Individuals tend to mistakenly assess themselves and their intellectual ability as better than it really is when learning something new.
Walking up to a Pittsburgh bank in broad daylight, a loaded gun in one hand, an empty bag in the other, McArthur Wheeler never presumed getting caught as he smiled at the surveillance cameras, clearly pointing his gun at the clerk. But when the city police handcuffed him, he surprisingly cried “I WORE THE JUICE!”
Wheeler’s case was studied by psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger and would lead to the phenomenon now called the Dunning-Kruger Effect. According to their findings, some individuals tend to mistakenly assess themselves and their intellectual ability as better than it really is. Have you ever scrolled through social media comments to find a 63-year-old trying to argue with recognized experts about climate change? Then, you understand the gist of it. Ok, boomer, am I right?
In Wheeler’s case, the burglar thought that drenching himself in lemon juice would make him invisible. After all, lemon juice ink remains invisible until heated up. Makes sense right…? I’ll let you be the judge of that.
Dunning and Kruger also developed a graphic to exemplify this effect. The vertical axis represents ‘confidence’ and the horizontal axis, ‘knowledge and experience.’ Dunning and Kruger found that beginners tend to consider themselves as experts, but then self-esteem drops drastically upon digging deeper into a subject, before slowly rising as that person actually becomes an expert. Yes, I’ve been personally affected by the effect in my first ever martial art class when I got knee kicked in the chest. Not cool, but I definitely deserved it.
Many experiments were conducted to evaluate people’s perceived skills. For instance, a group of professional comedians and another set of students were asked to rank jokes from one to 11. The rankings averaged at around eight on the chart, with the people showcasing the worst skills placing themselves in the 58th percentile, AKA better than 57 other people out of 100.
Now don’t get bummed out by thinking that being confident in your abilities means you’ll never be a successful human being. Just keep in mind to maintain a level head and remember what Socrates once said, “I know that I know nothing.”
‘Addict’ is a label that is often thrown around without much thought. If someone likes something a little too much, they’re considered an addict in the eyes of their entourage.
Addiction is not a quirky way to describe someone’s love and passion for a hobby. The reality is that addiction and negative stereotypes are causing fewer people to seek help, according to Recovery Lighthouse’s website, an addiction recovery clinic. Due to a fear of judgment and rejection, addicts often suffer alone and in silence.
How does addiction start though? An addiction is when people lose control over their consumption behaviours as well as the freedom to stop despite the consequences. Lacking self-esteem or being fueled with high levels of anxiety can exacerbate feelings of loneliness and sadness, due to missing their family and friends.
This loneliness may be the door that lets an addiction makes its way into their life. A person may perceive the consumption of certain substances as helping them cope with their negative feelings. The substance brings instant gratification – a phenomenon where a desire for instant happiness causes the person to do certain acts in order to feel better right away.
Sometimes it’s merely habit-related. Imagine someone drinks every single day at a certain time. The repetition becomes a habit and triggers a need. An addiction will start to form, not only when the person obsessively thinks about drinking, but when habits result in negative consequences. Such consequences can be social isolation from being in a state of enormous exhaustion, caused by the physical and mental toll of over-consumption.
Other symptoms of addiction include depression and high levels of anxiety during periods of withdrawal. Some may become aggressive. Even when the desire is present, cutting back altogether can be difficult when emotions the addiction helped cope with were never really dealt with.
The victim may not be aware of what they’re going through. It is important never to judge a person who is suffering from addiction: you’re never alone.
The paper focuses on the system’s efficiency in labelling early signs of anorexia.
Concordia graduate students Elham Mohammadi and Hessan Amini developed a research paper explaining an algorithm, using artificial intelligence, to detect signs of anorexia through social media for the Conference and Labs of the Evaluation Forum (CLEF) 2019, this September.
CLEF is a conference that has been running since 2000 in Lugano, Switzerland. It aims to address a wide range of topics, primarily focusing on “the fields of multilingual and multimodal information access evaluation.” Mohammadi and Amini worked under the supervision of Concordia Professor in Computer Science and Software Engineering Leila Kosseim.
Social media platforms are a rich source of information for research studies because people use these outlets to share a large sum of data in relation to their emotions, thoughts and everyday activities.
The research was based on a simulation scenario using past posts from social media. In an interview with The Concordian, Amini explained that there are a few reasons the study was focused on anorexia specifically.
