Inkless Wells

Paul Wells on all the latest out of Ottawa—along with the occasional post about jazz. Follow Paul on Twitter: @InklessPW
He also offers his thoughtful perspective of Stephen Harper’s last 10 years in his recent eBook, The Harper Decade.

Categories: Capital Read, Inkless Wells, Uncategorized

Hey look: Just on the off-chance that luring extraordinary scientists is a GOOD idea…

by Paul Wells on Friday, May 21, 2010 8:42am - 26 Comments

From the print edition, my column on the Canada Excellence Research Chairs, in which I acknowledge only in passing the concerns about how all the recipients are men. After three days of blanket coverage of that angle, I’m sure my column will seem hopelessly obtuse to many. But I wanted to use the space Maclean’s gave me this week simply to explain what the program is, and why it will have effects on several campuses that go well beyond the parachuting of some exotic hothouse flower into a cloistered perch. No, in every case that I looked at on Tuesday, the arriving CERC will be joined by colleagues in place and by new hires, new equipment, grad students and post-docs — 19 little colonies of well-funded, very ambitious talent on 19 13 campuses (Laval, Waterloo, UofT got two CERCs each; the University of Alberta got four). There’s room for criticism, but it seems to me that we should start from a basic understanding of this program’s goals and the effect it’s already having.

Tags: CERC, research

More by Paul Wells

Andrew (not PorC)

Is it suspicious that U. of Alberta gets 4, while the Montreal universities get none? Even if it is a coincidence, it's bad politics, and probably bad policy.

Bonko

The keyword here is excellence, not irrational token counting. Paul Wells is hardly a conservative and yet he's on board the excellence train, why aren't you?

tobyornotoby

"Paul Wells is hardly a conservative …"

So Andrew (not PorC) can't just ask his own questions and make up his own mind? He has to consider the reputed political leanings of the columnist, first? Help me with the process here, Bonko, do we declare our allegiance to some pre-approved political philosophy and then get an email list of who we are supposed to agree with?

Bonko

So you're claiming that global warming is caused by a dearth of Buffy Sainte Marie music featured on radio stations west of Kenora? That this same anti-Buffy Sainte Marie bias is also responsible for a third of respiratory illnesses in New Brunswick? Help me with the process here, toby, do we smash the contrabufinistas or let them continue to rape and pillage the good people of Sioux Lookout?

Two can play that game, bub. Centers for Excellence should be just that, not job creation programs for the grievance cohort, and I am delighted to see some members of the media wing of the Liberal party revolt against the political wing's quota politics.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Be_rad Be_rad

I thought conservatives were against the culture of victimization.
http://intensedebate.com/people/CndnRschr CndnRschr

Montreal had two nominations of the last 36 and failed to snag either. The idea that any given university should be entitled to its allocation of funds is shameful.

matt

What are the chances that the U of A was able to outcompete U of M and McGill in sweeting bids? A fair number of "lucid Quebecers" will tell you there's nothing surprising about that.

Mediawatcher

Maybe those Queeeeeeebec schools should start charging appropriate tuition fees. That may provide the money for them to compete for important scientists…oh wait, you have important mime and clown colleges to subsidize. On second thought, Alberta is subsidizing that too.

Endless whining from the leaders in whining…

http://intensedebate.com/people/Thwim Thwim

No, it's not suspicious. Alberta has had a heavy focus on technical/practical research for a while now.. especially (for obvious reasons) in the energy and environmental science pillars. Had these pillars leaned toward the softer sciences, such as "Social Peace and Protection", or "Mental Health & Citizen Engagement" it's unlikely Alberta would have received anything.

In fact, there's been some suggestion that Alberta's focus on research is coming at the expense of teaching its next generation of researchers. Considering how deep the need for that next generation is going to be in a few years, this may be a case of tortoise and hare.. with Alberta playing the role of the hare.
AT1

No disproportionate funding is not bad policy.

In fact, being a scientist, I would argue that PROPORTIONAL funding to each province is, in fact, a pretty clear sign of political interference.

And seriously, when did politics ever coincide with good science?

JamesHalifax

Paul……….I'm getting a little suspicious here. Why are all of your well-written columns by men? Where are the women?

I think you're discriminating again.

Andrew (not PorC)

No love for Mrs. Amiel?

Brian T.

