Category: The Conversation – Canada

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By David Sidhu, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Carleton University

Imagine you’re hiring someone for a job that requires a very kind, agreeable and co-operative person. You have two candidates and all you know about them are their names: Renee and Greta. Who do you think would be a better fit?

If you are like the people in our recent study on hiring judgments, you probably chose Renee. We found that smoother-sounding names like Renee were preferred to harsher-sounding names like Greta for certain kinds of jobs.

The idea that the sound of a word can make it a better fit for particular meanings or qualities is known as sound symbolism. And it suggests that even something as small as the phonemes in a name can carry surprising weight in how people are judged.

The power of sound symbolism

The best known example of sound symbolism is the bouba/kiki effect. Across languages and cultures, people tend to match the made-up word “bouba” with round shapes and “kiki” with spiky ones.

Why this happens is still debated. Various explanations exist, including the physical sensation of pronouncing the words or the way the sounds of the words imitate the features of round versus spiky objects.

Several years ago, we tested whether the bouba/kiki effect extended beyond invented words to real first names. In one part of that study, we showed participants silhouettes that were either round or spiky and asked them to match them with names.

Not only do people associate names like Bob with round silhouettes and Kirk with spiky silhouettes, but people also associate these names with different personality traits.

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Why people hate or love the sound of certain words

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Smoother-sounding names like Liam or Noelle were judged as more agreeable and emotional, while spikier-sounding names like Tate or Krista were judged as more extroverted.

Importantly, this didn’t mean that Liams actually were more agreeable than Tates. In fact, when our study looked at the personalities of more than 1,000 people, we didn’t find any sign these patterns existed in the real world. Nevertheless, people still make associations based on the sounds of names.

Names and hiring decisions

In our latest study, we were curious to see how these associations might affect judgments in a real-world context: hiring. Of course, employers usually have much more to go on than a name, but there are many instances in which candidates are screened based on only limited information.

There is also a great deal of evidence that socio-demographic cues in a name — such as race and age — can affect who gets a callback. The sound of a name itself could be another potential source of bias.

We designed job ads that looked for a candidate high in one of six personality factors: honesty-humility, emotionality, extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness (how organized or hard-working someone is) and openness to experience. For example, one ad looking for an agreeable candidate read:

An organization is looking to hire a new employee. The ideal applicant for this job should be:

• Co-operative
• Peaceful
• Not aggressive

A sample of adults recruited online were then given a pair of names and asked to decide who sounded like a better fit for the job. One name in the pair contained what are called “sonorant” consonants (l, m, n) that sound especially smooth and continuous.

The other contained what are called “voiceless stops” (p, t, k) that sound especially abrupt. For example, they might have to choose between Liam and Tate.

The people in our study made decisions for many different pairs of names, and the overall finding across three experiments was that smoother sounding names, like Liam and Noelle, were judged as better fits for jobs looking for someone high in honesty-humility, emotionality, agreeableness and openness.

When more information is available

We also tested what happens when additional information was introduced. For example, what if participants saw Liam in a picture or watched a video of him answering questions about himself?

We found that when people saw pictures of candidates (randomly paired with names), the influence of name sound decreased. When people saw a videotaped interview of the job candidates, the sound of a name no longer had an effect on their judgments of personality.

We also asked participants how well a given name fit the job candidate in the video. When people felt a name suited a candidate — regardless of sound — that candidate was judged more positively on almost every measure, including warmth and competence.

In other words, there seems to be a benefit of having a name that fits, even though it’s not yet known why some people’s names seem to suit them better than others.

Taken together, these results show the sound of a name might be one additional source of bias in hiring decisions. When people don’t have a lot of details about a candidate, it seems that there is much in a name.

David Sidhu receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC)

Penny Pexman receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC).

– ref. What’s in a name? How the sound of names can bias hiring decisions – https://theconversation.com/whats-in-a-name-how-the-sound-of-names-can-bias-hiring-decisions-263607

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Larry Till, PhD student, Werklund School of Education, University of Calgary

The fears are familiar: Artificial intelligence is going to eat our jobs, make our students weak and lazy and possibly destroy democracy for good measure.

As AI has become more accessible to the public, it’s become closely (and probably not unreasonably) associated with academic misconduct, especially plagiarism and other forms of cheating.

For some time now, research has been suggesting that the future of AI and post-secondary education would be deeply intertwined.

What if, though, teaching students to use AI properly — ethically, responsibly and critically — could help make them better, more engaged citizens?

Fuelling debate

Since its public release in late 2022, ChatGPT, one of the most commonly used generative AI (GenAI) models in the world, has sparked furious academic debate. But the either/or argument that it will kill us or make us stronger is a false dichotomy.

As a long-time post-secondary educator, public servant and current doctoral student examining education and civic literacy, I am interested in the potential for AI to help us build a healthier, more inclusive and more robust democracy by creating new ways to engage our critical thinking skills across disciplines.

I researched this article, in part, by using Scite.ai, a research tool to which I was introduced by Sarah Eaton, a member of my doctoral supervisory committee whose research focuses on academic ethics in higher education. Eaton has examined issues around student misconduct, and has also argued that the connection between civic and digital literacy, including the use of AI in post-secondary education, is strong and growing.

Universities and civic literacy

Civic literacy is about fostering students’ potential to become active, engaged students in the pursuit of peaceful social change.

Somewhere along the way, it seems, universities shied away from that part of their institutional role.

Through western modernity, universities came to occupy roles as endowers of knowledge while building on more ancient expectations that education carried social obligations, often construed as a form of “noblesse oblige.”

Decolonial, democratic and educational criticism rightly underscores the importance of recognizing varied forms of knowledge existing throughout society and in learners’ own lives, and how students and diverse disciplines collaborate to construct knowledge.

Through this lens, as some scholars have argued, universities have become spaces to foster forms of civic literacy.

