (Carney was a cabinet minister under Prime Minister Brian Mulroney.) The excerpt is embedded below. If it doesn't work, click on Pat Carney MP3.

Here how she begins ...

... you're debating the wrong question. It's not the role of religion in public institutions. it's the difficulty of being a person of faith working with people who haven't any ... any religion. And I'm speaking as someone with 27 years in parliament ...

It gets worse. She claims that atheists simply don't share her values, such as the Golden Rule, therefore you can't find common ground when trying to make policy.

All I can say is that it's a damn good thing she doesn't live in Western Europe because those secular societies clearly don't exhibit any of the values she holds so dear.

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[Hat Tip: Thanks to Tony Burns for preparing the audio excerpt.]

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Should Chilliwack BC Permit Distribution of Bibles in Public Schools?

Here's a notice from the BC Humanist Association.

Recent secular victories in Chilliwack are at risk.

On November 13th, the Board of the Chilliwack School District deleted Regulation 518 that stated, "The Board approves the distribution of Gideon Youth Testaments to Grade 5 pupils with parental consent." At the same meeting, the Board agreed to draft a new policy to permit the "distribution of materials" by March 2013.

This new policy represents an attempt to use public schools for religious proselytizing in BC public schools.

Superintendent Evelyn Novak intends to gather feedback through February to draft the new policy. While this feedback may not be open to the public, secular voices will be heard.

Please sign the petition below to send the message to the Chilliwack School Districts that BC schools should remain secular.

Sign the Petition. You will have to identify yourself but that shouldn't be a problem if you really believe in a secular school system.

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[Hat Tip: Veronica Abbas at Canadian Atheist.]

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New Premier of Ontario: Kathleen Wynne

Last night the Liberal Party of Ontario selected a new leader, Kathleen Wynne. Since it's the governing party, she automatically becomes the Premier of Ontario.¹ I was hoping she would be chosen but in the last few weeks it looked like her opponent, Sandra Pupatello, was going to win.

Kathleen Wynne represents the leftish wing of the Liberal Party of Ontario and that's the view I support. Wynne becomes the first women Premier of Ontario and she joins five other women who lead provincial/territorial governments in Canada. As of today, almost 90% of Canadians live in provinces headed by a woman!

Kathleen Wynne is also the first openly gay person to head a provincial government. She is married to Jane Rounthwaite.² Her sexual orientation wasn't really much of an issue during the campaign. Here she is, thanking her partner Jane during the acceptance speech last night.

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1. Subject to approval by the Lieutenant Governor.
2. Same-sex marriage has been legal in Ontario since 2002.

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What Does the Liberal Party of Canada Stand For?

I've long been a supporter of the Federal Liberal Party of Canada. It's the party of Mike Pearson and Pierre Elliot Trudeau—two Prime Ministers that I greatly admire. I even like Jean Chrétien!

Lately I'm having trouble understanding what the Liberal Party stands for. They've just had two leaders (Michael Ignatieff, and Bob Rae) who are complete mysteries to me. I really don't know what they stand for, or what they're passionate about.

Apparently I'm not alone. Here's the view of Thomas Walkom from a column in the Toronto Star a few days ago [Do Canada’s, or Ontario’s, Liberals matter any more?].

On the other hand, it’s not clear what the Liberals represent any more. They would like voters to think of them as the non-Conservatives — the alternative to Stephen Harper federally or to Tim Hudak in Ontario.

But are they?

Paul Adams, an astute political observer writing in iPolitics, argues that the federal Liberals have transformed themselves into the old Progressive Conservatives, socially progressive but fiscally to the right.

I’d go further. I reckon the old PCs of Joe Clark would find federal Liberal leadership candidate Martha Hall Findlay’s talk of dismantling farm marketing boards a bit too right-wing for their tastes

Similarly, Liberal front-runner Justin Trudeau’s enthusiastic embrace of the Alberta oilsands would probably be seen as a tad naive by the Red Tories of former Ontario premier Bill Davis, most of whom believed that strong business required equally strong regulation.

As a party, the Liberals haven’t had a new idea since the 1980s. Individual party members have (Stéphane Dion’s green shift comes to mind).

But the party, as a whole never signed onto Dion’s environmental agenda. Nor has it signed onto anything else.

The Liberals talk of holding policy conventions that would replicate that golden period of the 1960s, when the party embraced medicare, public pensions and welfare reform.

But they never do. Former federal leader Michael Ignatieff hosted a thinkers’ conference that headlined prominent conservatives. Nothing came of it.

The conventional wisdom among Liberals is that strong policy positions should be avoided at all costs in order to avoid alienating voters. Instead, Liberals prefer to talk about what they call values.

We've been discussing this issue with our former Liberal MP, Omar Alghabra, who happens to be a member of Justin Trudeau's team. Justin, for those of you who don't follow Canadian politics, it the son of Pierre Elliot Trudeau and he's running for the leadership of the Federal Liberal Party. We want Justin, and all the other candidates, to speak out on what the Liberal Party stands for.

Omar sent us a link to this video. It's obvious that Justin is avoiding the question. He stands for some trivial issues like legalizing marijuana but what about the bigger issues? How do I tell the difference between the Liberal Party and Conservative Party or the New Democratic Party? I don't think I can vote for Justin Trudeau or for any of the other leadership candidates. In fact, I'm not sure I can vote for the Liberal in the next election. The NDP is looking very attractive.

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