Today, the search for peace in the shadow of war and terror continues, but the stakes have grown to embrace the globe. In the absence of prophets, the ancient role of studying and advising is falling to a different breed of sage: academics whose insights are rooted in research and who feel a need to communicate their findings to a broader audience than students and scholars.

As international tensions escalate, the work of many University of Toronto scholars, programs and organizations is having a significant impact on the public debate over the need for war and the importance of alternatives. The September 11 attacks on New York and Washington gave renewed urgency to such work, for scholars know that that watershed event took place within a complex historical continuum. As anxieties over Sept. 11 spilled over into war in Iraq, one truth endured – to solve international conflicts, you first have to understand them. That’s why academics continue to probe the historical, religious, economic and political layers that lead from Europe to the Middle East to America and back, seeking insights that can help explain such events – and wisdom that might keep such tragedies from happening again.

Few Canadians have studied peace, conflict and disarmament longer than John Polanyi. The Nobel Prize laureate in chemistry was a newly hired chemist in 1959, much more interested in his lab work than in public issues, when some U of T science colleagues spoke out on the Conservative government’s intent to acquire nuclear weapons. Polanyi joined a small U of T group that journeyed to Ottawa to protest. “There we were,” he chuckles, “confronted by the jowls of the prime minister, Mr. Diefenbaker.”

Despite the academics’ opposition, Diefenbaker agreed to accept nuclear-tipped Bomarc missiles. (A year later, however, he reversed himself, and refused to arm the missiles with their nuclear warheads; it was Liberal Prime Minister Lester Pearson who eventually allowed the nukes into Canada.) Whether his protest succeeded or failed wasn’t the point, says Polanyi. “It’s important to force people in power to explain their views in public. Of course, sometimes it seems like speaking out has no effect. But doing so has more effect than not doing it. Pathetic as my little oar is, I want to put it in and row.”

Since then, Polanyi has studied long and written much about international issues, especially nuclear disarmament and peacekeeping. He was founding chair of Canadian Pugwash, which has advocated arms control for over 40 years, and in 1979 he co-edited a book, The Dangers of Nuclear War. But Polanyi is no starry-eyed peacenik: in 1995 he co-chaired an initiative that recommended establishing a United Nations strike force for peacekeeping or enforcement in global trouble spots.

Polanyi’s career of advocacy was recognized in January when he received the inaugural International Peace Award, given in honour of an influential Jain monk from India, the late Acharya Sushil Kumar. In his acceptance speech, he said that leaders could learn much from academia, a global and culturally diverse community that works together successfully because it shares two principles: “that none of us is in full possession of the truth, but all are groping toward it…[and] that the pursuit of truth is to be achieved through reason, and not through violence.” (See “World at the Crossroads.”)

Polanyi continues writing and speaking on the need to replace war with the rule of law. That doesn’t mean armed intervention is always wrong, he says. When NATO troops used force to intervene in Kosovo, in the former Yugoslavia, in 1999, it showed that humanitarian interests sometimes outweigh the power of the sovereign state. “We need to build on what we have achieved,” he says. “We need to keep nibbling away at the power of sovereign nations. Let’s continue down this path and see if there isn’t an imaginative way to achieve our humanitarian objectives.”

At U of T, science and religion agree on the need to explore alternatives to war. In the first week of February the Campus Chaplains Association, comprising the clergy and leaders of 20 on-campus faiths, came together to launch Peace Week, seven days of dialogue and diversity. Co-organizer Terry Kersch, chaplain at St. Michael’s College, says the event was a first in Canada. “As far as we know,” he says, “on no other campus has something like this been tried.”

The idea for Peace Week was broached last September at the chaplains’ monthly meeting, says Kersch. Eager volunteers raised $40,000 and organized a campus-wide marketing blitz. Peace Week started with a multifaith service in the Great Hall of Hart House, and then each evening leading activists and commentators delivered lectures on international issues. Anti-landmine crusader Jody Williams, who won the 1997 Nobel Peace Prize, spoke about how one person can make a difference in global affairs. U of T alumnus Stephen Lewis, Canada’s former ambassador to the UN and now special envoy dealing with Africa’s HIV/AIDS crisis, drew 1,000 people for his talk on “Economics Without War,” in which he lamented the fact that governments today spend $839 billion a year on war, but can’t find the $27 billion it would take to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.

Journalist and broadcaster Gwynne Dyer, clad in his signature worn leather jacket, attracted 400 people to St. Mike’s Sam Sorbara Auditorium for a talk on “The Prospects of Disarmament.” “A country with more than 10,000 nuclear weapons,” Dyer observed, “is going to attack a country with none to make sure that it doesn’t get any.” In today’s tense world, he warned that such action would only radicalize the Middle East and play into the hands of the terrorists Washington is trying to stop.

The final speaker was Craig Kielburger, a first-year U of T student who founded the children’s rights organization Free the Children at the age of 12, and a Nobel Peace Prize nominee himself. He challenged U of T students “not just to feel bad” about war, but to get actively involved in the peace movement. Peace Week ended with a multicultural concert and “celebration,” and the message was deliberate, says Muslim chaplain Imam Abdul Hai Patel. “We want to tell people that they need to maintain peace in this world, and the only way to do that is to be tolerant and accept and respect the dignity of everyone.”

Special events such as Peace Week have an impact that is both educational and motivational, notes first-year medical student Andrew Pinto. “Empowerment comes from witnessing individuals, such as these speakers, who have made a concerted effort towards improving our world and have succeeded.”

U of T scholars are also playing an influential role in the search for truth about global conflict. Political science professor David Welch, holder of U of T’s George Ignatieff Chair in Peace and Conflict Studies, is an expert on decision-making in crises, and on psychological approaches to the study of international conflict. He has co-authored several books on the Cuban Missile Crisis, and his book Justice and the Genesis of War (1993) won an award for outstanding contribution to U.S. national security studies. Welch probes the ways that personality and circumstance shape leaders.He says “figuring out how leaders interpret the world and how they evaluate their options” is the key to understanding their actions and motivations.

Political psychology is a fast-growing field that was pioneered in part by Janice Gross Stein, one of U of T’s distinguished University Professors and the director (currently on sabbatical) of the Munk Centre for International Studies. Understanding the psychological components of conflict, negotiation and decision-making has helped both Stein and Welch become occasional advisers to policymakers in Ottawa and Washington, as well as popular analysts in the media.

Meanwhile the Munk Centre itself, though barely three years old, has quickly become one of Canada’s most important forums for the study of international affairs. It is the home of a number of centres for regional studies (including Russian, Asian and even American), as well as academic programs and inquiries into citizenship and activism (see “Road Test”). In its pursuit of understanding, the centre pulsates with activity: one recent week included lectures on NATO, the new political economy in Europe, socialist realism, the African-American Islamic struggle, women’s health and human rights, and the future of India. A February conference on anti-Semitism, which included a major speech by former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, attracted community members as well as international scholars. Its fresh inquiry into the new form of an old problem garnered newspaper headlines for three days running.

A vigorous public presence is important to the Munk Centre. Accordingly, it has the latest in technology, meaning that broadcasting, video-conferencing and Web-casting are regular aspects of its institutional life. The centre has become “a window on the world for U of T, in the process taking on a public role in Canada,” says Louis Pauly, the centre’s acting director and holder of the Canada Research Chair in Governance and Globalization. “It is now a significant institution in the world of international relations studies. It has encouraged synergies in a lot of related areas.”

One of the many scholars based at the Munk Centre is Paul Kingston, a political science professor who teaches international relations. Kingston’s specialty is probing politics and development in the Middle East, particularly in war-ravaged Lebanon. One question that intrigues him is whether peace and civil society can rise from the ashes of war. The answer is complicated, he says, because many countries at war today are still struggling with the legacy of colonial rule: specifically, the leftover cleavage between rights and privileges. “Most colonial powers, especially the French, talked about rights, but operated based on privilege worked out through networks of collaboration,” he says. “The result in contemporary Middle Eastern societies, for example, is a confused political arena where privilege and rights exist side by side.”

The main difficulty for political reform in the region, Kingston continues, is “how do you build institutions and change attitudes? It hasn’t been done before.” In his book Britain and the Politics of Modernization in the Middle East, 1945-1958, Kingston chronicles Britain’s attempt to leave a legacy of development and civil society when it quit the region after the Second World War. Ultimately, the British weren’t very successful, he says, because “indigenous politics remained embedded in old, inequitable patterns.”

But new patterns are being formed. One of Kingston’s current research projects is tracking the emergence of newer vehicles of expression, such as disability politics, women’s groups and environmental issues. The evidence, he says, is that these emerging political entities are helping to build a more civil society, by breaking up older patterns of dominance and allowing newer voices to be heard.