Educating for democracy

The role of colleges and universities in fostering civic literacy, sometimes known as educating for democracy, feeds their contribution to fostering democratic societies. Universities frequently point to this role proudly, speaking of it in broad, glowing terms without offering a lot of specifics.

While universities and colleges often talk broadly about creating learning spaces conducive to democratic engagement and good citizenship, principles associated with democracy have tended to be concentrated in a relatively small number of academic disciplines, such as humanities, social and political sciences. The STEM disciplines don’t always give them the same attention.

The need for digital and AI literacy, across disciplines, raises rich possibilities around fostering the teaching and learning of democratic or civic dispositions. This refers to creating students who become voting citizens, who have the capacity to make informed political decisions about the leaders who represent them or to assess the validity of what those leaders present.

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AI is making elections weird: Lessons from a simulated war-game exercise

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The path to using AI to foster civic literacy requires the reinforcement of critical thinking, which encourages learners to challenge assumptions and cultivate independent thought.

Becoming critical, informed citizens

Many of us are familiar with concerns that AI doesn’t probe deeply; it can’t assess credibility as a human might; it’s typically working from dated information, having been trained on older, static data sets; it demonstrates bias and discrimination; and sometimes, it can outright hallucinate, making up facts that have no basis in reality.

There’s a bit of a void at the moment in terms of institutional AI policies on the use or misuse of AI and how everyone understands them, which is understandable, given how new the technology is.

This is where the connection between AI and civic literacy is especially strong: the same critical thinking skills we teach our students in literature, science or any other discipline can be applied to when explaining AI policy or transparently examining AI outputs in classes related to curricula and assignments.

By teaching students to question outputs and assess their validity, accuracy and trustworthiness, we can help them enhance the very skills they’ll ultimately need to become active, informed citizens.

They might then stand a better chance of becoming more critical citizens, employing their skills to resolve disputes and assess everything from the news they consume to promises made by political leaders. It can also help develop the skills to combat political polarization and misinformation.

True digital literacy includes not only determining in what contexts it could be appropriate to use AI but also how to effectively use AI-powered tools.

Need for prudence

University educators have to be prudent in our approach, though. So-called “cognitive offloading” — trusting machines to do our reasoning, thinking and memory work for us — is a genuine risk.

This risk makes the argument for using AI to teach critical thinking even more compelling. Human analysis of the output and its credibility is essential.

In a presentation at the University of Calgary in March 2025, Eaton noted:

“If anything, problems facing students, educators and citizens of the world may be even more complex in the future than they are today … These next-generation citizens will be navigating and leading changes we have not yet even imagined.”

What I am seeing in my research is that a broadening of the discussion to look at AI’s potential to foster civic literacy — as Eaton suggests — may be crucial to the future of democracy.

Larry Till does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Universities could bolster democracy by fostering students’ AI literacy – https://theconversation.com/universities-could-bolster-democracy-by-fostering-students-ai-literacy-261905

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Xin Li, Professor, Botany, University of British Columbia

Genomes contain the complete library of information required to build and maintain a living organism — the figurative blueprints of life. In eukaryotes, genomes are stored in the nuclei, where they are organized into chromosomes. A eukaryote is an organism whose cells have a nucleus surrounded by a membrane: plants, animals, fungi and many microbes are eukaryotes.

The human genome, for example, is organized in 23 chromosomes, each containing a portion of the complete genetic code. Until recently, it has always been assumed that each nucleus contains at least a complete set of chromosomes, and thus the “one nucleus, one full genome” rule.

However, our research has revealed that in two species of fungi, their genomes can be split across multiple nuclei, with each nucleus receiving only part of the total chromosomes.

A surprising discovery

Our laboratory at the University of British Columbia studies the fungus Sclerotinia sclerotiorum, which is a soil-borne pathogen causing stem rot or white mold in various crop plants, including canola, soybean and sunflower.

Despite its impact on cash crops, S. sclerotiorum‘s genetics and cell biology are not well understood.

While trying to better understand the biology of this fungus, our laboratory made a startling discovery about the organization of S. sclerotiorum’s 16 chromosomes during cell division and reproduction.

Most eukaryotic cells are diploid, meaning the nucleus contains two copies of each different chromosome. In many fungi, such as baker’s yeast, reproduction begins with a parent diploid cell dividing to form haploid spore cells with one nucleus housing one copy of each chromosome.

However, S. sclerotiorum spores, known as ascospores, each contain two separate nuclei. Previously, it was assumed that each nucleus was haploid, containing the full suite of 16 chromosomes. This would mean that each ascospore contains a total of 32 chromosomes, similar to a diploid cell.

Using fluorescent microscopy, we were able to directly count the number of chromosomes present in a single ascospore. Remarkably, we consistently observed only 16 chromosomes per ascospore, in conflict with the 32 predicted by the current “one nucleus, one full genome” theory.

Additionally, we used fluorescent probes to label specific chromosomes, and found that the two nuclei in an ascospore contain distinct chromosomes. Ascospores contain one set of 16 chromosomes divided across two nuclei, rather than each nucleus containing a complete set of chromosomes.

An irregular manner

The next question we asked was whether the 16 chromosomes are randomly assorted between the two nuclei, or whether this genomic division follows a regular pattern.

To answer this, we separated individual nuclei and determined which chromosomes were present through polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis. We found that chromosome composition varies among nuclei, suggesting the division of chromosomes between nuclei is in an irregular manner.

Intrigued, we sought to investigate whether similar phenomenon occurs in other fungi. Botrytis cinerea is another species of plant pathogenic fungi in the same family as S. sclerotiorum.

B. cinerea produces conidial spores typically with four to six nuclei, rather than the two regularly observed in ascospores of S. sclerotiorum. Using similar methods, we found that the 18 chromosomes in the B. cinerea genome are similarly split across nuclei, with each nucleus generally carrying three to eight chromosomes.

This observation showed that haploid genome “splitting” across nuclei occurs in multiple plant pathogenic fungi. However, whether this phenomenon is wider spread across fungal families, or even other eukaryotes, requires further study.