“It wasn’t covered that much in literature,” he said. “Finding out the patterns requires a more complicated source of analyzing information.”
Their focus was on the early detection of the eating disorder.
“We don’t want to detect the risk after it has happened or after it has caused damage to the person,” Amini explained. “We want to detect that the person is showing signs of anorexia.”
The focus of the study was to test the algorithm. Amini clarified that their role is not to diagnose or analyze the data. The study is about the system’s efficiency in labelling these signs. With this, they are able to send this data to an expert to closely evaluate it.
Surfing through over 2,000 social media posts would be tedious and time-consuming, so the researchers used an algorithm called “attention mechanism.” This algorithm systematically filtered through the abundance of posts to detect those that were the most important, using keywords.
They had one data set that was already separated by users that showed signs of anorexia and those that did not, as well as another set of data that was not categorized at all. Mohammadi and Amini analyzed the data to compare the function of the system; however, it must be noted that when dealing with personal data, ethical complications may occur.
Mohammadi explained that when dealing with user’s data, some people might be hesitant to have their personal information analyzed. “People might not be comfortable with it,” he said.
In being able to detect certain patterns of anorexia on social media, more complex research topics arise. Although this is a good start, Amini explains that this research requires many experts sitting together and discussing solutions.
Amini notes that although people think artificial intelligence (AI) systems like this are set up to replace humans, the opposite is true.
“AI is going to be there to help humans,” he said. Amini explains that it will make the lives of psychologists and mental health practitioners easier.
Although this research is not the final solution, it can help bring awareness to those in need of mental attention and create a healthier society.
Fall is finally at our doorstep! At last, we can enhance our Starbucks experience from a regular Caramel Ribbon Crunch Frappuccino to our beloved Pumpkin Spice Latte. Fashion just stepped into a whole new level with deep amber backgrounds on the Belvédère making for the perfect Instagram #nofilter posts.
Those jaw-dropping fire-like landscapes are undoubtedly one of the most beautiful times of the year – apart from the weather, of course. But what exactly causes the leaves to turn from their distinct bright green colour to those warm hues?
It all comes down to the amount of light vegetation gets from the sun. In summer, daylight can hit for almost 15 hours straight. During that time, leaves act like small factories that use the sunlight to produce all the necessary nutrients for trees to grow. This food-making process happens in cells containing chlorophyll. Chlorophyll is responsible for absorbing light from sunbeams to provide energy for later chemical reactions in the tree.
So, while you were working at your summer job, tweeting about that annoying colleague, trees and plants were casually thriving under the sun. Jealous, right? Well, hold your horses for a minute, because winter is coming.
As the year goes by, the days become shorter. Leaves stop their food-making process because of the shorter light exposure and the temperature change. Chlorophyll in the cells starts breaking down which makes the leaves lose their bright punchy green.
But you may have noticed that not all leaves have the same colour. This is due to the different concentrations of chlorophyll residues in the leaves as well as a mix of plenty of other chemical reactions happening simultaneously during Fall.
While for us, this season mostly translates to midterms and cuffing season, for trees it is just another step in their natural cycle of life. So, put on those Blundstones and your classy trench coat and enjoy the beauty of Fall.
A recent study invalidated the existence of a gene linked to homosexuality after decades of scientific debate.
The study, led by Andrea Ganna, a research fellow with the Broad Institute in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Harvard Medical School in Boston, examined data from thousands of participants that shared both DNA samples and behaviour information to two genetic surveys – the UK Biobank study and the private genetics firm 23andMe.
Instead of a gay gene, the study suggested evidence of five genetic variants strongly associated with what scientists call nonheterosexual behaviours. From the two that were associated only to men, one had been previously found to predict baldness, and the other was present in regions rich in olfactory receptors.
However, the published study emphasized that genetic markers cannot be used to predict sexual behaviour.
“Behavioral traits, like sexual behavior and orientation, are only partially genetic in nature,” wrote the research organization on its website. “They are shaped by hundreds or thousands of genetic variants, each with a very small effect, yet they are also shaped in large part by a person’s environment and life experiences.”
Ganna also acknowledged that what they called in the research as “nonheterosexual behaviour” is part of a large spectrum of sexual experiences.
“[The sexual experiences] go from people who engage exclusively in same-sex behaviour to those who might have experimented once or twice,” said Ganna in an interview with Science. This limited the experiment, since, in reality, people who have a single same-sex experience might be categorized as open, while not being gay or bisexual.