From her writing style and grasp of reality, it's more appropriate to say she's after Feshuk's job, not Wells'.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Jenn_ Jenn_

Oh, that's just great. Ms Amiel, IMO the lousy-est writer of opinion pieces since the invention of opinion pieces, is now the 'women's voice' is she? I mean, it's not like I disagree with every word like I do with Steyn. I can't follow the meandering, insert something (usually unrelated) about Jews into every article, the end rarely has to do with the beginning, opinon to know what it is!

But Feschuk is funny haha. Ms. Amiel is funny strange.

Bonko

It raises the question: who are the top female columnists in Canada? Amiel has been a professional journalist since the 1960s. Wente, Riley, Francis, Hebert, Zerbisias, Yaffe, Mallick, Klein, Kherridin (sp?), Kay, O'Malley…anyone else?
http://intensedebate.com/people/Jenn_ Jenn_

Good question. Although, isn't there a difference between a journalist and a columnist? If not, can we get it back? Amiel was probably a good journalist, although I don't remember personally. As to your choices, Hebert and O'Malley jump out at me. Most definitely not Mallick I'm not knowingly familiar with the others' writing, which isn't to say I've never read them.
http://intensedebate.com/people/psiclone psiclone

Chantal Hebert should be in the finalists
Crit_Reasoning

Chantal Hébert is Canada's best female columnist. The Ottawa Citizen's Susan Riley is up there, too.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Thwim Thwim

They went to CBC

Brian T.

May 10th print edition: "I spend time analyzing my dogs' waste in case they have worms, and on occasion I quite forget the bags of it in my pockets. I don't find the odour off-putting."

She then slips into a story about a Hungarian attaché who had an affinity for fish heads.

I'm not anti-woman folks, I'm pro-hilarious!

The Real Jan

I thought she was hired under the Spouses of the Incarcerated Employment programme.

Crit_Reasoning

Fearless prediction: Marci McDonald will write a very long piece in the Walrus about Harper's scary "anti-women agenda".
Exhibit A: Canada Excellence Research Chairs
Exhibit B: The Rapture!
Chuck Vs The World

Mr.Wells thanks for the article on this, I am not to bright on this issue(and many more as you can tell by my post's).

Just wondering Mr.Wells, do you know who was the Harvard and MIT people we almost got..
bonneau

Apparently, the research funded by the program focuses primarily on the oil sands, the Arctic, the oceans and health research.

It's interesting to see Harper and Big Oil at work. There is a reason for their every move, and if one reads in between the lines, one can see that this one also reeks of partisan interests.

It is obvious that the main objective for luring the "Wayne Gretszkys of science" to Canada is to justify and bolster, through "impartial" hard science, their case regarding the continued aggressive exploitation of the tar sands as well as the projected mass fossil fuel exploration in the Arctic.

Instead of investing green, the Cons are playing ostrich re: global warming. Harper says it's only about the economy. Of course economy is crucial but it should be intertwined with the environment. The new mantra should be "environomics". But try telling that to Big Oil. Where are you Stéphane Dion ?

The health care issue is a red herring. But not completely, that is, even the health research initiative masks a sinister motive. Who do you think benefits mostly from such research? That's right, Big Pharma. Need I say more.
bonneau

cont'd…

Now which brings us to the question of why only men were chosen. One of the reasons, obviously, is because women in general are more liberal-minded than men, and are more sensitive to environmental issues.

Mind you, as most posters, I am only speculating, but it kind of makes one aware of the interest factor, namely what really motivates people, politicians to act… the hidden agenda.
The health care issue is a red herring. But not completely, that is, even the health research initiative masks a sinister motive. Who do you think benefits mostly from such research? That's right, Big Pharma. Need I say more.
J.S. Robinson

The anxiety over no women being chosen shouldn't encourage gender quotas in the future. Thirteen different universities recruited 19 of the best scientists they could find within the government's four priority fields, and by coincidence the scientists recruited were all men. There was no coordinated policy of recruitment, which means that there was no coordinated discrimination. And any "equal opportunity" stipulation in research funding will just mean lower-quality research, since excellence will not be the only requirement.

On the Montreal universities, that is entirely the fault of the Quebec government. The price you pay for setting funding and tuition so low is that you can't attract top talent. That government prefers to preserve a culture of equal-opportunity mediocrity, to a more extreme degree than other parts of Canada do.