An unknown mechanism

The observation that the S. sclerotiorum and B. cinerea haploid genomes are divided across nuclei raises questions about how this separation plays a role in the rest of the fungal life cycle.

In order to produce the next generation, these fungi need to reform a diploid cell with the full suite of chromosomes, from which new ascospores can be produced. Presumably, this requires the fusion of nuclei with complementary chromosomes to reunite the genome. So how do these fungi ensure that the correct nuclei fuse?

Perhaps the simplest explanation would be one of viability selection: nuclei may fuse randomly, but only those with a complete genome would produce viable ascospores. This seems inefficient, and a more attractive scenario would involve some structure or mechanism to keep complementary nuclei together after the initial division, allowing them to easily reassemble later in the fungal life cycle.

We hope our future work will provide answers to these fascinating questions, and help broaden our understanding of the fundamental dynamics of nuclei and their genomes. This improved understanding will enable dramatic revolutions in gene editing, allowing researchers to manipulate chromosomes and nuclei at will.

Xin Li receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

Edan Jackson receives funding from Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

Josh Li receives funding from Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.

– ref. White mold fungi split their genome across several nuclei, with implications for future gene editing – https://theconversation.com/white-mold-fungi-split-their-genome-across-several-nuclei-with-implications-for-future-gene-editing-260699

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Faiza Hirji, Associate Professor, Department of Communication Studies and Media Arts, McMaster University

I recently watched both seasons of the Netflix drama-comedy Mo (2022-25), expecting a good laugh, since the show is headlined and written by funny and smart comedian Mohammed Amer.

Mo does provoke a lot of laughter, but it also stirs deep emotions, including despair, loneliness and helplessness, as the episodes explore life in America for people on the margins.

Mo is a semi-autobiographical depiction of Amer’s life. He’s a Palestinian who grew up in Houston, Texas, immigrating to that city when he was nine years old by way of Kuwait.

In the series, Amer plays Mo Najjar as he navigates a complex balancing act between the different cultures that have shaped his life. Mo undergoes struggles to obtain asylum status in the United States as a “stateless person” with no passport.

Amer uses elements of a situation comedy to introduce increasingly troubling sociopolitical themes, leavening an existential darkness with the love and laughter of the main character’s friends and family.

The comedy-drama format allows Mo to address difficult and divisive issues, such as immigration in America and the Israel-Gaza war, in non-threatening ways.

Amer’s comedic writing also serves to humanize his characters. This is particularly important accomplishment in the case of Palestinians, both at home and in the diaspora — and more broadly for Muslims globally — given the long history of misrepresentation of Islam in western discourse.

Comedy tackles erasure of Palestine

In his writing on the first Gulf War, Canadian researcher Karim H. Karim explains how western war propaganda attempted to dehumanize their enemy. He cites comments from the U.S. army members during the Gulf War as examples. They described Iraqis as non-human and animals: “fish in a barrel,” “cockroaches” and part of a “turkey shoot,” alongside the use of longstanding stereotypes about Arabs and Muslims

Dehumanizing techniques can also be seen in today’s conflicts in the Middle East.

For example, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich delivered a speech in October 2024 in which he said: “There is no such thing as a Palestinian nation. There is no Palestinian history. There is no Palestinian language.” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant also said: “We are fighting human animals and we act accordingly.”

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Read more:
How colonialist depictions of Palestinians feed western ideas of eastern ‘barbarism’

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Mo counters these types of messages repeatedly as features representations of strong women, respectful men and loving families, instead of the angry terrorists or oppressed women depicted in western imaginings.

Several researchers have previously documented such stereotypes, including Edward Said, Leila Ahmed, Yasmin Jiwani, Karim Karim and Ross Perigoe and Mahmoud Eid.

Comedy is non-threatening

Viewers get to know Mo’s family, the Najjars, and their quirks and idiosyncracies, as well as the complicated path they tread.

During the family’s asylum hearing, an opposing lawyer raises an objection to their claim, saying the U.S. does not recognize Palestine as a state. The statement is brief and the moment passes quickly, but the viewer is now aware of this kind of daily erasure of Palestinian people.

Over the course of the show, viewers see the many ways Mo protests the general erasure of Palestinian culture, including a recurring argument over the origin of hummus (made with chickpeas, garlic, tahini and olive oil).

Building that statement into a comedy is less likely to attract negative attention than a high-profile drama or documentary. For example, Hamdan Ballal, one of the directors of the Oscar-winning Israel-Palestine documentary, No Other Land, was injured in an attack by masked settlers and then arrested by the Israel Defence Forces in the West Bank. Israel’s culture minister said changes had been made to public funding rules to help prevent similar films from being made in future..

Comedy as simultaneous defusion and resistance is also practised by the Palestinian-Canadian comedian Eman el Husseini, whose stand-up routine touches on the idea that Arabs are perceived to be dangerous while painting a picture of her own family as affectionate, overbearing and harmless.

The strategic use of comedy to make characters relatable is a technique that has proven successful with racialized comedians tackling difficult issues, both for stand-ups like Russell Peters and situation comedy formats like Black-ish.

Crushing challenges

Humour may seem like an odd response to the characters’ crushing challenges. At one point, while in negotiation with a criminal who is threatening to amputate the foot of his friend, Mo suggests cutting off just a pinkie instead, hissing to his outraged friend, “Hey, you don’t wear pinkie rings, anyway!”

But in this series, humour becomes the coping mechanism for Mo‘s characters, however fraught or fragile the issue, from a lighthearted chuckle to the darkness of gallows humour.

At times, Mo’s mother, Yusra (Farah Bsaiso), seems utterly consumed by stories of dispossession taking place back in Palestine, while Mo becomes increasingly angry about examples of appropriation and erasure.

His sister, Nadia (Cherien Dabis), trying to forge a way forward, urges her mother to pull herself away from stories of tragedy back home and resist oppression finding moments of happiness. She insists:

“We’re more than our pain and suffering.”