The research also found that people with these genetic variants were more inclined to suffer from mental illness such as depression. It was noted in the findings that LGBTQI+ people are more likely to suffer from such illnesses due to societal pressure.
Some people from the LGBTQI+ community that faced societal pressure think that linking sexual orientation to genetics can have a negative impact on the long run.
“This could be a very slippery slope to eugenics,” said Queer Concordia’s Administrative Coordinator, Anastasia Caron. “There could be situations where people decide ‘let’s make DNA tests in the womb to figure out if your baby is gay or not’ and decide to keep it based on that.”
Queer Concordia is a student organization that aims to create a safe environment for all LGBTQI+ students at Concordia. Caron created a support group for students to act against discrimination towards community members.
As a member of the LGBTQI+ community themselves, Caron observed that societal pressure adds a lot of stress to students going through similar situations as them.
“A lot of people feel alone and don’t think that others feel the same way as them,” said Queer Concordia’s Resource Coordinator, Akira De Carlos. “It’s even better when you’re talking about your problems and see that someone else has the same ones and realize that ‘oh my god! I’m not alone in this.’”
De Carlos and Caron hope that biological research over sexual orientations stays moderate due to this potential rhetoric that can be used against the LGBTQI+ community.
We have all surely crossed paths with those orange-capped garbage cans that decorate Concordia’s campuses. Little hubs for our biodegradable waste, the list of things we can put in them is particular but easy!
If your trash is made from plants, like those brown paper bags greasy fries from a favorite burger joint are tossed in, plop it in! If your lunch was too big, the bins are perfect orphanages for leftovers you’ll abandon. It sucks that you cannot finish your grandmother’s pasta, but the compost will happily handle that for you. Napkins covered in mascara after crying over an assignment? A banana that got squashed at the bottom of your bag? Toenails? Yup, all of those organic-based items can go in, but it’s important to know exactly how composting works and why we bother with it.
It all comes down to microbes. Eons ago, before you, or I, or any of our ancestors stressed over school, there were tiny lifeforms on Earth that thrived without using oxygen. They are called anaerobes. Eventually, oxygen users like us, known as aerobes, joined the scene hundreds of millions of years later. We and anaerobes now strut across the same runway that is the planet, but humans have to be careful. No, you’re right, anaerobes won’t throw marbles under our feet while we pose, but they do dangerous things with our trash!
When you put that bite of your grandmother’s pasta in the general garbage, it all gets closed up in a plastic bag. This prevents airflow and creates a low oxygen environment that gives anaerobes a chance to grow. Contained in a perfect microcosm, they break down your food and produce methane as a byproduct. That’s bad because methane is a greenhouse gas; it absorbs the sun’s heat and consequently contributes to climate change.
Aerobes also biodegrade food, but make carbon dioxide instead of methane. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas as well, but soaks up way less solar radiation. In addition to that, aerobes manage to eliminate toxicity better and produce less of a rotten smell than anaerobes.
So, how do we get our food to be handled by aerobes instead of anaerobes? By composting!
Composts are set up to maintain airflow. Aerobes get the oxygen they need to live and this type of environment blocks anaerobic expansion. All it can take to sustain the right aerobic atmosphere is a simple stir of a container. With composts, we can make humus. Before you take your pita out, know that humus isn’t your favorite Middle Eastern spread (that’s actually hummus). Humus is a term used to reference dirt achieved from rotting organics. Those orange bins on campus are a way to take remaining glop and make beautiful, nutrient soil. Letting anaerobes process our leftovers goes the opposite way, tending to make waste more hazardous.
It’s worth noting that some compost processing sites actually embrace anaerobe disadvantages to harvest their methane. Humans burn the gas for heat and electricity. Despite not being clean energy, at least our species can use it and cause climate change instead of not using it and warming the globe anyway. If you think of all the landfills on our planet, there is a lot of food rotting without being exploited.
In a world piling up with trash, humans are faced with more and more complexities surrounding what to do with it. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency reported, “Pound for pound, the comparative impact of [methane] is more than 25 times greater than [carbon dioxide] over a 100-year period.” Concordia’s orange bins are a game of anaerobes vs. aerobes. These days, the seemingly simple act of throwing away a teabag is actually an influential decision that’ll shape history.