This is good news for those who are trying to reduce the threat of armed aggression. The more civil society takes root in difficult and desiccated places, the less likely are the people to embrace terror and war. But rebuilding is a delicate proposition, and it is made that much more difficult when the assumptions of the parties involved are vastly different, notes James Reilly, chair of the department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations. “Most people in the Middle East, for example, have a different historical memory of Western interventions in the region,” he says. “Here, the assumption is that the West is a force for good. There, they see the West as aggressive, as being concerned always with great power issues and economic access.”

In times of tension, then, some academics can make a contribution by standing up and telling the truth about a muddled situation. When political debate dissolves into name-calling (the “Great Satan” versus “the Axis of Evil”), universities can strive to explain complex issues in ways that lead to greater understanding rather than hostility. Reilly’s departmental colleague, assistant professor Amir Hassanpour, agrees. To understand the roots of conflict today, you have to know your history. “The Western powers have never cared about democracy in the Middle East,” he says. “The nationalist movements that succeeded in getting independence could not develop properly in terms of gender equality, economic development and political freedom. They were never allowed to become real alternatives to the colonial footprint.” He notes that in 1953, Iran had a democratically elected prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh, who nationalized the oil industry. “The Americans didn’t like it and had him overthrown,” Hassanpour adds.

Richard Sandbrook, a political science professor based at the Munk Centre, has no illusions that peace will spring from a military solution in Iraq. He lists a number of places where the U.S. has made a mess of “regime change”: Guatemala, Chile, Congo, Angola, Cuba. Nor have other powers, such as Britain, France and Russia, had better luck. “The picture is a bleak one,” he concludes.

Can scholarship point to a different path? Sandbrook obviously thinks so: he has just edited a book called Civilizing Globalization: A Survival Guide (2003). At a time when free-market globalization has become a flashpoint for protest, Sandbrook has gathered an international group of academics, policy analysts and activists to explore the problems of unfettered markets and create a vision of a new global community, founded on social and ecological concerns. He concludes sustainable peace and democracy can take root in the developing world only if the global economy is reformed to create a more equitable distribution of resources between North and South.

Another scholar who insists peace is more likely to come from new approaches to international co-operation is Thomas Homer-Dixon, director of U of T’s undergraduate Peace and Conflict Studies program. His studies, documented in books such as Environment, Scarcity, and Violence (1999), indicate that there are root causes for civil breakdown and international terrorism: a society’s truncated political aspirations, governmental weakness, and scarcity of natural resources. If developed nations target improvement in these areas – even in things as simple as water supplies and reforestation – Homer-Dixon believes the threat of terror and war can be substantially reduced.

Homer-Dixon, who has briefed politicians such as former U.S. vice-president Al Gore on his theories and addressed audiences at Harvard, Oxford and the World Economic Forum, expands on his findings not just in scholarly journals, but in the popular press. He feels a strong commitment to “bringing the findings of academic research to policymakers and the general public,” he says. “It’s important for academics to do so.”

Even (perhaps especially) when people don’t like what you say. One of Homer-Dixon’s opinion pieces in the Globe and Mail sparked a major dust-up in the national media after September 11. Various right-wing newspaper columnists objected to his focus on root causes, and his refusal to simplify the terrorist attack in terms of good and evil. But Homer-Dixon remained unapologetic, believing that continuing to ignore the causes of terrorism is a prescription for more of the same.

This February, Homer-Dixon followed with an opinion column of a different sort. He confessed in the Globe that he had had real trouble making up his mind on the Iraqi situation – an uncharacteristic admission for a published expert. “If you’re perplexed and confused by the issue, you’re not alone,” he wrote. “In recent months, I’ve found my own opinion shifting from one side to the other, a picture of indecisiveness.”

In the end, he identified four reasons for going to war, and four major reasons to hold off. On balance, he concluded, it remained a time for patience, not bombs. By relating his own personal struggle, Homer-Dixon showed Canadians the best face of academia: informed yet inquiring, rational yet compassionate. He explained a complex situation and came to a conclusion, but provided enough information to let readers make up their own minds.

It’s no wonder Tolstoy took more than 1,000 pages to chronicle war and peace. The relentless entwining of history, economics, politics and religion is staggeringly complicated, but for academics, that’s the challenge. They have both the right and the responsibility to do the hard thinking about these issues and to make their views known wherever a willing audience is found. Answers are elusive, but the search for truth continues.

Brad Faught (PhD 1996) is a Toronto writer.

We shall never have peace so long as large segments of humankind are voiceless. Until now, much of the world’s population, being poor, has been at the mercy of the rich. They remain poor. The richest 25 million Americans have an income equal to that of almost two billion of the world’s poorest. For the half of the world’s population that lives on less than $2 per day, it would be better to be a European cow that receives $2.20 daily in subsidies from the European Community taxpayer.

That these numbers are becoming known is the harbinger of change. The change will come, however, from the clamour of the poor. They must be heard in international forums, made effective through international agreements – in effect, through international law…

Does the international community have the right to intervene in Iraq? Surely it does. By modern standards, Saddam Hussein has long since forfeited his right to rule. The principle that Lester Pearson enunciated decades ago, that the sovereignty of the individual supersedes the sovereignty of the state, applies. This is why we recognized an international responsibility to the suffering people of Somalia (ineptly), Rwanda (too late), Bosnia, Kosovo, East Timor, Angola, Sri Lanka and so forth. We do not abandon them all, on the specious grounds that we cannot help them all. We have an obligation to do all we can.

But we must be cautious not to intervene recklessly, leaving behind a worse situation than we found. Additionally, we should not intervene without a convincing international consensus, or we lack the necessary moral authority.

We can claim that our reasons for intervening are cogent, but if we are unable to make the case to others, they are not. If we ‘pre-empt’ on feeble grounds, we invite others, on equally specious grounds, to pre-empt that pre-emption. We return to the jungle of unilateral acts.

Jan. 18: Ten thousand war protestors converge on U of T. The march finishes with speeches in Convocation Hall.

January-February: Science for Peace, a U of T-founded organization, fills lecture halls by hosting films on September 11, Iraq after the Gulf War and U.S. foreign policy. “We’re trying to arm people with as much information as possible,” says president Paul Hamel.

Jan. 21: St. Michael’s College holds a forum on “Iraq and the ‘Burning Bush.’” Professor Joseph Boyle of philosophy says the Iraq conflict satisfies none of the Catholic Church’s criteria for a
“just war.”

Jan. 30-Feb. 2: 550 students from across Canada attend an anti-war conference at U of T’s Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Participants agree to organize more anti-war groups in the
coming months.

Feb. 2-8: Peace Week includes top speakers, a multifaith service and a concert.

Feb. 3-7: Islam Awareness Week offers displays, seminars and Middle Eastern food. A Muslim engineering student says the event “gave me confidence during a time when many Muslims felt vulnerable and in the spotlight.”

Feb. 5, March 3: Trinity College continues its World of Islam lecture series. Topics include Islamic architecture, culture and human rights.

Feb. 6: Hart House holds a debate on Iraq. As speakers argued for and against war, one student tested the middle ground: “World order is not served by military action, but genocidal monsters cannot be kept in power.”

Feb. 6: Two part-time U of T students attract 130 people to an “Evening of Engagement for Peace in the Middle East” at U of T’s Koffler Institute. The agenda includes belly dancing, Jewish songs and skits, and people from different communities discussing prejudice.

Feb. 9: Brian Mulroney kicks off a conference on anti-Semitism with a speech blasting Canada’s “disgraceful” history of intolerance. Speaking to reporters afterward, the former PM berates the Chrétien government for not siding with the U.S. and Britain against Iraq.

Feb. 22: The Muslim Students’ Association hosts a lecture by British journalist Yvonne Ridley, who was taken captive by the Taliban in Afghanistan in 2001, and held for 10 days. She urges the audience to “join the biggest superpower in the world today…the anti-war movement.”

It may have been the strangest job interview in U of T history. Political science prof Ron Deibert needed five undergrads to cross the United States in a motor home. This was no pleasure trip: nine months after Sept. 11 tested U.S. confidence and tolerance, Deibert wanted five young Canadians to confront the myths and realities of the American dream.

As an extra complication, documentary filmmaker Mike Downie would tape the entire trip for broadcast on TVOntario.

This was Deibert’s second summer exposing students to strange new worlds. In 2001 he challenged six interns to champion their own political cause: promoting research into neglected diseases. The students’ creativity got them on CBC News, in the Globe and Mail and into the G8 summit of world leaders. Last year, Deibert turned his attention to America. “We’re taking a traditional seminar and busting out of the university environment,” he says. “Instead of talking about Ground Zero and the security implications of 9/11, we decided to go there.”