Ultimately, it is Yusra who summarizes what it means to smile through one’s pain, telling Mo:

“The world will always try to tear us down. And when they do…we smile. Because we know who we are.”

Resilience

In Season 2, Mo, still undocumented in Texas, gets accidentally trapped in Mexico after unwittingly crossing the border. His Mexican fiancée leaves him in frustration and loneliness.

Throughout this season, Mo’s anger at the American immigration system grows as he repeatedly tries — and fails — to get home. He seems to be engaging in constant self-sabotage, in which he simply cannot accept the process that his lawyer and the bureaucracy have outlined for him.

Yet, as the depth of the dehumanization experienced by Mo and his family becomes more and more apparent, Mo’s simmering, ever-present anger starts to seem less dysfunctional. Instead, the world’s indifference becomes spotlighted.

During these episodes, Mo begins to learn how to live with — but never accept — injustice.

However, this is still a sitcom, and some things do work out for Mo. At the end of Season 2, Mo and his family get their U.S. passports and so can finally visit their family in Palestine.

As Mo is getting ready to return to Texas, after a joyful and also heartbreaking visit with his relatives, he is harassed by an Israeli border guard. At this moment, Mo realizes he must develop the same inner strength and resolve embodied by his mother, earned after years of having to bear such harassment.

Although Mo is consumed by anger and sadness at the unjust actions towards him by the guard, against all his instincts, he thanks the border guard, smiles and walks on.

Faiza Hirji receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

– ref. Netflix’s ‘Mo’ delivers humour and heartache as it explores Israel-Gaza war, Palestinian and Mexican migrant life in the U.S. – https://theconversation.com/netflixs-mo-delivers-humour-and-heartache-as-it-explores-israel-gaza-war-palestinian-and-mexican-migrant-life-in-the-u-s-249684

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Danita Catherine Burke, Senior Research Fellow, Center for War Studies, University of Southern Denmark

In 2024, the European Union held public consultations to review the fitness of the EU’s seal product ban regulations. The results of these public consultations are available now and reveal zero public feedback from people in Kalaallit Nunaat, or Greenland.

The lack of input from the Kalaallit/Greenlandic public is strange given the importance of seals and sealing to Kalaallit Nunaat. So why is the EU proceeding without them?

In 2009, the EU banned the import of seal products. The
ban was revised in 2015 after a World Trade Organization ruling to permit two exceptions: certified Indigenous/Inuit pelts from subsistence hunting and personal-use items brought into the EU by people from their travels.

The EU based its ban on “public moral concerns.” The ban came about after decades of anti-sealing activism. The EU was heavily influenced by the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW); arguably the leading anti-sealing advocacy group.

Is the ban ‘fit for purpose?’

In 2020, the Kalaallit government called for the EU to help combat the stigma against seal products. It wants the EU to do more to educate the European public on what the Indigenous exception means and why it exists; for example, to make clear that Greenlanders don’t hunt baby seals.

This call, however, has had little impact, though the EU claims the “rights of Indigenous peoples are a thematic priority under the European Initiative for Democracy and Human Rights.”

The European Commission launched a public consultation process on the fitness of its seal trade regulations in 2024 that ran from May 15 to August 7, 2024.

The purpose of the fitness check was to “assess if the rules in place remain fit for purpose,” focusing on their socio-economic impact and the impact on seal populations.

Negative feedback

The consultation process resulted in 14,146 public comments, most of them from France (82.74 per cent), Belgium (4.4 per cent) and the Netherlands (3.52 per cent).

A lot of the comments were negative, and included remarks in this vein:

“Against this barbarism, unnecessary cruelty … these ‘killers’ [show so much] indifference, are clearly psychologically suspicious.”

Some questioned the validity of the exemptions for seal product imports, with one writing:

“These exceptions to the marketing of seal products within the EU are dangerous and can lead to abuses.”

There was a lot of feedback from IFAW and Sea Shepherd supporters; both organizations are prominent anti-sealing advocates.

Though negative comments dominated the feedback, support was also expressed by Indigenous and coastal peoples and organizations from Arctic states.

Most notably, the consultations indicated no contributions from Kalaallit Nunaat. This is odd, considering the emphasis of the EU process on ostensibly learning more about the socio-economic impact of the ban on communities most affected.

Feedback from Kalaallit hunters

In interviews with Kalaallit hunters in July 2025, my co-author Erik Kielsen and I found seal hunters were unaware of the consultation process.

As part of ongoing research project entitled Seals, Stigma and Survival funded by the Nordic Council in Greenland’s Nordic Arctic Programme, we spoke with Ole Jørgen Davidsen of Narsaq and Thor Eugenius of Nanotalik.

Davidsen and Eugenius are the community leaders for the hunting and fishing association KNAPK (the Fishermen and Hunters Association in Greenland) in Kalaallit Nunaat.

Both men were surprised the EU had conducted and concluded public consultations without hearing from Kalaallit hunters. They only learned about the EU review and consultations when talking to us.

Eugenius said: “I hadn’t heard that. I also don’t even know if the KNAPK has heard about it.”

Davidsen echoed his colleague’s surprise:

“This is the first time I’m hearing about it. From you. It would have been very important for the EU to have us have a say in these processes, and I would have had something to say, to include, if I had known it was happening but I’m just hearing about it now.”

The EU ostensibly wanted its review to provide information on the socio-economic impacts of its sealing regulations on those most affected. Kalaallit Nunaat has been significantly impacted by the ban. Kalaallit hunters have endured loss of income, restrictions on their marine ecosystem management and socio-cultural consequences from the anti-seal hunt stigma.

So the EU’s assertion that it wanted to hear from those impacted is suspect.

What’s next?

The EU report on its seal trade ban is still pending.

The people of Kalaallit Nunaat, however, have been devastated by the fallout of the ban. It is unclear why the EU appears to be proceeding with its review without public input from Kalaallit Nunaat, given the impact the ban has had on their communities and economy.

