THE CANNON SkuleTM’s Newspaper since 1978
cannon.skule.ca
OCTOBER 2018, Volume XLI
Is Amazon’s Marketplace Fair? How Amazon is Disrupting Everything SAMUEL PENNER Cannon Senior Editor Amazon is a household name connecting people from around the world with nearly every kind of consumer product. Is the convenience of having low cost goods readily available at our fingertips a good thing in the long run? According to Statista, an online statistics and business intelligence portal, Amazon’s market share in 2017 for e-commerce retail was 37% and is expected to increase significantly by 2021. Projections for that same timeframe predict that Amazon’s market share will be responsible for 50% of the Gross Merchandise Volume
(GMV) for online sales: the dollar value of merchandise sold through a specific marketplace in a given time. In early September, it was briefly valued around one trillion dollars and has more revenue than most of the biggest tech companies, like Google and Microsoft, combined. Large retailers have often been in the business of offering in-house private label products on their shelves to compete with ‘name brand’ products, like Walmart’s George clothing or Costco’s Kirkland brand products. Amazon continued on page 3
THE AMAZON STORE IN SEATTLE SELLING ITS OWN PRIVATE LABELS CREDIT: FORTUNE
The Villain of Politics: Emotions
Opinion: Rationality is Increasingly Lost in Politics ANDREW ZHAO Cannon Contributor On October 2nd, US President Trump’s ambassador to NATO, Kay Bailey Hutchison, set off international alarm bells when she proclaimed that, “Washington remained committed to a diplomatic solution but was prepared to consider a military strike if the development of
the medium-range system continued”. This is a direct example of politicians playing to people’s emotions – though many people remain oblivious to the frequency with which this occurs. Politics has become a battleground where politicians fight more for control of the emotions of the people than for control of the national interests.
Concerns About Smart Cities page 4
Beto O’Rourke, a candidate for the United States Senate, has become one of the most popular American politicians today. He became the first Democratic nominee to win a Texan statewide office since 1994, gaining more than half of the votes. What is it about him that makes people gravitate towards his vote? He may have a solid platform, but
he’s not the only one. What Beto has going for him is that he is a good salesman. At the end of the day, that is what a politician is: a salesman. They have a product that they want you to endorse. Any good salesman will tell you that the true essence of the sales industry is that the customer is buying emotions. Beto knows how to communicate with the
Myths About Mental Health page 12
people in a way to invoke their deepest emotions. If you have watched any of his speeches, you would notice his flamboyant gestures and his thundering tones. You will notice how his passionate speeches always touch on a topic that is very controversial in American society. More often than not, Beto does not even Emotion continued on page 3
AI in the Criminal Justice System page 14
2 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
THE CANNON Masthead EXECUTIVE TEAM EDITOR IN CHIEF
Najah Hassan
Rick Liu
ONLINE DIRECTOR
Diana Li
GRAPHICS EDITOR
Nadya Abdullah
PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR
Fletcher Mason Clugston
LAYOUT EDITOR
WEBMASTER
Alex Bogdan
SENIOR EDITORS Zaeem Amjad Prerna Anand Dale Gottlieb Harry Khachatrian Samuel Penner Ruknoon Shadid Dinder Marguerite Tuer-Sipos Linda Yu
Letter from the Editor Lower temperatures, fallen leaves, pumpkins, Halloween decorations and Thanksgiving. All reminders that October is upon us. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I would like to take a moment to remind everyone how fortunate we are to be a part of a community like SkuleTM. In this place of problem sets and midterms, we’ve found friends who are just as weird as us, who accept us for who we are and who bring out the best in us. Additionally, the amount of resources, clubs and assistance available to us is truly remarkable. So, a big thank you to each and every one of you Skuligans for making this place what it is. When the team decided that the theme for this issue would be controversy, you could feel the excitement in the room as the gears started turning. Everyone had an idea for what they wanted to write about. Whether it was something in the political world, our rapid advances in technology or something much closer to SkuleTM, each of us had an opinion that we wanted to get out there. The editorial team and all the contributors really hit the ball out of the park on this issue. We’ve got articles ranging from myths about mental health, politicians and their tweets and egoistic altruism. Just by reading through these articles, I have learned so much. Here’s hoping that you, dear reader, will too and that this issue of The Cannon will spark some insightful conversation among your own circle, just like it did in ours. Writefully, Najah Hassan
About CONTRIBUTORS
STATEMENT
WRITERS Alyson Allen Samuel Beggs Andrew Zhao
The Cannon is the official (serious) newspaper of the University of Toronto Engineering Society. Established in 1978, it serves the undergraduate students of the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering. Submissions are welcome by email. Advertising and subscription information is available at the same email or from the Engineering Society at 416-978-2917.
