Conversations That Matter

Can Science Save Us with Dr. Scott Sampson

Scott Sampson PhD

Science and why we need more that ever

 

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Scott Sampson, PhD of Science World on the role of science in our lives, our economy and the opportunity BC has to be a global leader in research and development. Sampson points out, “we use science everyday for everything, it’s all around us, whether it's understanding the atmosphere or the iPhones in our pockets or the medical care we receive or the cars we drive or whatever it is. It's all based on science, but not many people think about that. They just sort of go through their lives using the things that are around them, not really realizing that there's a series of basic research, which then moves to technology which then moves to the marketplace.”

 

Sampson’s biggest concern is we’ve literally driven children’s sense of wonder away - wonder that is needed if we’re going to cultivate the scientists of the future. Sampson says there are three components of modern life that are inhibiting children from asking how everything works, “there's the fear factor, there's the over scheduling factor, we schedule kids to the nth degree. They don't have time for free play, and there's the tech factor and I think that we rob kids, especially young kids, of their childhood by not letting them have that free unstructured playtime.”

 

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

Social Licence to Operate with Radha Curpen

Ep 133

Radha Curpen

Social Licence to Operate

 

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Radha Curpen on the role of Social Licence in the development of projects that affect the environment, our neighbourhoods and our relationships with each other. What is ‘Social Licence’, who grants it, how do you get it, does it affect or influence regulators and does it have legal weight? Curpen says, “the gap between the legal licence and society's expectations is where social licence resides. There is a distrust of the regulatory process. And as a result, people are talking about social licence as something else in addition to the regulatory process of getting a licence.”

 

Complicating the process of acquiring ‘Social Licence’ is the nature of who will grant it. Curpen says it’s challenging, “this social licence discussion is the result, is the outcome of people not being satisfied, of people's expectations being higher, or of having to voice certain issues.”  As a result the overall regulatory process can become unstable and oddly creates a situation where there is reduction of public confidence in the formal regulatory process.

 

To obtain ‘Social Licence’, Curpen says, “you need to identify the stakeholders, engage them early, collaborate, get their input and continue to do so after your approval is obtained and continue to do so during the life of the project, that's what I call corporate social responsibility, the outcome of that is what we call the social licence to operate.”

 

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

Women in the Media - It's still a Man's world with Shari Graydon

Shari Graydon

Women in Media - It’s still a Man’s world

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Shari Graydon of Informed Opinions which strives to amplify women’s voices to ensure women’s perspectives and priorities play an equal role in Canadian Society. Graydon regrets that in 2017 women remain under-represented as experts in the media, while men provide the lion’s share of commentary and analysis. She says, “that it is a profound loss that we are not actively engaging, accessing, utilizing, permitting women to contribute their talents, insights, energies and intelligence to everything we're doing.”

Graydon points to the US election as proof that women are still treated differently, “it's very, very clear that the degree of sexism that operated in terms of the coverage and attitudes generally, reinforced by media about Hillary Clinton's candidacy are still alive and thriving”. She notes that the more women experts and politicians we see, the easier it will be for all of them to be perceived as competent and treated more responsibly.

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

Canadian Education in the Global Market

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Diana MacKay the Executive Director of Carleton University’s Global Academy on Canada’s valuable education resource. MacKay says we have a lot to offer to students and educators around the world. In recent years, there have been about 245,000 international students studying in Canada at any given point in time and the goal is to increase the number to 450,000 by 2020. While it’s important to continue to attract international students, MacKay asks, “what happens if we expand our offering, if we were to package up the expertise of our universities and colleges and start selling it to audiences around the world in the business sector for one?”

 

According to MacKay the benefits of expanding the education menu are far reaching. Pathways to a Canadian education include “Online, satellite campuses and programs that have them live here to name a few. They’ll contribute to our economy by being part of the Canadian system, they’ll get a professional program or a chance to practice their skills, apply their skills using their deep knowledge and conducting their business in English. There's untold demand around the world for people to come and gain their fluency in English through an experience here.” Canada has an education system that is extremely marketable through a wide range of venues and MacKay says we can do so much more than we’re currently offering.

 

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

The Power of Story with Greg Power

Greg Power

The Power of story

 

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Greg Power of Weber Shandwick, a public relations expert who says the days of just the facts are over. Power says, “audiences need to connect to the person sharing the information and simply stating the facts isn’t good enough in a post truth world.” Power says, “stories connect us, they resonate and storytelling is an important part of our evolutionary DNA. It's how we've always organized the world and how we need to organize the world to participate in it.”