The EU has time to address its research gap, given its report is not yet published. It should immediately solicit Kalaallit public input. In doing so, the EU would signal that it takes its legislative review seriously and it would show a commitment to its stated prioritization of Indigenous human rights and democracy.

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Erik Kielsen, Founder of Kielsen Coordination in Kalaallit Nunaat, co-authored this article.

Danita Catherine Burke does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. The European Union excluded Greenland from public consultations on the EU seal product ban. Why? – https://theconversation.com/the-european-union-excluded-greenland-from-public-consultations-on-the-eu-seal-product-ban-why-263387

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Morgane Brunet, Postdoctoral researcher, Marine geoscience, Université du Québec à Rimouski (UQAR)

Far beneath the waves, down in the depths of the Japan Trench — seven kilometres below sea level — lie hidden clues about some of the most powerful earthquakes and tsunamis on Earth.

From September to December 2024, Expedition 405 of the International Ocean Discovery Program (IODP) embarked on a four-month long mission to offshore Japan. Aboard the Chikyu — the world’s largest scientific drilling ship — 60 scientists teamed up with experienced drillers to uncover deep-sea sediment cores from beneath the sea floor.

The scientists included sedimentologists like myself, alongside geochemists, micropaleontologists, structural geologists, geophysicists and paleomagnetists. We drilled into a fault zone where only one prior expedition had drilled directly before. IODP Expedition 405 — also called Tracking Tsunamigenic Slip Across the Japan Trench (JTRACK) — is only the second deep-drilling mission to access this area.

This time, we reached and sampled the décollement, or the basal detachment, of the fault that ruptured during the devastating 2011 Tōhoku mega-earthquake. We collected cores that will help scientists better understand how such powerful earthquakes are triggered.

An unexpected slip

On March 11, 2011, the Tōhoku mega-earthquake struck off the northeast coast of Japan, triggering a catastrophic tsunami. At magnitude 9.1, it was the most powerful earthquake ever recorded and the deadliest natural disaster in Japan’s modern history.

More than 18,000 people died. The earthquake severely damaged the Fukushima nuclear plant; there was an estimated US$235 billion in damages. Scientists were surprised not by the scale of the earthquake, but by the location of the largest plate slip that had triggered it: not deep underground, but just beneath the sea floor, at the shallowest part of the plate boundary.

The rupture took place along the Japan Trench, where the Pacific Plate dives beneath the Okhotsk Plate. Until then, this shallow section of subduction zones was thought to slip slowly and quietly.

But during the Tōhoku event, more than 50 metres of slip occurred on a fault that ruptured the sea floor, displacing huge amounts of water and generating the devastating tsunami.

Drilling into the fault

During the IODP 405 expedition, we set out to understand the conditions that make such tsunamis possible.

The Japan Trench provides a natural laboratory to investigate the fundamental processes of tsunamigenic earthquakes that trigger massive tsunamis.

For that reason, we drilled deep into the plate boundary fault, the exact zone that ruptured during the 2011 earthquake. This meant drilling more than 800 metres beneath the seafloor and into the fault itself to recover samples of rocks and sediments.

We also installed a long-term observatory to monitor temperature and fluid pressure at the earthquake’s source, hoping to detect subtle signals locked in the material that once unleashed one of the most powerful earthquakes in history.

Retrieving cores

On board the Chikyu, operations ran 24-7. Every three hours, a new core arrived on deck — a long, cylindrical archive of Earth’s memory. As sedimentologists, we got to work right away peering through the transparent liners with flashlights, scanning for traces of sand, volcanic ash or anything hinting at past geological events.

Each core told a chapter of a story written over millions of years. Layer by layer, they revealed a sequence of faulted, fractured or deformed sediments and rocks. Some contained smectite — a slippery clay mineral known to reduce friction along faults. These are precisely the kinds of materials that can allow tectonic plates to slip easily, even at shallow depths near the sea floor — exactly the kind of setting that could produce a tsunami-generating earthquake.

One of the most thrilling moments came when we hit layers of chert — a hard, glassy rock that marks the transition from deep-sea sediments to oceanic crust. We had reached the décollement zone, the very boundary where one tectonic plate dives beneath another.

In the lab, slicing open the cores revealed something else: beautifully banded colourful clays, tinted in rich shades of chocolate, vanilla and caramel — a natural palette created from geological processes deep within the Earth.

Each new core entered a tightly co-ordinated workflow: scanned by high-resolution, X-ray-computed tomography, tested for physical and chemical properties, then split in half. One half was carefully preserved in a permanent archive, while the other was examined and sampled thoroughly by scientists from various countries and disciplines.

My research focuses on the sedimentary signature of past earthquakes and tsunamis. On the Chikyu, I searched for deposits called homogenite-turbidite sequences. These form when a quake shakes the sea floor, triggering a submarine landslide (the turbidite), followed by a slow rain of fine particles stirred up by the tsunami (the homogenite). These sequences are geological time capsules, helping us estimate how often giant earthquakes have struck in the past.

Fault evolution

The Chikyu returned to the original site drilled soon after the 2011 earthquake. This gave us something rare in geoscience: an opportunity to observe how the fault has evolved over more than a decade. We installed a borehole observatory, deeper and more advanced than any before in this region.

Over the coming years, it will monitor temperature and fluid flow in real time, giving us a window into the living, breathing dynamics of a megathrust fault.

Using this data, scientists will simulate earthquake conditions using numerical models or experiments to test how these rocks respond under pressure. They will analyze the chemistry of the fluids trapped within the fault and use advanced logging tools to build a detailed picture of the fault’s internal architecture.

Others — like myself — will focus on the sedimentary record, deciphering past events to better understand the frequency of earthquakes and tsunamis.

From understanding to preparedness

The Japan Trench is not an isolated case. Subduction zones around the world, from Chile to Alaska to Indonesia, pose similar risks, often just offshore from densely populated regions. If shallow slip can happen there too, then our current models and preparedness strategies must evolve accordingly.