Imagine cultivating plants with endless sources of natural fertilizer. Considering Earth’s current state, such a process would answer many of our problems regarding food production and the viability of the soil.
Yet, such a sustainable system broke from the imaginary and is now known as aquaponics.
Historically practiced by Aztec and Chinese populations, aquaponics is a combination of fish farming (aquaculture) and soilless farming (hydroponics). Yielding as much as 12 times the amount of crops produced in soil per square foot, aquaponics successfully addresses farming in resource-scarce areas.
But how does it work?
The three main components of aquaponics are plants, fish, and bacteria.
Fish excrete high amounts of ammonia, increasing the toxicity of their environment. That water is then transferred to another tank, where bacteria (Nitrosomonas) break down the ammonia into nitrate. Pumped to the last tank, the nitrate-concentrated water will be utilized as nutrients for the plants. The water, now purified by the plants, is redirected to the fish tank for the process to be repeated.
Some companies in Canada have started using this farming technique. AquaGrow Farms is an aquaponics company and one of its operations runs at The Mississauga Food Bank to provide fresh food to people in need. Around 900,000 Canadians make use of food banks every month, on average.
Aquaponics has incredible potential because of its low need for resources. This helps lower any environmental impact while producing quality goods that are in high demand.
Astrology might not be foolproof, but it can help people understand each other’s behaviours
I’m an avid believer in astrology. I am a proud Libra, and I would like to think horoscopes are not as ridiculous as some claim they are. I am not fully versed in the planetary alignment that astrology is based on, but I do believe a person’s star sign can explain their behaviour. Certain traits can easily be spotted, if you pay close enough attention.
A Libra is a natural born leader, with an affinity for balance and an uncontrollable need to please people. According to Astro, a website that describes astrological signs, an Aries is dramatic, emotional, assertive, impulsive and, most importantly, kind-hearted. A Virgo is democratic—some might say a control freak, but that is just part of their love for order and organization. Geminis are as secretive as they are blunt. The list goes on.
I can see why some people would consider astrology to be fictitious, as it has no scientific basis nor is there much accuracy when it comes to astrologers’ predictions. At times, a Capricorn can read something about a Sagittarius and relate to it just the same. Many readings and sign characteristics are inconsistent. Daily horoscopes might speculate about your day, but there is no certainty in what astrologers predict to be “a day full of opportunities” or an “eventful evening.”
If you were to unknowingly read a horoscope that was not yours and apply it to your life, only to discover it was not intended for you, this might reinforce your belief that horoscopes are nonsense. However, in an age when we are taught to tolerate beliefs and religions based on books that may as well be fictional, I don’t understand why astrology is considered hogwash by some people. In some ways, astrology is similar to religion, in the sense that it is not 100 per cent accurate yet millions of people believe in it.
Astrology is a peaceful form of spirituality, exploring human behaviour and psyche. Some might even draw parallels to psychology—after all, psychology’s main purpose is to understand the complexity of human beings and the reasons for their actions. Astrology attempts to answer such notions as well.
I understand why this could be deemed pathetic or ridiculous. I can almost hear the skepticism: “How the hell can you understand why I act the way I do because Mercury, ruled by Mars on the left of Jupiter, says so?” I agree that a person’s sign does not always explain their motives or behaviour. Yet, if you’re a believer in astrology like me, general descriptions might make you wary of certain signs, such as blunt Capricorns or intense Scorpios. I normally don’t like to generalize, but based on subjective experiences with these signs, these two are oftentimes rough around the edges and hard to handle.
Star signs do explain to me why a person might act the way they do, and how one should be aware of certain reactions. Many types of science are based on facts and observations of the world around us. But I believe these sciences are also based on interpretations of the world around us. Whether it’s mathematics, astronomy or physics, I believe such theories would not be born without thorough interpretations of the world and beyond. So why shouldn’t astrological reasoning be taken as seriously as scientific reasoning?
Astrology has been dubbed a “pseudoscience,” according to The New York Times, because it’s not as detailed or factual as other scientific fields. I believe certain things in life cannot be completely explained through science and factual evidence. Some things are beyond the socially constructed definition of reasoning. The belief in astrology, and its depiction of a person’s personality, might seem far-fetched with no theoretical or scientific framework. But the same could be said about most religions. On the brightside, at least astrology never started wars! Just don’t leave an Aries and a Gemini alone together.