The internships were open to the 800 students in PoliSci 108, the global politics course that Deibert, who runs the Citizen Lab at the Munk Centre for International Studies, teaches with centre director Janice Gross Stein. The five students selected joked that they sometimes felt like stereotypes out of Gilligan’s Island.

There was Alex Cooke, confident, conservative economics student from Trinity College; Alexandra Artful-Dodger, argumentative poli-sci junkie (and yes, it’s her real name; she changed it from a long Polish name she insists even Poles can’t pronounce); Beth Palmer, the quiet, sensible history major (think of Gilligan’s Mary Ann, if she’d been a feminist with a background in anti-violence issues); Geordie Gibbon, a laid-back musician who didn’t yet have a major; and Nadia Daar, the only second-year student in the group, a Muslim from Oman studying poli sci, economics and music. In June 2002, the five of them, with Deibert, Downie and driver, set out from U of T for a three-hour, um, three-week tour.

It wasn’t fun and games. The road was long, the 34-foot Pace-Arrow crowded and hot. At night, the students stayed in motels while their seniors slept in the RV. Lunch was sandwiches in the motor home; dinner was fast food. Still, the students experienced unforgettable events, ideas and people. Among the highlights:

In Stratford, Conn., the students attended a New England town hall meeting to explore grassroots democracy. They found it boring. (Nadia, who grew up in an absolute monarchy, was saddened to see democracy reduced to disputes about cutting trees.) But after the meeting the Canadians were invited to the fire hall next door for pizza. The students even got to try on the firefighters’ chemical suits that they had all seen in pictures.

In New York City they joined the throngs gaping at Ground Zero, but found little of interest in the vacant pit where the World Trade Center once stood. Geordie sagely turned his back to the site and watched the pilgrims instead. “You can see the effects of the tragedy [better] by looking back at the people here,” he said, “rather than looking at the hole.”

In Hinton, W. Va., the students experienced the Civil War: a fierce street battle between actors dressed as Union and Confederate soldiers. The students were disgusted by this celebration of war in the name of heritage. But Downie’s camera caught two great moments: Geordie sitting with the locals and “jamming” period tunes on his guitar, while Dodger debated slavery with the clone of General Lee.

In Moycock, N.C., the students visited a shooting range. As they argued gun control with their instructor, each also had to fire a pistol. “Every one of us hit the target,” recalls Beth. “It was so easy,” she recalls. “You’re so detached from it. I could so easily have turned around and shot anybody.” Alex noted he had fired guns before, at the Hart House shooting range.

In Atlanta, Dodger, Geordie and Alex Cooke toured CNN and scored points off a producer. When asked about being part of the AOL Time Warner empire, the producer admitted he thought CNN went overboard in covering Warner’s Harry Potter movie. And he confessed that the globally influential network has little appetite for investigative reporting: “It’s not very profitable.”

In Selma, Ala., the students learned two versions of Selma’s notorious “Bloody Sunday” of March 1965, when police broke up a peaceful civil-rights march. A woman recalled seeing people clubbed, gassed and trampled by horses. The head of the chamber of commerce recalled it as a minor incident resulting in a few “scrapes and bruises.” But he agreed it’s important to remember history; it brings in the tourists.

In Arkansas the students visited a Christian theme park. Before taking a tour through 38 biblical simulations, the group browsed in the gift shop. Incensed to find a book that called Islam evil, Nadia refused to enter the park; she wouldn’t give her money or respect to a business that didn’t respect her.

Actually, respect was never an issue for these students. When the others returned, they told Nadia she had missed a good laugh. Especially when a smirking Geordie borrowed the guide’s microphone and led a tour group in singing Jesus Loves Me. Nadia was disgusted. “No matter how intolerant they [the park owners] are, I thought it was disrespectful how intolerant they
[the students] were.”

In the most moving experience of the trip, the interns spent a day probing the Texas-Mexico frontier, courtesy of the El Paso sector of the U.S. Border Patrol. In 2002, this sector alone apprehended 94,000 illegal immigrants.

In the control centre, the students watched on TV as guards rounded up two Mexican teens. They also drove with the guards through empty desert along the barbed-wire border.

With dusty shanty towns and ragged children visible across the Rio Grande, Dodger asked one border agent if he felt sympathy for the illegals. Sure, he said. “If I were Mexican, I’d be doing the same thing. But what do you want us to do – open our borders?” For once the students had no answers. “I feel so spoiled,” commented Beth. “What makes us so lucky?”

The students went on to explore “faith” by visiting both Roswell, N.M. (the UFO capital of the world), and the 2,900-seat Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, Calif. The group also toured NORAD headquarters in Colorado Springs. Located deep inside a mountain, the centre monitors North American airspace. The students described it as “cheesy… like a movie set.” They were less impressed still when they learned the centre got its news on
Sept. 11 from CNN.

Heading home, Deibert arranged one last attraction: a gay rodeo in Nebraska. Here, in the middle of Middle America, gay cowboys and cowgirls competed in “animal-friendly” events such as steer decorating. Deibert thought the event epitomized the trip’s frontier theme, literally and metaphorically. The students weren’t so sure; the competitors they talked to didn’t feel welcomed by the locals at all. “I think the only reason the town accepts them is the money they bring in,” says Nadia.

After visiting 26 states in 21 days, the students returned home on Canada Day. “They wouldn’t admit it,” says Deibert, “but I sensed they were very, very grateful to be Canadian, and to be back in their country.”

What had the trip taught them? For Nadia, it confirmed her preconceptions: “I thought of Americans as being in this bubble away from the rest of the world; not conceited, but self-absorbed. I found that holds true exactly.”

Others thought they were starting to understand the American view. “It’s a very military culture,” noted Alex Cooke. “Military power factors into their thinking, whereas it’s a major debate in Canada.” “I was surprised how politically disengaged people are,” said Artful-Dodger. “People didn’t feel they had any kind of commitment or dedication to making life better.”

Six months later, Dodger learned one final lesson. On a radio show promoting TVOntario’s documentary, “Into America,” she was surprised at how many people phoned in “spouting totally brainless anti-American propaganda. After all our making fun of Americans, the Canadians made fun of themselves for us.”

But even though it’s not turning heads like it used to, the Net is no has-been. Internet use is rising around the world, and the growing popularity of high-speed access and wireless mobile devices will jump-start a new round of online products and services. But the next Net revolution is not about technology: it’s about adapting the power of networks to the needs of their users. And U of T researchers are part of the race to develop a more user-friendly Internet that really will transform the way we live, work and communicate.

Consider the need for better communications in health care. When medical problems occur, you want your doctor up on all the latest knowledge. But MDs can’t read everything, and they certainly can’t lug a library of journals to a patient’s bedside for immediate reference. Thanks to one collaborative research project at U of T, however, that may not be a problem for long.

“Bringing Evidence to the Point of Care” is designed to help doctors become better informed, save time and maybe even save lives, by giving them powerful on-the-spot information tools. The project aims to improve patient care in clinics and at the bedside by adapting reference material on treatment methods and other medical research for use on mobile computers (such as a Palm or Blackberry). The information would come from existing services, but there are many problems to solve, such as assessing doctors’ actual needs in clinics and hospitals, and finding the best interface for presenting complex data on small screens. Social factors are important, too, says co-investigator Mark Chignell, director of the Interactive Media Laboratory in the department of mechanical and industrial engineering, and director of the Collaborative Effectiveness Lab. If a GP uses one of these devices, he asks, “Does the patient trust the doctor less? Does the doctor feel less physical interaction with the patient?”

Headed by Sharon Straus, a professor in the Faculty of Medicine, the project is funded by Bell University Laboratories (see An Internet for Everyone), which brings expertise in wireless networking. Chignell hopes to see field trials start by the end of this year. The real test will be how people adjust to the technology. But the project benefits from a unique collaboration of medical researchers, industrial engineers and computer scientists, who are emphasizing user-centred design and usability testing.

In future, similar systems could work in other disciplines, notes Chignell. “There are all kinds of applications where people have to make decisions and need a set of information in real time, such as maintenance workers at a nuclear power plant or for military aircraft,” he says. “It’s a form of technology-based evolution that basically makes people more capable.”

Helping people share information when they need it is also a focus of U of T’s department of electrical and computer engineering, where associate professor Shahrokh Valaee is working to develop “ad-hoc” networks, in which wireless handsets such as cellphones, laptops and personal digital assistants “talk” to each other directly instead of bouncing their signals to an intermediary base station, as happens today. Communications towers are common enough in cities, but they’re expensive to construct, and provide uneven service in many buildings. What’s more, they’re never around where they’re most needed, say in emergencies such as accidents or forest fires, where rescue workers need to talk or share files over cellphones and laptops.

