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Trottier 2025

emily.shore@mcgill.ca — Tue, 12 Aug 2025 17:15:44 +0000

A recording of the event is now available on our YouTube channel.

Trottier 2024

emily.shore@mcgill.ca — Wed, 19 Jun 2024 18:37:52 +0000

Date: Monday, Sept. 23rd
Time: 7:00 PM
Location: ɬ�﷬, Leacock Building - Rm 132 (attached to the ɬ�﷬ Arts Building) - 855 Sherbrooke St W, Montreal, Quebec H3A 2T7

Trottier 2023

emily.shore@mcgill.ca — Tue, 23 May 2023 18:30:28 +0000

Symposium Schedule

All events will take place in Moyse Hall in the ɬ�﷬ Arts Building

WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 13th 1:30 PM EST: Roundtable discussion moderated by Joe Schwarcz

This event will NOT be live-streamed but made available for viewing afterward.

Trottier 2022

joyce.peralta2@mcgill.ca — Tue, 14 Jun 2022 14:26:56 +0000

The Science of Life and Death

ada.mcvean@mail.mcgill.ca — Sun, 03 Oct 2021 20:24:45 +0000

In Whom Do We Trust?

emily.shore@mcgill.ca — Wed, 17 Jun 2020 21:44:38 +0000

This is the age of the pandemic. And that is truly terrifying. But it is also the age of the “infodemic,” and that too has some chilling features. We are relentlessly bombarded by a tsunami of information, the reliability of which is often questionable, especially when the source is social media. When it comes to controversial issues, be it in the area of medicine, nutrition, or environmental concerns, bloggers and politicians with sketchy relevant backgrounds are as likely to throw their hat into the ring as scientific experts.

Longing for Longevity

emily.shore@mcgill.ca — Fri, 05 Jul 2019 20:11:54 +0000

Symposium Schedule Tuesday | October 22

Roundtable Session: 1:30pm - 3:00pm
Moderated by Joe Schwarcz PhD, Director, ɬ�﷬ Office for Science and Society

Participants:

The Food Babe Decoded

alexandra.pires-menard@mail.mcgill.ca — Sun, 15 Mar 2015 10:39:57 +0000

Vani Hari, who goes by the alias “The Food Babe” has become a real social phenomenon. She blogs, appears on TV and has just come out with a book that quickly made it to the New York Times best seller list. She has lots of followers and lots of critics, including myself. I don’t disagree with her goal of improving people’s eating habits. I just disagree with the methods used. Irrational fear-mongering is not the way to go. "There is just no acceptable level of any chemical to ingest, ever," she says.

Dr. Joe Book Talk - Toronto Public Library, City Hall

emily.shore@mcgill.ca — Fri, 11 May 2018 18:17:04 +0000

Dr. Joe will discuss his new book, "A Feast of Science"!

Free and open to the public. Signed copies available.

Beer Foam and Artificial Hips

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Wed, 05 Mar 2014 11:04:57 +0000

Forty eight years ago there was an epidemic of heart failure in Quebec City. The clue was that the thirty men affected were all beer drinkers. In a round about way, the culprit was the introduction of a new dish washing detergent that left a residue on glasses. Detergent is the enemy of foam on beer and brewers countered the problem by adding a foam boosting agent, cobalt sulphate, to their product. It seems the potential toxicity of the cobalt compound was not considered. It should have been because cobalt affects the heart and causes heart failure.

The Food Babe and her hero

Joe Schwarcz — Sun, 30 Mar 2014 12:48:23 +0000

The "Food Babe," a lady who blogs about food issues, is a continuous source of comic relief for the scientifically minded but for many members of the public she is a respected "whistleblower" who protects them from all those nasty food producers who want to kill off their customers by hiding dangerous ingredients in their products. Now she has managed to reveal how pizza can "literally" blow your mind! She has set her sights on glutamic acid which is added to pizza in the form of protein hydrolyzate or yeast extract to improve flavour and get people to eat more.

When it comes to insomnia, there’s no shortage of advice

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Sun, 13 Apr 2014 14:31:53 +0000

O sleep! O gentle sleep! / Nature’s soft nurse, how have I frightened thee, / That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down / And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Is fish really brain food?

Joe Schwarcz PhD — Sun, 31 Aug 2014 05:07:15 +0000

Is fish really brain food? P.G. Wodehouse certainly thought so. In his wonderful “Jeeves” stories, Bertie Wooster encourages his brainy butler to eat more fish whenever a particularly challenging problem arises. But to what extent does fiction mirror real life? One can make a theoretical case for fish consumption based on the fact that docosahexaenoic acid, or DHA, the famous omega-3 fat in fish, is the main component of brain cell membranes, and that communication between brain cells is a function of the integrity of these membranes.

Cosmos, Joe Schwarcz Win Skeptics’ Critical Thinking Prize

alexandra.pires-menard@mail.mcgill.ca — Thu, 09 Jul 2015 13:05:12 +0000

The 2014 Balles Prize in Critical Thinking, an award for excellence in the promotion of science and reason, was given this year to the creators, producers, and writers of Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, and to Dr. Joe Schwarcz for his book Is That a Fact? The Balles Prize is given annually by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), publisher of the magazine Skeptical Inquirer.

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