Our goal wasn’t just to understand why the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake happened, but to help prepare for the next one. By improving tsunami hazard assessments and deepening our understanding of mega-earthquake fault behaviour, we contribute to building global resilience.

IODP Expedition 405 marks a major milestone for earthquake and tsunami science. In the coming years, data from the new borehole observatory, along with lab experiments and sediment analyses, will offer unprecedented insights into how these faults evolve and how we can better anticipate and mitigate the impacts of future megathrust earthquakes.

Morgane Brunet receives funding from the European Commission through a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Global Fellowship.

– ref. We drilled deep under the sea to learn more about mega-earthquakes and tsunamis – https://theconversation.com/we-drilled-deep-under-the-sea-to-learn-more-about-mega-earthquakes-and-tsunamis-252010

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Shelley Boulianne, Professor in Communication Studies, Mount Royal University

Since taking office, United States President Donald Trump has used tariffs to address perceived trade deficits with other countries. He claims that other countries have cheated and pillaged the U.S. via trade deficits.

In response, many political leaders have implemented retaliatory tariffs on American products, although Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney recently lifted many of them in an apparent peace offering amid Canada-U.S. trade negotiations.

Citizens have also been engaged in these trade wars by avoiding the purchase of American products and services, as well as avoiding travel to the U.S.

From June 25 to July 8, 2025, Kantar, a global research and consulting company, conducted a survey through its online panels of 1,500 respondents in Canada, France and the United Kingdom, respectively.

Strict quotas were used to ensure the survey respondents would match the census profile of the adult population in each of the three countries.

Surveying consumers

As a social scientist who examines citizen engagement in civic and political life, I designed the survey questions. Respondents answered yes or no to:

Due to Trump’s recent tariffs, have you boycotted: a) American products, including grocery items; b) American services, such as Facebook, Amazon, or TV streaming services; and c) Travel to the United States.

The graph below outlines the results. Compared to the U.K. and France, Canadians were far more likely to report boycotting American products, services and travel.

Canadians, of course, have greater opportunities to boycott compared to other countries, given historically high levels of travel and international trade with the U.S. and Canada’s close proximity to the country. Statistics Canada reports that Canadian trips to the U.S. are down by 28.7 per cent from last year.

This case study of political consumerism reveals important distinctions compared to traditional boycotts.

Politically motivated boycotting is typically associated with those holding left-wing views.

In this case, both left-wing and right-wing people are participating in the boycott of American products. There are no ideological differences in participation in Canada and France. However, in the U.K., those on the right are more likely to boycott American products, services and travel than those on the left.

Existing research also shows well-educated people are more likely to boycott, particularly in Canada and France.

But in the Kantar survey, education did not impact participation in the boycott of American products, services and travel. All educational groups were motivated to participate.

Expressing discontent

Boycotting is a particularly attractive form of political behaviour in the case of international relations, because angry international citizens cannot simply contact Trump to express their discontent.

In fact, criticizing U.S. policies under Trump may result in being turned away at the American border by U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

Instead, consumers can express their discontent through the choices they make when grocery shopping, when making travel plans, and finally, in their choice to refrain from using American-owned social media like Facebook.

This situation is also unique because Trump actively encourages citizens to boycott companies with which he disagrees. Despite his own calls to boycott companies, Trump and American officials have called Canadians “nasty” for boycotting U.S. alcohol and travel in retaliation of American tariffs.

Follow the leader?

Now Canada has lifted most of the retaliatory tariffs, with Carney explaining that Canada has the “best deal with the United States right now.”

Canadians may choose to follow the direction of their prime minister or they may view this as an opportunity to take more responsibility and continue to use their purchasing choices to influence trade relations.

The responses may also differ across countries.

The U.K. says it has negotiated the lowest U.S. tariff rate so far and therefore, British citizens may choose to end their boycotting.

In contrast, political leaders in France continue to criticize the European Union’s recent trade agreement with the U.S. In this case, French citizens may follow suit and continue to use their purchasing power to influence trade relations.

Shelley Boulianne does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Canada is leading the U.K. and France in boycotting American goods due to Trump’s tariffs – https://theconversation.com/canada-is-leading-the-u-k-and-france-in-boycotting-american-goods-due-to-trumps-tariffs-263395

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By S. Mehmet Ozsoy, Assistant Professor of Finance, Concordia University

Unlike hurricanes and floods, which arrive suddenly and tend to dominate headlines with dramatic images of wrecked homes and submerged towns, droughts are often overlooked by media, governments and markets because they unfold more slowly.

Their gradual toll on fields, reservoirs and rural communities tends to be overshadowed by flashier disasters, but their consequences are no less severe.

A drought is a shortage of precipitation — typically lasting a season or longer — that results in insufficient water availability for ecosystems, agriculture and human use.

As climate change accelerates, droughts are projected to become more frequent and intense, especially in dry regions. This makes it increasingly urgent to understand their complex impact on agriculture, water supplies and regional economies.

Droughts don’t just hurt farmers

Droughts barely register in financial markets, despite their widespread consequences. Yet research shows that droughts can slash food industry profits by increasing farming costs, disrupting supply chains and tightening profit margins.

Droughts hit utilities and agriculture hardest. Shrinking water supplies wilt crops and strain water providers. But the impact extends far beyond them: low river levels can stall hydropower production, pushing up electricity costs and affecting water-heavy industries like textiles and chemicals.

Shallow waterways can also delay or block barges carrying goods, which hikes shipping costs. These disruptions ripple outward, affecting everyone from factory workers to shoppers.

Yet markets often ignore these risks until damage becomes impossible to overlook. With climate change poised to make droughts more frequent and severe, this blind spot could pose growing risks to investors and the stability of food supply chains.