“The difficulty is in programming these devices so they can co-operate,” says Valaee. Because ad-hoc networks have no central controller to regulate system use, one or two devices can hog the available frequencies, causing delays or choppy conversations for other users.

Valaee’s approach, developed over the past year, involves creating what he calls “ADmission control” software for wireless devices. It’s a world first; a sort of wireless traffic cop designed to regulate text, video and voice traffic to ensure that messages get through efficiently.

Before his ideas can be commercialized, Valaee has more problems to overcome, including developing pricing models and ensuring data security. But once a technology’s early days are behind it, he says, this is how progress happens: society moves forward using individual stepping-stones created by many researchers across all disciplines. “No one person can claim that their job is going to change the Internet dramatically. You have to have small pieces here and there,” says Valaee. “So whose work is going to drastically change the way we live today? I would say no one’s – and everyone’s.”

Not far away, in the department of computer science, the future of the Net is all about accessing information. Now we access the Net through desktops and laptops, but according to department chair Eugene Fiume, within 10 years “computers will start to bury themselves. Some people are going to wear them, but others will find it nicer to have them on the tip of a pen or on a piece of paper.”

Computers, says Fiume, “will be unobtrusive enough to use and still carry on a conversation, and give you information that might enhance your quality of life and your effectiveness.” As you shop, for example, you’ll naturally access your own database. “It may tell you what your consumption of an item has been in the past, contraindications to your medication will come up as alerts, or there will be suggestions as to alternative suppliers.”

U of T is helping build this world of invisible computers, says Fiume. “We have an absolutely international-calibre artificial intelligence group, with two or three people doing really strong work in ‘intelligent agents.’” An intelligent agent, or “bot,” is a program that performs a specific function (searching, monitoring, comparing or reacting), based on preferences you provide or that it learns from observing your actual behaviour. Your bot will be like a personal assistant, says Fiume, supplying Web-based information and personal services when you need them. It will even make choices on your behalf. It could make stock trades based on your investment style, or book hotels for your next trip. It could even co-ordinate purchases from multiple suppliers, as in a home renovation.

The university’s computer scientists are also exploring vision-based interfaces, natural-language processing and specialized input devices, says Fiume. Within a decade, you may speak, gesture or just raise an eyebrow to command your computer. It may even manipulate you back. You could feel force online, such as when you run into a virtual wall – “force feedback” that could transform online activities such as games or shopping. “You’re not going to throw the keyboard away,” says Fiume, “but it will just become one more tool in the toolbox.”

The Net of the future won’t just change the way you use information; it might transform your world view. As the Net becomes more of a basic utility, it gets more interesting, says Mark Federman, head of McLuhan Management Studies at the McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology. “We’ll only start to see the real hidden effects on society now that we’ve stopped paying attention.”

Federman’s current project, the Global Village Square, will establish a permanent video link between a major commercial property in Toronto’s financial district and public gallerias in Milan and Naples, Italy. The plan is to install a giant screen in each building to transmit real-time, life-size images to each other. Passersby will be able to see, hear and speak with whomever they “bump into” in the other space. Says Federman, “We’re looking to create a new medium and then look at what the effects are as we interconnect places and spaces.”

Plans call for the Toronto-Italy connection to be up and running this fall. If funding permits, more screens will be added in malls, parks and city squares around the world. “This is the world’s first instance of public space, where we can see globalization on an individual level,” says Federman. “How will that change the way we view the world once it becomes very personal?” What happens when Canadians connect directly in a joint classroom with people in emerging nations? Federman says his project “will allow ordinary people to connect – not through government delegations, not through grand plans and UN teams.”

The Web’s potential for social change fascinates many scholars. Sociology professor Barry Wellman is the director of NetLab, a research group at the Centre for Urban and Community Studies. He’s enjoying his role as a sociologist who can influence the design of hardware and software. “It’s wonderful that I can play in this and not just study it,” he says.

One of Wellman’s first collaborations came in the early ’90s, when U of T computer scientists consulted him on a project that enabled people to collaborate using desktop video-conferencing technology. He jumped at the chance to advise on social issues, such as privacy, and helping people interact with a screen. “I had always been interested in science fiction, and here was a way to make science fiction become real.”

Scientists and social scientists at U of T now regularly inform each other’s Net-related research, combining insights and engineering that make computing more useful in the real world. “There are a number of computer scientists who realize they need to co-operate with social scientists, and U of T is very much in the forefront,” says Wellman. “It’s very rare to have that collaboration and support and mutual awareness.”

Today’s Net trends, says Wellman, involve personalization and portability. Soon we’ll all carry personal wireless devices that combine the functions of a cellphone, pager, e-mail, video camera and PDA, he says. “The master concept is individualization” – having systems that match the way you work.

If you’re concerned about information overload, Wellman offers a solution. He has worked on a software research project with Ottawa-based Mitel Networks that will prioritize your voice and e-mail messages. His new software would send your most important messages to the top of the stack. The trick lies in figuring out the protocols, such as whether to prioritize e-mails from your company president (even on Saturdays?) or letting your spouse’s messages outrank all others.

Wellman is also working on a way to use portable handsets to gather information on our surroundings. You could be alerted to coming events while strolling through a park, or check sale prices as you pass a store. “We’re moving to a society where people are quite mobile in their work and leisure. They’re no longer sitting at home tied to a computer,” says Wellman. And that will create a growing need for what he calls “e-awareness: more intelligent, more informed communication with our environment.” He’s working with the New Jersey Institute of Technology to develop a solution that we might see in three to five years.

Just as important as technology are the social and legal frameworks that will rule how the Net develops. To Professor Andrew Clement in the Faculty of Information Studies, the most crucial issue is who can access the Net, and how. “Access to information and education is a basic foundation of democratic participation and inclusive society,” he says. “If you want an equitable society, then everyone should at least have the means of accessing the opportunities.” He has spent years shaping policy development around Canada’s information infrastructure.

But the integration of the Internet into society is producing a stream of sticky issues. Who should have access to online court records or health information? How far abroad are you responsible for libel published on the Web? Should the Net also be a phone network?

Helping untangle these issues is Richard Owens, executive director of the Centre for Innovation Law and Policy at U of T’s Faculty of Law. Just as the old stone building in which it operates has been retrofitted with sleek, modern offices, the centre is adapting existing law and policy frameworks to suit new technology. It provides scholarship and consultation to government and industry and on complex issues such as patent policy, privacy and research ethics.

“Technology is developing so quickly that the real challenge is to maintain perspective and develop longer-term policies,” says Owens. Judges and legislators, he adds, need help understanding many of these issues. “By having a centre like this that is able to provide informed comment on a real-time basis, we can avoid some of the risks and consequences of wrong decisions.”

One grad student at the centre, for instance, has found an unexpected flaw in Internet telephony. While using the Internet to make free long-distance calls is great for consumers, his study discovered this causes trouble for many countries, which depend on long-distance calls as a revenue source. “If you allow the Internet to replace telephones,” says Owens, “there is a serious impact on the budgets of these developing countries.”

Owens is also studying issues in digital music. Ottawa currently charges a tax on recording media such as blank CDs, aimed at compensating the music industry for online piracy. But, says Owens, “you’ve got some evidence the subsidy isn’t working.” Plus, new remedies in both law and technology may eliminate need for the levy, he says. “Our point is, let’s make sure these all work together, and probably we should look at diminishing the intended scope of the policy.”

Another evolution underway at U of T is the Net’s potential in education. The Joseph L. Rotman School of Management is now a wireless community that allows students to receive and submit assignments, participate in discussion groups and gather information online, from anywhere in the building, without “plugging in.” “It’s not just about having a paperless school, it’s about enhancing the learning experience,” says Tom McCurdy, the Bonham Chair in International Finance and a professor of finance at Rotman. “What it’s done is allowed much more flexible access to all the resources.”

We all know that e-commerce hasn’t taken off as once predicted, but part-time Rotman MBA instructor Tom Vassos is working to help businesses develop online strategies. As part of his teaching and research, he’s developing models of effective e-business plans. He believes companies that build e-strategies will win in the long term. “We need this research so we’re not just going by the seat of our pants based on hype in newspapers.”

Vassos, whose theories have helped hundreds of companies plan online strategies, is creating an “e-business road map,” a toolbox of potential e-strategies. Whether they’re using the Net for production, marketing or managing customers, he says, “there are pieces of e-business that every company can benefit from.” On the cutting edge is his Prism model, an analysis of e-business automation that can help companies maximize transactions. Its principle is simple: the more you automate a transaction, the easier you make it for clients to buy. For instance, a florist who sends a customer an e-mail reminder one week before his wife’s birthday, complete with a one-click option to buy a bouquet, will probably sell more flowers than a florist who sends no reminders. Automating one step further (and thereby boosting sales) would be a florist who seeks automatic approval to send a bouquet every year.

