Arts & Sciences Talks 2008
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2961
2024-03-29T08:07:50ZPeak Oil: An Ongoing Case Study in Unsuccessful Avoidance Behaviour
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2993
Peak Oil: An Ongoing Case Study in Unsuccessful Avoidance Behaviour
Grant, Lyle
Peak oil is the point at which oil production reaches a maximum value and thereafter declines. Because of the dependence of industrialized society on oil, peak oil may be one of the most important, possibly cataclysmic, events in modern history. Averting economic damage due to peak oil is defined as a behavioral problem in terms of one-trial discriminated avoidance responding. Several factors that make it difficult to execute this type of avoidance responding are discussed. A risk management approach for dealing with the problem is advocated.
2011-03-29T17:08:08ZIf you Are What You Eat, Souldn't you Know What Is Inside That Package and Where It Comes From?
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2992
If you Are What You Eat, Souldn't you Know What Is Inside That Package and Where It Comes From?
Smythe, Elizabeth
This presentation examines national and international political struggles over food labeling, food scares, concerns about climate change and sustainable food production have increased public concern about food regulations and led to demands for more information about what we are eating. Given globalized food systems, eaters must rely on others to assure the quality and safety of what we eat and face challenges in knowing its provenance. Labeling can aid consumers to make choices and redress the shift of power and influence to large corporate agribusiness only i trade rules and agreements do not limit or circumscribe consumer choice. Food labeling is also of concern to food exporters and organizations like the World Trade Organization and the Codex Alimentarius because it has trade implications, blocking or limiting market access and/or conferring commercial advantages on one product or over another. Corporate agribusiness and biotechnology firms have agressively lobbied against certain mandatory rules on food labeling while consumer, local food and environmental actvitists, and public opinion have supported it.
2011-03-29T17:06:13ZMaking Equitable Education in Rural China through Distance Education
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2991
Making Equitable Education in Rural China through Distance Education
McQuaide, Shiling
China has made great strides toward universalizing basic education in rural areas over the past two decades, yet wide urban-rural and East-West disparities in schooling access and quality not only remain, but are growing. In 2003 the "Distance Education Project for Rural Schools" (DEPRS) was launched by the Chinese government to improve the quality of basic education in rural areas of China, especially that of the poorer western provinces. Chinese scholars refer the DEPRS as "the largest ICT (Information & Communication Technology) project in the world up to now" as "it serves a larger population than any other similar programs do". Little attention, however, has been paid to the project in the English world so far. This paper offers a descriptive analysis of the effectiveness and cost efficiently of the DEPRS. Through exploring if, how and to what extent ICT facilitated distance learning has promoted basic education in remote rural areas, it hopes to shed light on the ongoing debate on the issue in the international distance education community.
2011-03-29T17:04:05ZNorthern Lights with Five Satellites
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2990
Northern Lights with Five Satellites
Connors, Martin
Athabasca's contribution to studying the science of the Northern Lights started nearly 10 years ago with precision measurement of their magnetic fields. We now measure that effect in a number of places in North America linked by internet. In 2002 we made the step forward to taking images of the northern lights and discovered that there is a special kind over Athabasca, measured by our Japanese colleagues. In 2007, NASA launched the 5 THEMIS satellites, and their data can be used along with data from the ground to study the origins of the Northern Lights in space. Athabasca itself has grown in this period, and our formerly dark site is now lit up too much to permit proper observations. We hope to get funding for construction of a new and improved Athabasca University Geophysical Observatory, to be built next year in a more remote and darker location.
2011-03-29T17:01:46ZReimagining Globalization: An Unfamiliar Narrative?
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2989
Reimagining Globalization: An Unfamiliar Narrative?