The reason why so many butterflies have been seen across Eastern Canada
Rain in an American desert, winds in Quebec and more time for reproduction than usual were all factors that lead to the massive increase in painted lady butterflies flitting through air over the last few weeks, according to Maxim Larrivée, the section head of entomological collections and research at the Montreal Insectarium.
“What happened this year is unprecedented.” Larrivée said. He explained this phenomenon is a combination of many factors. “Last winter, there were unusual rains in the Sonoran Desert where the butterflies spent the winter,” which led to a higher survival rate, he explained. In addition, strong southern winds in Quebec in April facilitated the butterflies’ migration north, which is why they showed up a month earlier than usual.
According to Larrivée, the swifter migration allowed the butterflies to produce in larger numbers. Normally, they have time to cycle through one or two generations each summer once they arrive, Larrivée explained. However, since they showed up so early this year, the butterflies had the chance to generate an extra life cycle. “This created this explosion of individuals,” Larrivée said.
There are also factors keeping the butterflies in Quebec longer than expected, Larrivée added. “Normally, when they migrate back to the south in the fall, they go up in the air column and they’ll migrate at 300 to 400 metres in the air,” he explained. “However, what happened this year is they faced heavier southern winds in early September, and that put them to the ground. They are now sitting and waiting for winds to shift from north to south so they can ride them and facilitate the migration.”
Featured Butterflies at the Montreal Insectarium. Photo by Kirubel Mehari
While there were some initial misconceptions among the general public about the type of butterfly filling the skies, Larrivée confirmed that most of the butterflies Quebecers have been seeing are in fact painted lady butterflies. “They are part of a group of butterflies from the gene called Vanessa [cardui],” he said, adding that “painted lady” is their common name. “A lot of people confuse them with monarchs because they are flagship migratory butterflies.”
The distinction, according to Larrivée, is that monarchs are bigger in size, with bright orange and black veins running through their wings. The wings of the painted lady, on the other hand, are brown in the centre, with orange patches visible when the wings are open. When the painted butterfly closes its wings, their mottled pattern blends with the ground. “The good thing about [the phenomenon this year] is that almost every Quebecer will now be able to distinguish a monarch from a painted lady,” Larrivée said.
According to Larrivée, the fall migration of these butterflies finally began in mid-September. “We have been stalled in this warm weather pattern with limited-to-no winds,” he explained. “Normally, the painted lady would take off within a few days after hitting contrary winds.”
However, Larrivée specified that this delay has nothing to do with the hurricanes pummeling the Caribbean in the last month. “I’m sure there are some larger global weather patterns that are influencing this, but I don’t think the hurricanes are related to their abundance,” he said. “We had a similar phenomenon in 2012, but it happened in early August instead of early September. It was a smaller magnitude, but it was historical from our standpoint and it lasted just a few days because the winds changed more rapidly.”
Outside of Quebec, there has also been an increase in painted lady butterflies around the Great Lakes of Ontario, Vermont, Maine and all the states bordering the Great Lakes. Once they begin migrating, the butterflies’ route takes them to the southern American states and northern Mexico. “There will be a few stragglers who will be a bit behind, but the bulk of them should be gone by Oct. 2 ” he said.
Larrivée is the founder and director of eButterfly, an international, data-driven project dedicated to butterfly biodiversity, conservation and education. According to Emma Despland, an associate biology professor at Concordia, eButterfly is a citizen science project where ordinary people can get involved in scientific research by taking pictures of butterflies they see around the world.
“We want to know where the butterflies are and when. So, either you hire an army of thousands of students across the continent or you ask ordinary people, ‘If you see one of these butterflies, let us know,’” Despland said. “It’s a way to get information and get people involved with science and the natural world.”
Two of the assignments in Despland’s class, Techniques in Ecology (BIOL 450), require students to use eButterfly as a resource. “In the first assignment, students have to go out and photograph three butterflies, identify them and upload their identifications on eButterfly,” she said, adding that this gives her students practical experience as naturalists. “I think that’s valuable for Concordia students because they’re very urban, so they don’t have much experience with the natural world,” she said.
Larrivée said he hopes to better map the migratory corridors of the painted lady butterfly to see if this species coordinates or aligns with the monarch. “I’d be really interested to use the sightings reported by our participants on eButterfly to determine what corridors they used to migrate and where to spend the winters in the south,” he said.
Students can contribute to the eButterfly project by sharing their observations and submitting photographs to eButterfly.org.