“This model could apply to any form of e-business, not just a commerce transaction,” says Vassos. It also includes other sectors, such as banking and government services (think driver’s licence renewals). His challenge is to flesh out his models by analyzing more real-life successes and failures, a process begun at www.TomVassos.com. “Now that we’re climbing out of the trough of disillusionment,” he says, “I think companies are now finally starting to find some value in [e-business], to either increase sales or decrease costs.”

Half a century ago, U of T economics professor Harold Innis theorized that a society’s means of communications determines its destiny. If the Internet is indeed about to transform society, today’s U of T scholars are making sure that people’s needs come first.

The project was launched in 2000 to find an effective way of communicating with KMDI’s widespread membership, says computer science professor Ron Baecker, KMDI’s founder and chief scientist. Researchers have developed a system that broadcasts audio, video and slides over the Web. It not only lets you watch an event live, but provides a searchable archive for locating specific topics within past events.

Unlike other Webcast systems, the ePresence Lab includes a real-time chat function that allows viewers to send messages, ask questions and share information with the presenter and each other. “Most of what’s out there doesn’t provide an opportunity for dialogue and interaction,” notes Baecker. While the system is now used only for special events, it could one day be used anywhere you’d want to enhance the experience of being “present,” from press briefings and annual meetings to schoolrooms or medical consultations.

With additional funding, KMDI could add such features as mobile-device capability and audience polls. Researchers are also studying how to search audio tracks for key words and phrases. “We want to keep pushing the edge on the technology,” says Baecker.

Now there’s a Web site for anyone wanting to influence Canada’s foreign policy, and researchers hope it will make a real difference. “No other country has ever asked its citizens to take part in consultation at the developmental stage of policy-making on foreign policy,” says Liss Jeffrey, adjunct professor at the McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology and director of the McLuhan Global Research Network. “Canada is doing something terribly special here.”

The site, www.foreign-policy-dialogue.ca, is an initiative of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade and the Canadian Centre for Foreign Policy Development. Developed and maintained by Jeffrey’s byDesign eLab, its aim is to explore the Net’s potential to enhance citizen engagement in democracy.

There’s growing public demand for a greater say in government, says Jeffrey. “What we need are supportive instruments that will allow people to go in, get the information they want and have a chance to debate, deliberate and put in their own contributions to the shaping of government policy.”

Since the site went live in January, it has already recorded lively discussions on such topics as NAFTA, human rights, trade versus sovereignty, and softwood lumber. There was even a proposal to post Canadian observers in the U.S. Senate. “The next challenge is analysis,” says Jeffrey. “How do you put these views into the policy cycle so policy-makers can actually do something with them?” Her team is due to report back to Ottawa in May.

Bell University Labs (www.bul.utoronto.ca) is a collaborative research program that connects Bell Canada employees with researchers at Quebec and Ontario universities. The goal is innovation, but not just in technology.

In U of T’s psychology department, Professor Ian Spence is studying how different personalities respond to computers. The resulting technology profile inventory could help deliver more personalized services online, he says, by identifying different personality types and creating Web pages adapted to individual user preferences.

The division of biomedical communications is researching the power of images (illustrations, photos and video) to communicate information over the Web. The study examines two Web sites related to breast cancer, one aimed at surgeons and the other at consumers. Results will help identify the most effective types of imagery for communicating to specific audiences.

In the Faculty of Social Work, Professor Elsa Marziali has developed a training manual and Web site to help seniors access the Internet. Feedback from users at the Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care in Toronto was used to modify her Web design and training strategy, yielding new guidelines for senior-friendly interfaces.

FITNESS
Forget the gym
You don’t need a gym membership to get fit. Opportunities to shape up are everywhere – if you can overcome the mental hurdles holding you back. “It’s less hard than people think to increase their physical activity participation to a level that contributes to improved health and reduced risk,” says Dr. Jack Goodman, associate professor in the Faculty of Physical Education and Health.

But it’s got to be fun, adds Dr. Mark Leith, a psychiatrist and clinical teacher. “If you can’t find the time, you’re still not seeing it as something pleasurable,” he says. “Your body wants to run. Let it happen.” While you’re at it, lose the goal-oriented mindset (and the heart-rate monitors), he says. “Exercise should bring a sense of pleasure and release.”

Start slowly, says Goodman. Get off the subway two stops early and walk. Bypass the escalators and bound up the stairs. Take the kids for a stroll after dinner.

From there, adopt a habitual activity, such as gardening or walking the dog. After that, two or three episodes a week of actual exercise won’t be so daunting. When you’re ready, you can graduate to bouts of more spirited exercise, three to five times a week, for 20 to 30 minutes. Take your time, says Goodman. “It takes months to establish a change in lifestyle.”

Warming up right
Warming up before exercise is just as important to your physical well-being as the game or exercise routine that it precedes, says new U of T football coach Steve Howlett (BA 1985 Scarborough). Warming up stimulates blood flow to the muscles, makes muscles more flexible and increases respiration rate and perspiration. What’s more, it’s not just your physical self that benefits. “Warming up may make one feel better and therefore more confident,” says Howlett, a member of the Ontario champion Varsity Blues team of 1983. “There also may be a meditative element that may bring a sort of peace, reduce anxiety and focus attention prior to performative events.”

Just make sure your warm-up matches your needs. Howlett offers a guideline of five to 10 minutes of low-intensity activity (such as jogging or biking), followed by 15 minutes or so of gentle stretching, gradually pushing the muscles beyond the normal range of motion.

DIET
Five tips for smarter eating
Studies show that 95 per cent of dieters fail to achieve their weight-loss goals. Why not bypass the diet industry’s $40 billion worth of hype and learn from the experts?

Find the balance: Weight control is a state of equilibrium between the amount you eat and the energy you expend, says Dr. Khursheed Jeejeebhoy, professor of medicine at U of T. For weight maintenance, most people require 30 to 32 calories a day per kilogram of body weight; a 70-kilo person, for example, will need approximately 2,100 calories. Even an extra 100 calories a day over that limit will pack on the pounds. The good news? Cutting out those extra 100 calories a day will take off pounds. You don’t need to slash your daily caloric intake in half and eat only cabbage and grapefruit to lose weight.

Shun your impulses: “The food industry has perfected the art of selling food in a fiercely competitive environment,” says Dr. David Jenkins of the department of nutritional sciences. Loaded with saturated fat, sugar and highly refined carbohydrates, today’s packaged foods are engineered to whet your taste buds and keep you coming back for more. To avoid overstimulating your appetite, choose satisfying but less tempting alternatives.

Ignore the fad diets: Dieters are often so anxious for a quick fix they don’t question the so-called facts. “Ask yourself, ‘how do we know it’s healthy?’” says Jeejeebhoy. “The data for that is almost non-existent.” Fad diets fail, he adds, because they don’t work with your appetite. “Unless you change your whole diet habit so you are satisfied with a lower number of calories, you are never going to lose weight.”

To feel satiated, seek out foods that offer more volume with fewer calories: Fruits and vegetables fill you up with their high water content instead of costly calories. Whole grains and fibre are useful because they make your stomach and intestines expand and make you feel more full. Some bulky low-fat foods are also slow to digest, making the “full” feeling last.

Find other passions: With today’s hectic lifestyles, many people eat out of frustration. “Their fulfilment comes from being filled with food,” says Jenkins. If your workload is too hectic, prioritize and cut it down. Bored with life? Find a new hobby or revisit an old one. Stimulate your mind, not your appetite. And don’t forget to exercise.

WORKPLACE WOES
Standing up for your health
When they think of occupational health, most people picture industrial workers falling off ladders. But even an average office contains hidden health threats.

According to Pat McKee, associate professor in the department of occupational therapy, poor posture and inactivity are the two biggest threats to workplace wellness. With fax machines, phones and the World Wide Web at our fingertips, there’s no reason to rise from our comfy swivel chairs, she says. “We need to introduce some inefficiencies to the office.” Move the printer to the other side of the room so you have to walk to it. That will give overworked muscles a break and jump-start the circulation that will flush metabolic waste products from them.

Beyond that, laments McKee, people don’t know how to use their chairs or adjust their monitors and keyboards. They pay the price in poor posture, cramped necks and repetitive-strain injuries. Ideally, she says, your eye should hit your computer monitor about a third of the way down. The screen should also be tilted so it doesn’t reflect any light-source glare. A below-the-desk keyboard tray is critical, because your forearms should be parallel with the ground to avoid unnecessary stress on your arm and shoulder muscles. (It also promotes better overall posture.)