Shrivastava, Meenal
As an idea or concept, globalization finds expression in the rhetoric and rationale for social and political action almost everywhere. However, the ebb and flow of this debate has ranged from declaring the 'End of History' and 'the Flattening of the World' to 'the End of Globalism' and 'Sinking Globalization'. This obviously raises the question "how is contemporary globalization and its consequences conceptualized and understood? Secondly, we need to question the significance of the discourse of globalization to ask why it matters. This presentation provides a broad overview of the contending debates on globalization and the resultant rise of 'Global'. approaches. While accepting the concept of globalization as a meaningful guide to the interpretation of the current conjuncture of geopolitical, economic and cultural trends, the paper, however, argues for the refocusing of the geographical, economic and cultural studies of globalization. The rational for this argument does not just lie in the shifting international context but also in the concern with the silencing of the historical and contemporary experiences and roles of a vast majority of humanity.
2011-03-29T16:57:33ZTransboundary Conservation: Citizens, Security, and Cross Border Collaboration
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2988
Transboundary Conservation: Citizens, Security, and Cross Border Collaboration
Stefanick, Lorna
This talk examines the evolution of transboundary conservation initiatives; specifically, initiatives in the Rocky Mountains of southern Alberta and northern Montana. This is the home of the world's first Peace Park, the Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park. This remarkable park, part of the so-called "Crown of the Continent", is now the epicenter of a far larger transboundary initiative, the Yellowstone to Yukon (Y2Y) conservation project. The Waterton-Glacier Park and Y2Y are examples of an ecosystem approach to managing a portion of the northern border of the US; they stand in sharp contrast to other American initiatives that seek to promote national security on its southern frontier by sealing borders, and as a result, dividing ecosystems. While the Waterton-Glacier Peace Park stood in the past as a symbol to the world of peaceful coexistence, its future utility as a conservation management model that promotes collaboration may diminish given the heightened concern for perimeter security after the 9-11 terrorist attacks on the US.
2011-03-29T16:54:24ZBack Roads
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2987
Back Roads
Ferguson, Ted
Athabasca University and NeWest Press are hosting Ted Ferguson, national journalist and author of the newly released autobiographical adventure, Back Roads, set in the woods somewhere near Athabasca. Hear about the Ferguson family's rural adventures in this humorous account of a radical change in lifestyle. Discussion will focus on Ferguson's long and varied career as a Canadian writer as he fills us in on what it's like to write in different areas of the country, from Victoria to Vancouver, Alberta to Toronto, Cuba and South East Asia. Anne Nothof, English Professor at Athabasca University and editor of Back Roads will introduce Ted Ferguson and facilitate the event. Ted Ferguson was born and raised in Victoria, BC. For ten years, he worked as a newspaper reporter, television critic, sports columnist, and magazine writer in several cities across Canada, before becoming a full-time freelance writer 30 years ago. His articles have appeared in the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, Reader's Digest, Canadian Business, enRoute, and the Imperial Oil Review. He has publisehd seven books, including the Alberta Non-Fiction Book Award winner, Desperate Siege. His last book, Blue Cuban Nights, was publishe din 2006.
2011-03-29T16:46:44ZInformation Needs of Men and Their Partners about Prostate Surgery
https://auspace.athabascau.ca/handle/2149/2986
Information Needs of Men and Their Partners about Prostate Surgery
Vandall-Walker, Virginia
Prostate cancer is the single greatest cancer threat facing Canadian men, affecting one in eight men with a mortality rate of one in 27. Over 22,300 Canadian men were newly diagnosed in 2007, compared with 12,000 newly diagnosed with lung cancer (Canadian Cancer Society, 2006). Approximately 20% (or 4,400) of these men elected radical prostate surgery *Siemans, Schulze, McKillop, Brundage, & Groome, 2005) a common treatment-of-choice especially when the disease is detected in the early states. Recent statistics indicate that at least 800 men will undergo the procedure in Alberta in 2008. In this presentation, a study undertaken to determine the current information needs of men and their partners about prostate surgery is described. A review of the literature, urology professional input, content analysis and interpretive description analysis of data from focus groups comprised of men and their partners who have experienced prostate surgery, collectively informed the prostatectomy handbook, "Before and After Radical Prostate Surgery" (Vandall-Walker, Moore, & Pyne, submitted for publication) ensuring that this important patient teaching tool is evidence-based.
2011-03-29T16:41:46Z