Canada’s leading scientists discuss issues and future progress surrounding HIV/AIDS
More than 900 of Canada’s top scientists, physicians and community leaders joined Canada’s largest HIV/AIDS conference in Montreal from April 6 to 9.
According to the Canadian Association for HIV Research, in 2017, more than 70,000 Canadians live with HIV, and every year an estimated 2,300 to 43,000 new infections are reported.
Canada’s annual HIV/AIDS conference was held at the Hotel Bonaventure in Montreal. The Canadian Association for HIV Research is Canada’s leading organization for research on the disease. The organization includes more than 1,000 researchers, scientists and physicians committed to finding ways to prevent and cure HIV.
The 26th edition of the conference addressed how HIV remains a pressing issue that still requires more resources and research to prevent its spread and find a cure. This year’s theme was “We’re Not Done Yet,” in reference to the need for more research and resources to help eradicate HIV/AIDS.
Five presentations were given, focusing on issues related to HIV/AIDS, protection and preventative measures.
“Tremendous successes have been achieved in the fight against HIV-AIDS,” said Dr. Alexandra de Pokomandy, a faculty member at McGill University and a renowned HIV researcher, during her presentation. “However, people living with HIV, health care workers, community members and researchers in Canada and elsewhere around the world also agree that many challenges remain, and HIV continues to kill.”
More than 800 people attended the event and stopped by specialized kiosks to learn about HIV research and resources.
Realize Canada, one of the organizations with a kiosk, is a national charitable organization that works with schools, employers, insurance companies and other associations to help improve the daily lives of people living with HIV and other episodic disabilities, such as depression, Hepatitis C and chronic fatigue syndrome. “Realize is geared towards postsecondary students,” said Puju Ahluwalia, Realize Canada’s project coordinator.
“When someone has an episodic disability like HIV, there is little predictability as to when these episodes will occur or for how long,” Ahluwalia said. “Realize Canada works with schools and student disability offices to help raise awareness and offer assistance for students living with an episodic disability.”
Students who have a test or an assignment due on a specific date might not be able to meet the deadline if they are affected by an episodic disability like HIV. Realize Canada will guide these students to different resources on their campuses and help work with their schools. Realize Canada works as a rehabilitation resource to help provide students with the health care and psychological support they need, Ahluwalia said in an interview with The Concordian.
During the conference, the PrEP pill was a point of discussion during a presentation by Dr. Peter A. Newman, a researcher at University of Toronto. The PrEP pill was legalized in Canada in February 2016. According to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention Canada, PrEP-exposure prophylaxis, or PrEP, is a pill that reduces the risks of contracting HIV from sex by more than 90 per cent. Among people who inject drugs, it reduces the risk by more than 70 per cent. The risk of contracting HIV from sex can be lowered further if you combine PrEP with condoms and other safe-sex methods.
Photo by Ana Hernandez.
PrEP can stop HIV from spreading throughout your body and is most effective in preventing HIV when taken daily, states Canada’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. PrEP should only be used by people who are HIV negative and who are at high risk for HIV infection. People interested in using PrEP should talk to their health care provider and meet with a doctor to receive a prescription. Depending on one’s insurance policy, or work insurance the price for PrEP can be covered in full.
However, Newman addressed how stigmas have begun to emerge within the LGBTQ+ communities on whether or not someone is on the PrEP pill, and whether or not they could have sex without a condom. “When dating, some men who are on the PrEP pill might receive pressure to not use a condom when having sex, or might be judged for using a condom,” Newman said during his presentation.
Another presenter, Allison Carter, who is a PhD student at Simon Fraser University, focused on the feminist approach to women living with HIV. Carter’s study revealed that “women who are HIV positive can be happy and enjoy emotional and intimate relationships,” she said.
Among the 1,300 HIV-positive women involved in the study, those who claimed they were happy were involved in long-term sexual relationships. “We want women to know that they can have sex and have pleasure,” Carter said.
Bill Nye documentary takes a look at the scientist behind the TV persona
Bill Nye the Science Guy inspired a generation of children to pursue science and think critically about the world around them. He made topics that often appear dense and unappealing interesting to a general audience.
But who is Bill Nye? Who is this man who made topics like friction, gravity, chemistry and electricity palatable to elementary school students? Bill Nye: Science Guy, directed by David Alvarado and Jason Sussberg, takes a closer look at the man who made science fun.