 

Power believes great storytelling includes, “people, it involves conflict, it has human drama and it has a solution.” As Power points out, this was the magic of Steve Jobs, “he understood how to use drama. During the launch of the iPhone he created conflict by stating smartphones are not so smart and then positions the keyboard on the smartphones, as the enemy because of the screen space it robs from you the user He goes on to state screen space is your freedom. He turned it into a drama and let me tell you why. Let me tell you who the villain is and now let me show you is the hero and the hero was the iPhone.”

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

Are your City, Office and Home Accessible? with Brad McCannell

Ep 129

Brad McCammell

Are your City, Office and Home Accessible?

 

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Brad McCannell of the Rick Hansen Foundation says, “we are all on a long slippery slope towards mobility challenges” He says the time to pay attention to accessibility in your home, your office and your city is now and he points out, “we’re not doing such a great job.”

 

McCannell says an effective accessibility strategy is consistency. “ Imagine having to plan your trip not knowing from one intersection to the next if you get from one side to the other. Will there be a ramp? Will it be an appropriate ramp?’ McCannell says we’ve had a hogpog policy that includes a little of this and a little of that and it comes up short of an effective accessibility plan.

 

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

The Bravest Girls in the World with Giselle Portenier

Ep 128

Giselle Portenier

The bravest girls in the world

 

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Giselle Portenier who is producing a documentary on the “Bravest Girls in the World”, girls who run through the jungle, across the desert evading predators of all sorts along the way to escape a ritual that mutilates them and could kill them. Portenier says, “It's a complete violation of their human rights.”

 

Portenier is working to tell the story of girls who are running from genital mutilation, a custom that is imposed upon them by their cultures and their families, “it’s not just a women's issue becau

se the girls get married to men and when they do get married to men, they're much more likely to die in childbirth, they're much more likely not to enjoy sex. And it's also the men that are demanding it be done in many of the cultures, a lot of FGM is performed for financial reasons because if a man wants a cut girl, and he has to pay a bride price for the girl, he's prepared to pay a higher bride price for girls that have been cut.”

 

You can support Giselle’s production by contributing to

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/in-the-name-of-your-daughter/x/7718625#/

 

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

Is there a Trump bump in the markets?

Ep 127

Murray Leith on Stock Markets

Is there a Trump Bump?

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Murray Leith the Head of Research at Odlum Brown on investing during what appears to be a Trump Bump. Leith says, “everybody's calling it the Trump rally but I actually would argue that there's fundamental, economic reasons for the strong performance in the stock market.”

Despite the markets around the world being up by more than 10% over the past two months Leith points out the reasons stem from the strength of the US economy, “there's this feeling that because the market didn't do a whole bunch until after the election, that it's all about Trump and that maybe investors are too euphoric. But really, a 10% return in a year when the economy went from bad to quite a bit better, that's just pretty reasonable.” Leith says enjoy it for now but don’t make your investment choices on swings in the market, he says, “wise investing means having a long term strategy”.

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

I'm Right and You're an Idiot with James Hoggan

Ep 126

James Hoggan

I’m Right and You’re an Idiot

This week’s Conversation That Matters features James Hoggan who penned, “I’m Right and You’re an Idiot” an insightful look at the toxic level of public discourse. Hoggan has long been  speaking out about anthropogenic climate change and found himself in the midst of some heated arguments. He says he wrote the book to understand why others weren’t listening to him.

Along the way he learned that shifting one’s perspective or beliefs is an extremely difficult prospect. He points out we’re programmed to dig our heels in especially when we encounter a forceful voice on the other side of the equation.

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv

Medical Heroin and why we need to prescribe it with Eugenia Oviedto-Joekes

Eugenia Oviedto-Joekes

Crosstown Clinic

This week’s Conversation That Matters features Eugenia Oviedto-Joekes who lead a team of researchers that ran the NAOMI and SALOME clinical trials on the effectiveness of providing chronic heroin addicts with medical heroin or hydromorphone. The trails generated positive results and lead to the creation of Crosstown Clinic.

Crosstown is funded and operated by Providence Health Care because it’s working. Oviedto-Jones points out that injectable heroin is one tiny part of what the clinic offers, “the most important part is the building of relationships and re-establishing a way of caring for people which is something we have not done for more than 30 years.”

Conversations That Matter is a partner program with the Centre for Dialogue at Simon Fraser University. Join veteran Broadcaster Stuart McNish each week for these important and engaging Conversations shaping our future.

Please become a subscriber and support the production of the program at www.conversationsthatmatter.tv