But many workplace health concerns can’t be dealt with in isolation. If your company has a health and safety committee, says McKee, get involved. “Worker participation in shaping the environment has a major impact on working conditions.” If you toil in a less organized office, inform your supervisor of workplace problems or the need for more ergonomic furniture.

MENTAL HEALTH
Exercise your mind
Everyone knows nutrition and exercise are important to overall health, but many people are unaware of the physical benefits of spiritual practices such as prayer and meditation.

Dr. Yvonne Kason, of U of T’s department of family and community medicine, wants to get the word out about the mind’s incredible powers. A family physician and psychotherapist, Kason says studies show that tuning into a higher power can have a big impact on your health. “Meditation, prayer and yoga will help lower the heart rate, decrease your blood pressure and relax your muscles,” she says. A 2001 article in the British Medical Journal also pointed to the benefits of mantra (repeating a sound to encourage inner peace) and rosary prayer for improving cardiac functioning.

According to Kason, there is evidence indicating that prayer speeds healing and reduces complications in surgery. “We don’t have scientific biochemical brain scans proving why prayers work, why meditation improves depression,” she says. “All we can say is that clinical studies have documented that they do.”

A U of T study is also exploring the powers of the mind through mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, an approach that combines Buddhist meditation, hatha yoga poses and modern cognitive therapy. While the study is in the early stages, its participants are feeling the benefits, says grad student and co-investigator Andrew Welch of the department of occupational therapy. “On a social level and on a work level, we’ve seen some increases in their ability to function.”

Want to reap the benefits of spiritual practices? There are many different types, so take time to investigate what works for you. Once you’ve found a system, Kason advises starting with five minutes of meditation each morning and evening. Gradually increase that time to 20 minutes or more. “If people do that for a month,” she says, “they will definitely notice a difference in increased calmness, feeling of connection with a higher power, and increased ability to tap their spiritual connection as a tool for healing.”

PUSHING SCIENCE FORWARD
Medical research is long and painstaking work, but some U of T pioneers hope dreaming big could mean big breakthroughs in areas such as these:

Diabetes: If detected early enough, Type 1 diabetes is treatable. Thanks to a research group headed by Dr. Michael Dosch, a professor in the department of pediatrics, science is closer to diagnosing diabetes risk much earlier. Dosch and his team discovered a link between Type 1 diabetes and nervous system autoimmunity (diseases that attack the nervous system). Based on this link, researchers can trace early stages of diabetes through protein markers left by an autoimmune attack such as multiple sclerosis. Dosch, who is collaborating with a biotech firm to refine this detection, hopes a diagnostic tool will be ready within 18 months: “We hope to test every four- or five-year-old child.”

Spinal cord repair: University of Toronto researchers hope to solve the mystery of reversing nerve damage in paralyzing spinal cord injuries. The team, led by Molly Shoichet, associate professor of chemical engineering and applied chemistry, is investigating how to deliver regenerative molecules to a compressed spine, such as that suffered by actor Christopher Reeve. So far, the team has seen increased mobility in paralyzed rats, and proven that its delivery method is safe for human use. “Our goal is to go for gold,” says Shoichet. “We want to find a strategy that will restore complete function.”

Engineered organs: An ambitious multidisciplinary research project initiated by U of T aims to create the first engineered heart (a new organ made of living tissue, as opposed to an artificial heart of plastic or metal). The intent is to pool talent in biomedical engineering from around the world, in the first co-ordinated project of its kind. “We’re working on capillary beds; others are trying to make cardiac muscle,” says key investigator Michael Sefton of the Institute of Biomaterials and Bioengineering. “The Living Implants From Engineering [LIFE] project was created to combine everybody’s efforts.” If successful, the LIFE project could address organ shortages and lead to other organ replacement spinoffs.

Psychiatric disorders and strokes: Research into two proteins in the brain could mean new treatments for strokes and psychiatric disorders. A group led by assistantpsychiatry professor Fang Liu discovered that communication between proteins known as dopamine D1 and NMDA receptors controls cell death in the brain. Next step: decipher this link and control it. The findings also have implications for brain injuries and epilepsy, says Liu. “I’m hoping that clinically they can use this research to design drugs.”

SCIENCE
Four new U of T advances
From new glimpses into intricate cell workings to an improved vaccine for Alzheimer’s disease, U of T researchers continue to expand the frontiers of medical knowledge. Among last year’s advances:

Progress toward pain relief: Painful sensations are dramatically reduced when a particular gene is absent, researchers have found. Their discovery promises new treatments for chronic pain – a “huge, silent public health crisis,” says study co-author Dr. Michael Salter, director of the U of T Centre for the Study of Pain.

Led by graduate student Mary Cheng and post-doctoral research fellow Graham Pitcher, the researchers found that mice lacking a gene called DREAM (downstream regulatory element antagonistic modulator) were much less sensitive to pain than mice with the gene.

An improved Alzheimer’s vaccine: Hope for a safe, effective way to prevent Alzheimer’s disease was revived when researchers described a method of refining an experimental vaccine to eliminate potential side-effects.

Dr. JoAnne McLaurin and Dr. David Westaway of the department of laboratory medicine and pathobiology, along with Dr. Peter St George-Hyslop, director of the Centre for Research in Neurodegenerative Diseases, isolated the active component of the original vaccine and used this to create a refined, precisely targeted vaccine. Their report suggests the new vaccine can stimulate the immune system into fighting harmful plaque deposits in the brain – without triggering the brain inflammation seen in recent clinical trials.

Overcoming drug resistance in cancer cells: Antiangiogenesis is a promising cancer therapy that attacks tumours by cutting off their supply lines – the blood vessels that feed them oxygen and nutrients. Unfortunately, the drugs sometimes lose effectiveness, and cancer cells regrow.

Dr. Robert Kerbel, a professor in the department of medical biophysics, unravelled this conundrum by showing that cancer cells can mutate in a way that helps them survive better even when relatively oxygen-starved. The finding suggests antiangiogenic therapy may work better if combined with drugs that target cancer cells in oxygen-poor environments.

Cell workings explained: The intricate machinery that determines a cell’s internal calcium levels is now understood, thanks to Dr. Mitsu Ikura and graduate student Ivan Bosanac of Princess Margaret Hospital. Because cellular calcium levels affect brain function, the study “represents an important milestone in developing drugs that could one day combat brain diseases like epilepsy,” says Ikura, a professor of medical biophysics.

Their research describes how an important messenger molecule inside a cell acts as a “key” to unlock one of the cell’s entry ports, or receptors, allowing calcium to enter. This molecule-receptor interaction – previously a mystery – determines varying calcium levels throughout the cell.

NATURAL MEDICINE
“Natural does not equal safe”
Call a remedy “natural,” and many Canadians open their wallets. But take care, warns Heather Boon, assistant professor in the faculties of pharmacy and medicine. Many natural medicines have never been proven effective – or even harmless. “Natural does not equal safe,” she says.

What’s more, natural medications can affect the way conventional medications work. For instance, St. John’s wort, a popular herbal remedy for anxiety and depression, can cause your body to metabolize other drugs faster.

Still, judging whether the natural stuff “works” is not as straightforward as you might think. A belief in whatever you’re doing to help yourself has an influence on results, says Boon. “A cancer patient may consider an herb to work if it makes her feel better, but an oncologist may consider it effective only if it prolongs the patient’s life or shrinks the tumour. We need to be careful about making generalizations about whether something works or not.”

Before clambering aboard any natural-health bandwagon, Boon advises patients to do some research and talk to their health-care providers – both the conventional and complementary variety. He suggests asking if there’s any evidence that specific natural products are effective, and whether they have any adverse effects. Also ask whether there are people who shouldn’t use the product, and how it interacts with conventional medicines.

MODIFIED FOODS
Tampering with nature?
Strictly speaking, genetically modified organisms (GMOs) have been around forever, with our fore-farmers from way back experimenting with plant breeding to yield crops with as many desirable traits as possible. Why not? GMOs can improve the nutritional quality of food; help plants grow in unfavourable environments (such as arid fields or regions of high salinity); prevent or reduce infection by bacteria, viruses and insects; and spur remediation of contaminated soil or water.

They might even prove our salvation: GMOs offer the means to utilize farmland most efficiently and produce nutritious foods in sufficient quantity to feed a world population that could hit eight billion by 2025.