Banks reveal the economic toll of droughts

Climate shocks like droughts hit local economies hardest — especially small, private businesses. While researchers can access financial data for public companies, the finances of private firms are far more opaque, making it difficult to understand the local impact of droughts.

To address this gap, we studied how prolonged droughts affect the financial stability and loan performance of regional banks across the United States. The stability, or fragility, of these banks can sway the economy, as seen in the 2008-09 crisis.

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Read more:
The window of opportunity to address increasing drought and expanding drylands is vanishing

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By examining bank balance sheets, we traced the broader economic ripples of droughts and found that a two-year drought can have the same economic impact on a region as a one-percentage point increase in the unemployment rate.

Communities suffer when banks do

Smaller banks are closely tied to their communities and often lend locally — often within just five miles — making them especially vulnerable when droughts strike. As small firms struggle to repay loans in the wake of such disasters, banks see an increase in missed payments.

Our data shows that droughts disrupt entire communities as job losses and tight budgets create a domino effect throughout local economies.

Banks in drought-hit areas see lower profits and rising risks. Unpaid loans, or “non-performing loans,” spike not just for farmers but for homeowners, businesses and commercial properties.

When farm workers lose income from unplanted or failed crops, they may fall behind on mortgage payments, even if farms themselves are insured.

Missed mortgage payments signal household distress, while defaulted business loans hit farms, food producers and service providers like caterers as customer demand dries up. Reduced wages also means less spending at local restaurants, equipment stores and other small businesses.

Unlike hurricanes or floods — which are designated disasters by the U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency — droughts receive no such status.

Once a flood or hurricane is declared a federal disaster, U.S. federal agencies provide financial assistance to eligible households and businesses. FEMA offers several programs, including financial assistance for temporary housing, home repairs and the replacement of personal property.

FEMA also supports the Disaster Unemployment Assistance and the Dislocated Worker Grant program. In addition, the Small Business Administration provides long-term, low-interest loans to eligible businesses and some homeowners, while the IRS (Internal Revenue Service) offers administrative disaster-related tax relief.

Because droughts don’t have access to the same resources, banks and local economies are left to cope on their own instead of receiving emergency aid from FEMA. As a result, our research found that banks are more likely to close branches in drought-hit areas. These closures can make recovery even harder for local businesses left reeling from droughts as they lose vital loan access.

Diversification offers some protection

From banks reeling with unpaid loans to families struggling to make ends meet, the fallout from droughts is real and far-reaching. Droughts don’t just dry up water — they drain livelihoods and destabilize economies.

Larger banks and firms with operations across multiple states are better able to weather climate shocks. This diversification acts as a form of self-insurance, helping them absorb losses in one region while staying afloat in others.

This might explain why stock markets often ignore the risks posed by droughts. Large players are less exposed to local downturns. But smaller, more vulnerable businesses that are reliant on local stability don’t have the same buffer.

As these crises grow more common, markets, regulators and policymakers need to rethink how droughts are measured and mitigated before entire communities are left behind.

Regulators have begun to take some notice. Climate risks are now formally recognized as threats to financial stability by the Financial Stability Board, an international body that monitors the global financial system.

Still, recognition is only the first step. Without concrete action, droughts will continue to destabilize communities.

Erkan Yonder receives funding from Fonds de recherche du Québec (FRQ).

S. Mehmet Ozsoy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Droughts don’t just dry up water — they drain livelihoods and weaken local economies – https://theconversation.com/droughts-dont-just-dry-up-water-they-drain-livelihoods-and-weaken-local-economies-261140

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Matt Polacko, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Political Science, University of Toronto

Canada’s recent federal election reversed a trend of declining voter turnout, increasing by more than six percentage points over 2021. Elections Canada reported a turnout of almost 70 per cent, the highest level in 32 years.

The predominant consensus as to why turnout surged this year is the increased stakes at play amid United States President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to Canadian sovereignty and his imposition of heavy tariffs on Canadian goods.

While this is certainly true, this explanation somewhat obscures the fact that the election was also heavily focused on the state of the Canadian economy. Ongoing tensions with the U.S. were front and centre, to be sure, but voters were also concerned about the rapidly rising cost of living as well as housing affordability and job precarity.

These economic anxieties were simply magnified by the U.S.-Canada trade war and its perceived pocketbook threats to jobs and inflation.

Turnout by social status

Can Canada expect voter turnout to increase further in the future?

Probably not, given that both support for democracy and satisfaction with democracy have been on the decline, with roughly half of Canadians not feeling represented by their government. These indicators are particularly acute among Canadians of lower class, income and education levels.

To better understand these trends, I investigated turnout by social status since the 1960s in new research published in the Canadian Journal of Political Science.

I found that people at lower socio-economic levels are significantly less likely to vote than the rest of the population. This was not always the case.

Since the 1980s, these individuals have become much less likely to vote than their higher socio-economic counterparts. This has opened up a large turnout gap for each demographic group.

The voter turnout gap between the bottom and top third of income earners has increased roughly 12 percentage points since 1980 and between non-degree and degree holders by roughly seven percentage points.

Electoral participation

These large turnout gaps are being driven by the demobilization of lower status individuals, as middle-income earners and the middle class have tended to vote at rates much closer to the upper class and top third of earners.

When we compare these class turnout gaps to other advanced democracies, Canada’s are quite large. This finding shows that like the U.S., social class has a modest effect on which party that voters support in Canada, but a particularly strong influence on electoral participation.

What could be driving the class turnout gap and demobilization of lower socio-economic individuals?

Prevailing evidence points to the resource model of political participation, whereby individuals with jobs, a higher income and education are more likely to have access to a wider range of resources (particularly money, networks, time and skills), which better facilitates their participation in politics.

But people must also be motivated to participate by interest groups and political candidates and parties.

Failure to prioritize the economy

A crucial way political parties attempt to mobilize voters is through their platforms. Using data form Comparative Manifesto Project, an international research program, I show that over time, parties in Canada have devoted increasing attention to socio-cultural issues compared to economic issues, especially since the 1980s.