Nye noticed in the 1990s that America had a bad relationship with science, and he wished to do something about it. Through his educational science show, he wanted to raise a generation of critical thinkers.
But the end of the show in 1998 left Nye in flux. He was struggling to find where he fit in the scientific community. Anti-scientific sentiment was still strong in America, with climate-change deniers disputing the established scientific consensus. Nye has made it his personal mission to counter the voices that are shaping a generation of scientifically illiterate children.
The film looks at how Nye challenges the core beliefs of science deniers by engaging in debates with them. He does this to try to bring awareness to the general community of climate-change deniers, and hopefully change their minds so they in turn can use their platforms to change the minds of others.
Nye struggled with his image as he attempted to transition from kid’s show host to reputable scientist. The documentary tackles who Nye really is, separating Bill Nye the character from Bill Nye the person.
For audiences familiar with Nye and his science show, Bill Nye: Science Guy is a documentary that allows a peek behind the curtain to see the real person behind the character, and explores where Nye ends and the Science Guy begins. It looks at how pained Nye is at the rising scientific illiteracy in America, and how he has made it his personal mission to turn it around and bring science back to the masses by eliminating one dissenting voice at a time through logic and the scientific method.
Bill Nye: Science Guy premiered at the SXSW Festival in Austin, Texas on Mar. 12.
The science behind drug addiction, and how drugs affect the body
It’s said we are creatures of habit. Sometimes though, those habits can turn into addictions. In this edition of The Healthy Side, we are going to explore drug addiction and its real effects on the body.
Drug addiction is an organic disease of the body. Using addictive substances literally changes the brain’s chemistry, leading to a strong physical dependency on them.
The brain is a very complex organ, made up of billions of cells called neurons. The connections between these neurons is what enables us to think, move, feel, act and essentially process every conscious and unconscious intake of environmental stimuli and respond accordingly.
You may have heard that there is electrical current in the brain.
A neurotransmitter can be excitatory or inhibitory—that is, it may contribute to exciting the next neuron or inhibiting its excitation. For our purposes, we are going to talk about a well-known excitatory neurotransmitter called dopamine. Dopamine, along with a few other neurotransmitters, is responsible for making you feel good.
Once dopamine is released via transporters in the producing cell, called the presynaptic cell, it temporarily latches on to the receptors on the surface of its target, called the postsynaptic cell, and causes further actions to occur in that cell.
The dopamine itself is not taken in by the target cell—its binding is temporary and after a short period it is detached and taken back into the presynaptic cell.
Substances can affect and alter this natural pathway in three broad ways:
Overproduction of dopamine: the opioid family of substances such as heroin and fentanyl stimulate VTA to over-produce dopamine. This rush of abnormally large amounts of dopamine hits the user with a sudden and very strong feeling of euphoria. An unfortunate side-effect of opioids is slowing down breathing. This can be particularly dangerous if mixed with other substances that also slow down the body such as alcohol, anti-anxiety medications and other opioids. Current statistics indicate every 19 minutes, someone dies from accidental prescription drug overdose (most of them containing opioids).
Blockage of the transporters: drugs such as cocaine quickly enter the brain and bind to the transporters on the presynaptic cell, blocking dopamine from being taken back inside. This accumulates large amounts of dopamine in the space between these cells (called the synaptic cleft) and for longer. Constant presence of larger than normal levels of dopamine in the cleft causes the postsynaptic cell to be hyper-activated, leading to a prolonged feeling of euphoria. This establishes a powerful link between this feeling and the drug – which makes the user want to use it again.
Stimulation and blockage: amphetamine family of drugs behave both like opioids and cocaine. In lower dosage, meth acts like cocaine in blocking the uptake of dopamine back to the presynaptic cell. In higher doses, in addition to the blocking effect, meth stimulates the presynaptic cell to release even more dopamine. Because of this dual effect, the accumulation of dopamine in the synaptic cleft becomes extreme, leading to dangerously high hyper-activation of the postsynaptic cell. This results in an extreme feeling of euphoria making meth incredibly addictive.
Drugs alter how the reward centre communicates with the rest of the brain: affecting emotions, movement, reasoning and decision making. Repeated use of these drugs makes changes to the chemistry of the brain, which eventually prevents the user from experiencing the same euphoria when first using the drug: the user builds tolerance toward the substance.
Fardad is a science student here at Concordia. He wants to share his research and learning about the science field with the Concordia community.