Still, many worry about tampering with nature. Concerns run the gamut from setting off food allergies to introducing poisons into the food supply. But Dan Riggs, associate professor of botany, urges confidence. “Give them a try,” says Riggs, who has been working in plant biotechnology for almost 20 years. “A number of foods, particularly processed foods, already contain GMO-derived materials. And no one has died from consuming [them]. It’s extremely unlikely that the modification of existing components most of us have consumed for years without problems is going to cause trouble just because they’re in a different food.”

MYTHS
Debunking the theories
Time to set the record straight on some common health theories:

You must drink eight glasses of water a day. Health gurus claim that drinking eight glasses of water a day keeps your body operating smoothly. Dr. Anne Kenshole of the department of medicine is waiting for proof. “My enquiries as to what promoted this have come up with a big zero,” she says. Kenshole says a Dartmouth Medical School study found no evidence as to why healthy adults living in temperate climates need to drink that much water. As an endocrinologist, she sees first-hand the damage from drinking too much H2O. “In people with heart or kidney disease, unnecessary water intake can overload the kidneys after a period of time,” says Kenshole. “It can upset the sodium and the potassium balance, all of which is determined by the kidneys.”

Calcium fortified with magnesium prevents bone loss. The health industry is cashing in on the new focus on osteoporosis in our aging population. A decade ago, pharmacies sold mostly simple, no-frill calcium supplements. Now their shelves are stacked with calcium combinations such as magnesium and zinc/boron. “The research out there is backing the use of calcium with vitamin D,” says Dr. Angela Cheung, department of medicine, “but the research isn’t really there for magnesium or the others.” If anything, she says preliminary reports indicate that magnesium might be harmful. While Cheung is currently studying positive effects of vitamin K, she advises people to stick with a proven team: calcium and vitamin D.

You can develop a resistance to antibiotics. Many people believe that the more antibiotics you take, the stronger the dose you require. Not true, says Dr. Andrew Simor, department of laboratory medicine and pathobiology. It’s the germ or bacteria itself that develops a resistance, not the body. “The germ may mutate or acquire genetic material that allows it to be resistant,” Simor explains. “Then the antibiotic is no longer effective” – and you need a different drug, not a stronger dosage. Still, Simor recommends using antibiotics only when absolutely necessary: “The overuse or misuse of antibiotics promotes antibiotic resistance in germs. And that’s not a good thing.”

White teeth equal healthy teeth. Celebrity choppers look great in pictures, but blue-white teeth are often weaker than their yellow counterparts. “The whole issue of trying to get whiter-than-white teeth is carried way out of proportion,” says Hardy Limeback of the Faculty of Dentistry. He points to the current array of whitening toothpastes that promise to get rid of ugly stains better than the average paste – a cosmetic claim that requires no confirmation from Health Canada. One thing these whitening toothpastes will do, he says, is promote gum recession through their abrasive agents if used improperly.

HEALTH
Three risks you’d never expect
You eat tofu and practise those yoga poses. You might think you’re in the clear, health-wise, but new risks keep emerging:

An unhappy marriage can affect your heart, according to U of T associate professor of psychiatry Dr. Brian Baker. His three-year study measured changes in blood pressure and heart-wall thickness in 103 married men and women with mild hypertension. People who were dissatisfied with their relationship developed a slightly thicker left ventricle – which may indicate heart strain – while those who enjoyed marital harmony showed a small decrease in left ventricle thickness (and lower blood pressure).

Driving right after the Super Bowl raises your risk of being in a collision, says Dr. Donald Redelmeier, a U of T medical professor and director of clinical epidemiology at Sunnybrook and Women’s College Health Sciences Centre. After examining U.S. data from 27 Super Bowl Sundays, Dr. Redelmeier found, on average, an extra 1,000 car crashes, 600 injuries and seven deaths during the four-hour periods after the big game. He blames driver fatigue, alcohol consumption and inattention.

If you’re planning a tropical holiday, seek health advice from a professional – or risk joining the growing number of Canadians who contract malaria. The number of imported cases of malaria, a potentially fatal illness, has soared in recent years, says Dr. Kevin Kain, professor of medicine and director of Toronto General Hospital’s Centre for Travel and Tropical Medicine. With 2.5 million Canadians visiting the Third World each year, Kain sees an urgent need to educate travellers about malaria. “We have no immunity,” he says. “We fight for our lives like a one-year-old.”

TALKING TO YOUR DOCTOR
These days many patients arrive at their physician’s office knowing more about an illness than their doctor, says Dr. Wendy Levinson, vice-chair of medicine. Surprisingly, that’s a good thing. “Studies indicate that patients who are actively involved in their care do better.”

But many people remain intimidated by the doctor-patient relationship, notes Dr. Michael Evans, assistant professor in the department of family and community medicine. To get the most from your doctor, he says, honesty and openness are key. “People say, ‘Oh my God, how can I talk about my hemorrhoids?’ But we see hemorrhoids five times a day, five days a week. What we want is what’s best for you, but for that to happen, you need to be forthright.”

Preparation is also important. Come to appointments with a list of medications and questions you want to ask, says Levinson.

“Not everyone wants the same thing from their physician,” notes Evans. “Some might want more information, some less. It’s helpful when patients say, ‘Here is what I’m going to need from you to solve this health problem.’”

ADDICTION
A matter of motivation
Here’s a revelation: most smokers want to quit. What’s more, most of them will (three-quarters of people who have ever smoked quit by the time they’re 65). “So you have to ask yourself, ‘Do I want to quit now or later?’” says Dr. Roberta Ferrence, director of the Ontario Tobacco Research Unit, part of the Centre for Health Promotion in the department of public health sciences. “Because all you’re doing is delaying the misery.”

A person who is motivated to quit has the best chance of pulling it off. But external support is crucial. Research says that people who are trying to kick the habit in a supportive environment (i.e., in a home where family members applaud the effort) enjoy the most success.

Ferrence advises quitters to keep busy, steer clear of smokers and put the money they would have spent on cigarettes aside for a big treat. Most relapses occur in the first week; about 85 per cent in the first year. “If you can go three months without a single relapse, you’re probably going to stay quit,” says Ferrence. And if quitting is becoming a drag, the Canadian Cancer Society has a helpline for support: 1(877) 513-5333.

MARIJUANA
The truth about pot
A recent Senate committee proposal to legalize marijuana has many Canadians confused. Isn’t pot supposed to be bad for you?

It all depends on the user, and on the patterns and context of use, says public health sciences assistant professor Dr. Benedikt Fischer.

To start, consider the pharmacologically active material contained within the rolling papers – tetrahydrocannabinol. A mild intoxicant that resembles alcohol, THC depresses the central nervous system, rendering users outgoing, goofy and sometimes sleepy. It affects their alertness, short-term memory and response time. In some cases, it inspires panic, paranoia and delusions. An alarming set of evidence links cannabis use with drivers involved in automobile accidents.

Beyond that are the familiar side effects of smoking: irritation to the bronchial lining, coughing, wheezing, excessive sputum, shortness of breath, risk of cancer and long-term chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and the possibility of developing an addiction.

If you’re pregnant, forget it (kids born of pot-smoking moms may suffer cognitive problems). Ditto if you’re a schizophrenic who is controlled and functioning in society (you’re more likely to suffer a relapse) or under 15 (starting so young suggests certain social trouble and run-ins with authority).

That said, says Dr. Harold Kalant, professor emeritus in the department of pharmacology, “There’s no evidence that marijuana does any harm to people who are well-balanced, have no predisposition to major illness, use [it] moderately, and don’t do anything risky or foolish while using it.”

Intriguingly, Poy (MA 1997) is also a student. As she settles into a chair at Toronto’s Four Seasons Hotel tea room, the first thing she says, with pleasure and pride, is: “I just handed in my thesis yesterday.” Her doctoral thesis in history at U of T focuses on the immigration of generations of Chinese women to Canada. Poy is the first member of a visible minority to become chancellor of U of T. In 1998, she had broken another barrier by becoming Canada’s first senator of Asian descent. Given that Chinese have been living in Canada for a century and a half, she wonders why such representation has taken so long. But she looks firmly to the future rather than dwelling on past grievances. “The alumni are taking diversity very seriously by electing me,” says Poy, who supports the goal of making the university’s faculty and administration as ethnically diverse as its student body. As chancellor, Poy hopes to be a role model for young people, especially those who are visible minorities, and plans to foster open communications with students by scheduling times when the door to her Simcoe Hall office will be open to all.

As ceremonial ambassador, U of T’s chancellor is most visible at convocations, when she or he shakes thousands of graduating students’ hands. The chancellor also welcomes foreign dignitaries to campus and attends more than 100 university events throughout the year, from Spring Reunion to President’s Circle events. Previous distinguished chancellors have included Pauline McGibbon (Ontario’s first female lieutenant-governor, who was chancellor from 1971 to 1974) and former United Nations ambassador George Ignatieff (who held the post from 1980 to 1986). Outgoing chancellor Hal Jackman served as lieutenant-governor from 1991 to 1996 and is president of the Henry N.R. Jackman Foundation. Chancellors are elected for one three-year term and can be re-elected for a second session.