This reduced focus on economic issues has tended to align with both a decline in overall turnout as well as the decrease in voter turnout of lower status individuals. Could there be a connection?

When I examine economic preferences by socio-economic status in Canada, it is revealing that lower status individuals care a lot about economic issues; they’re significantly more likely to favour economic redistribution than the rest of the population.

Therefore, it’s not surprising that I found lower voters are more likely to cast ballots when political parties devote greater attention to economic issues.

This research suggests that Canada’s party system has failed to adequately prioritize economic issues to keep lower socio-economic people engaged in voting. It’s not surprising these groups check out of politics, especially when there is mounting evidence across the country that legislators favour higher status voters.

Political disengagement of large social groups is a fundamental problem that deeply undermines democracy and representative government.

A growing class gap in electoral participation means that the elevated position in society of the privileged few can magnify political and social inequalities in a never-ending loop. Socio-economic inequality fosters political inequality, which then fosters socio-economic inequality, and so on in a pervasive self-reinforcing cycle.

Politicians should take note

The 2025 federal election was the first in many years where the economy and pocketbook issues were in the spotlight, which very likely played a role in the uptick in turnout to buck recent trends. In the coming months, once the data is available, I will test this assumption through further research.

However, parties should take note if they want to increase the electoral participation of lower status groups, especially with rising inequality and a cost-of-living crisis showing little signs of abating.

Matt Polacko receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), and Fonds de recherche du Québec – Société et culture (FRQSC).

– ref. Canada’s class divide at the ballot box is growing – https://theconversation.com/canadas-class-divide-at-the-ballot-box-is-growing-263504

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Marta-Marika Urbanik, Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Alberta

Public concerns about fentanyl’s proliferation across Canada have focused on overdose deaths and drug-related disorders. However, in addition to these pressing concerns, our recent research in Thunder Bay, Ont., unmasks additional impacts of Canada’s street-based drug economy.

Our work with 81 unhoused and street-involved community members reveals how big-city drug traffickers moving into smaller Canadian communities can wreak havoc. These out-of-town dealers often forcefully take over people’s homes so they can use them as a base to sell and produce drugs.

These groups and their home takeovers are a significant contributor to homelessness. Home takeovers force people out of housing and into homelessness, deepening cycles of poverty, housing instability and trauma.

Drug traffickers move in

In recent years, drug trafficking groups have distributed and manufactured fentanyl within
and beyond Canada. Canada’s major urban centres, like Toronto and Edmonton, are now saturated with various criminal groups competing for a share of profits from the illicit drug trade.

Consequently, some groups have figured out that expanding or exporting their operations into smaller Canadian communities like Thunder Bay can be immensely profitable. Smaller cities often bring less competition, significantly drive up drug prices and provide these newly arrived dealers with greater anonymity from law enforcement.

Drug traffickers’ movements into smaller cities have raised serious public safety concerns, increasing local residents’ exposure to gun and drug-related violence.

Organized drug trafficking networks have significant resources but even so, moving into a new community to set up shop within the criminal underworld is no easy task.

One reason is that smaller communities often have some established players in the informal drug economy who may not be willing to step aside or share their client base with the newly arrived urban dealers.

That means entrepreneurial groups have adapted the long-standing practice of deploying home takeovers within drug economies. This works for their market expansion efforts..

‘Trap houses’

In a home takeover, out-of-town drug traffickers prey on low-income residents in social housing units and those who are otherwise marginalized. They forcefully take over their residence, and convert them into “trap houses.”

In other words, people’s residences become the base from which these groups produce and sell drugs and operate their business. These trap houses shield the drug traffickers from police and other authorities by reducing their need to sell drugs in public spaces.

Residents often have no choice but to accept these groups into their residence. Our research participants reported that out-of-town drug traffickers use a range of violent, coercive and manipulative tactics to gain initial access to their homes, including providing free drugs, forcing drug repayments, violence and extortion.

As one of our participants said, resisting a home takeover is almost impossible because drug traffickers can always find a way into their homes and will retaliate if they can’t get in:

“…they find their way in. There’s always a way in, and there’s always a weak point.”

Drug traffickers often prey on seniors or newly housed individuals, often within days or weeks of them moving in:

“When a homeless person gets pulled off the street, and they get given [a housing unit]… [the drug traffickers] reach out anywhere between six and eight weeks, and then it becomes a trap [house].”

Homelessness and housing insecurity

Residents whose homes have been taken over are left with little to no recourse.

Reporting takeovers to police or housing authorities is rarely an option. Many residents fear eviction, criminal charges or that dealers will retaliate with violence toward them or their family and friends. As one participant put it:

“If you call the cops, you’re probably dead.”

Given these fears, they see abandoning their home as the only way to escape this dire situation.

By not reporting to their housing authority or police, their homelessness and need for new housing remain undocumented. Critically, many former residents are often precluded from joining other housing support waiting lists.

Even after moving and somehow managing to get a new residence, several of our participants became homeless once again after their new place was also taken over.

Risk for homelessness

Home takeovers should be treated as a serious risk factor for homelessness.

Social housing providers can help by creating pathways for residents to report these takeovers safely, protecting them from legal consequences, and by moving people quickly into a new residence if needed, without penalizing them.

Police also play a critical role. They must treat residents experiencing home takeovers as victims, not as suspects, and build trust with the victimized individuals assuring them that they can be protected from retaliation if they speak up.

Addressing home takeovers is not only about limiting drug trafficking — it is also about protecting people’s homes, reducing homelessness and strengthening community safety.

Marta-Marika Urbanik receives funding from Killam Trusts and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Carolyn Greene receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Katharina Maier receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

Matthew Valasik does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Drug dealers are plundering people’s homes into ‘trap houses,’ driving up homelessness and violence in Thunder Bay – https://theconversation.com/drug-dealers-are-plundering-peoples-homes-into-trap-houses-driving-up-homelessness-and-violence-in-thunder-bay-260061