Choosing the chancellor is the task of 36 alumni who form the College of Electors. They spread the word that they are looking for candidates, preferably grads. Their executive board also combs lists of distinguished Canadians – Order of Canada recipients, honorary degree recipients, Who’s Who – to come up with a shortlist. After many highly confidential discussions, they cast votes by secret ballot.

The woman they’ve chosen has already shown an immense capacity for generosity at U of T – and hard work. Poy has served on the university’s Governing Council, won an Arbor Award for her volunteer work and established the Richard Charles and Esther Yewpick Lee Chair in Chinese Thought and Culture at the Faculty of Arts and Science in honour of her deceased parents. “She’s an ideal choice,” says Joseph Rotman, a generous supporter of the business school that bears his name and a Governing Council member. “She brings insight, capability and creativity to the job, and an unwavering dedication to human rights and tolerance.”

As honorary president of the University of Toronto Alumni Association, the chancellor also represents more than 365,000 alumni worldwide. She presides over the association’s annual general meeting, attends regional alumni events, speaks at the annual Arbor Awards ceremony (which recognizes outstanding alumni volunteers and friends of the university) and participates in a host of other alumni events – making her the most direct link between alumni and U of T.

Poy was born into a wealthy Hong Kong family in May 1941, but her start in life was not easy. She was just six months old when Hong Kong was invaded by the Japanese and nine months old when her family fled to China. There, they spent the war years as refugees, often on the move and selling her mother’s jewels in order to live. “Don’t worry,” her father told her mother, “after the war, I’ll buy you more.” He kept his promise.

Poy, who was sickly as a preschooler, has vivid memories of those years. As a child of two, she remembers climbing atop the cargo on a truck and holding on for dear life. She also remembers being carsick and throwing up hard-boiled eggs, which her family always ate while travelling. “It has taken me 50 years to get over my phobia of hard boiled eggs,” she says.

When they returned to Hong Kong after the war, their ancestral home was still standing. But Hong Kong was devastated; there were food shortages, rationing, little money and few schools. At an early age, Poy absorbed some harsh truths: “You can never count on what you think you have, because it can all disappear,” she says. “But your own knowledge and hard work – nobody can take that away from you.”

In postwar Hong Kong, Poy’s father was the rice controller, a highly contentious position that involved importing and overseeing fair distribution of residents’ staple food. But Richard Charles Lee, who was also a civil engineer, belonged to no political party. “He worked well with everyone,” recalls Poy. As a loving memoir of her father, Poy has written and self-published Building Bridges: The Life & Times of Richard Charles Lee, Hong Kong 1905-1983 – in both English and Chinese.

In 1959, after three years in a private girls’ school in England, Poy came to Canada and enrolled at McGill University in Montreal to study history. That’s where she met Neville Poy, who was in his final year of medicine at McGill. (Neville’s younger sister is Gov. Gen. Adrienne Clarkson.) They were married shortly after she graduated, when she was 21 and he was 27. At her convocation, Vivienne’s father asked her why she had achieved only honours and not first class honours. To this day, Vivienne is driven by his high expectations. “I keep feeling he’s there watching me,” she says, “making sure I do the right thing.”

The accomplishment she’s most proud of in her life? Her close-knit family: three sons – Ashley, 37, Justin, 33, and Carter, 29 – three grandchildren and her husband of more than 40 years. Hobbies? She enjoys the solitude of gardening at the family’s Muskoka cottage and swimming there three times a day. She also loves travelling: in the midst of a blustery Toronto winter, when many were fleeing to warm latitudes, Poy and her husband took a two-week Antarctic cruise, during which she eagerly learned how to walk on ice using cleats. “I want to do things like that before I get too old,” she says.

Poy glances at her watch. Our hour is up. Her husband is picking her up in two minutes. Neither one of us has touched the tiny tea sandwiches. “Maybe you could take them home?” she suggests pragmatically.
And she’s off.

Susan Lawrence (BEd 1972) is a Toronto editor and writer.

But one word I had trouble with: scholarship. You hear it a lot at this university, in reference to the disciplined methods of academic research. It seemed to me a musty old word, more suited to 19th-century Oxford than the modern U of T with its striking new engineering and computer science building, its entrepreneurial business school and its growing cluster of Starbucks outlets. “Scholarship.” The word made me think of caps and gowns, footnotes, reviews of the literature and all the other fussy accoutrements of academia that so many of us left behind when we graduated.

My comeuppance took place in two parts. First came the green papers of Provost Shirley Neuman. She is leading a thorough academic-planning exercise that will determine the university’s strategic priorities over the next decade. U of T president Robert Birgeneau has already set out his vision of a university that ranks among the world’s top research institutions. It is quality of scholarship that will attract the best faculty, and make U of T a more desirable destination for the best students. Neuman, in probing the characteristics of the best research universities, says that they encourage “informed scholarship that is methodologically and theoretically rigorous.”

In an era of increasing competition and shrinking resources, embracing a standard of excellence makes sense. Still, I wondered, why does excellence depend on theses and bibliographies and peer reviews?

Then I chanced to find, in this magazine’s library, an article by former U of T president Claude Bissell. Back in 1963 he gave a precise description of the university’s mission: “to create knowledge as well as disseminate it.”

Of course, new knowledge can come from anywhere: industry, government, backyard astronomers. But Bissell contended that a university’s unique tradition of academic discipline and academic freedom makes it the most reliable place for developing and testing new ideas. “The university teacher must first of all undergo a rigorous preparation and a long apprenticeship, before he (sic) is admitted into the community of scholars; but once admitted, he is given complete freedom to pursue an idea or a fact wherever it leads him.”

And that’s it, really. Creating knowledge is hard work. New ideas can turn on you; your data could be flawed; some people might not like what you say. As the world gets more complex, we need confidence that new ideas – whether in engineering or economics, science or social work – are legitimate products of disciplined inquiry. Fussy or not, scholarship works.

At the University of Toronto we save our gowns for graduation day. The rest of the year we work in the real world, contributing directly to our community. With its extraordinary array of world-renowned thinkers, scholarly programs and institutes, the university has the talent and the passion to reach out and constructively address compelling issues and problems at home and in other parts of the world.

Over the past year, it has been hard to turn on the CBC news and not see Janice Stein, director of the Munk Centre for International Studies, interpreting the latest Middle East conflict. The public is less aware of Professor Stein’s involvement behind the scenes, as foreign-policy adviser to both the U.S. and Canadian governments. Her experience in international conflict and negotiation makes her a role model in bringing the fruits of scholarship into the policy arena, as well as the classroom, where she also teaches U of T undergraduates in one of our most popular first-year courses.

When Roger Martin is not building Canada’s best business school, the dean of the Rotman School of Management also serves as chair of the Ontario Task Force on Competitiveness, Productivity and Economic Progress. With senior representatives from business and academia, the task force is finding new ways to monitor and strengthen Ontario’s competitiveness.

Of course, U of T scholars contribute on a local level, too. At Innis College, the interdisciplinary urban studies program is improving the quality of life in Toronto. As well as encouraging students to examine such controversial sites as the city’s port lands and the Jane-Finch Mall, the program has brought together experts from academia, business and government to explore solutions to our many urban problems.

The same can be said for our students and staff. Our student governments and staff have long supported the city’s food banks and collected clothing for the homeless. Among many initiatives, St. George students tutor and mentor students in “inner city” high schools through the Faculty of Arts and Science, and University of Toronto at Mississauga students promote community service through their Annual Volunteer and Involvement Fair.

Every day, the University of Toronto’s role in the community becomes more relevant, not less. Our Faculty of Medicine has a proud record of research and clinical care that has transformed human health. Our scientists are making major contributions in research, from fundamental discoveries to the creation of patents and the establishment of high-tech businesses. In law, engineering and many other disciplines, we are drawing more and more faculty members from outside academia. Graduates from the Faculty of Music grace orchestras and concert stages around the globe.

The university has an essential role in society. As Provost Shirley Neuman noted recently in her acclaimed Green Papers launching our new round of academic planning, U of T’s social mandate is central to our mission. Indeed, as publicly subsidized institutions, universities are expected to assist in addressing the most pressing cultural, social, economic and policy issues.

This is not only the right thing to do, it is also necessary for any institution that hopes to attract the most talented students, staff and faculty. Nothing can match the educa-tional value of studying and working alongside people who are transforming knowledge, and, in the process, society and the world. U of T is a proud community of just such people.