LAYOUT CONTRIBUTORS Diana Li Raman Mangla PHOTOGRAPHER
Dina Castelletto
SPECIAL THANKS Anonymous Contributors Mackenzie Brown
DISCLAIMER The views expressed in this newspaper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the Engineering Society unless so indicated. The editors reserve the right to modify submissions to comply with the newspaper’s and the Engineering Society’s policies.
CONTACT The Cannon 10 King’s College Road Sandford Fleming Building Room B740 Toronto, ON M5S 3G4 cannon.skule.ca cannon@skule.ca facebook.com/cannon.news
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OCTOBER 2018 Amazon continued from page 1 Similarly, Amazon has been steadily introducing its own private labels for a wide variety of products ranging from clothes to batteries. According to a 2018 article written by Julie Creswell in The New York Times, Amazon’s batteries, priced 30% lower than competing brands, now represent about a third of the online battery market and outsell Duracell and Energizer. Batteries, however, are only the tip of the iceberg since Amazon has near a hundred private label brands on their site. According to Creswell, the aim of Amazon in the early 90s was to democratize retail and facilitate Emotion continued from page 1 include a detailed plan of action in his speeches! Instead, Beto offers Americans the promise that he will fight for them. In a country where the people feel helpless against its democratically stifling government, Beto offers the emotions of hope and a will to renew the fight. That’s the winning strategy of a good politician. They gain more emotional support than their competition and turn that emotional support into votes. The path to power lies not in the minds of the people, but in their hearts. The same goes for a politician. A politician makes his/her platform not based on what the country needs, but on what he/she thinks the people need to hear. A classic example of this can be seen in Donald Trump. It is true that he has been talked about and analyzed over and over, but there is a reason for that. He provides us with an example of how a populace can be swayed by extravagant promises that hold little substance. One of his most well-known mottos, “Make America
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small manufacturers in reaching the marketplace where traditionally wellestablished brands reigned supreme. There are indications that the rapid shift toward private label brands indicates a growing bias. Big technology, big data, and the internet of things are shaping how people shop and interact with the world. With the power of big data, companies like Amazon can identify how consumers spend and target our spending habits to great effect. Creswell reports that Amazon is using the knowledge gained through its algorithms to guide online shoppers away from competitors and toward its
own products. In addition, Alexa’s voice technology is capitalizing on further bias by only providing Amazon brands in response to a product search. Combined with their ever-increasing market share, this creates a landscape where competitors must nevertheless sell their products on Amazon’s online platform to reach a wide enough consumer base. The academic debate as to whether Amazon’s behavior is monopolistic is gaining traction in more circles thanks to an article written by Lina Khan. David Streitfeld, writing for The New York Times, described Lina Khan as reframing decades of monopoly law,
where he explains how her article published in the Yale Law Journal is finding readership in Washington. Her thesis is essentially that antitrust laws have not changed to reflect the current realities of internet commerce, especially in the case of Amazon. According to Streitfeld, Khan’s argument goes against the consensus regarding antitrust regulation, and that it should be defined based on consumer welfare. Since Amazon has historically low prices, it would not constitute a target for intervention by the federal government. Khan argues that it is the structural power that Amazon is gathering
which poses a threat to a fair marketplace. Khan reasons that regulating Amazon based on its structural influence could be sensible such as treating it like a utility or telephone network, where access to its infrastructure is non-discriminatory. Whatever the future holds for Amazon, our access to the consumer marketplace will more and more be dominated by platforms on the internet like Amazon in the same way that our consumption of information is curated by platforms like Google and Facebook. The 21st century could be defined by how we decide, as a society, to regulate the influence of big businesses and the private citizen.
Great Again”, provokes an emotion in the people of a stagnant country who feel threatened by various developments in the global community. From a paranoia of terrorism, to increasing competition from other countries. However, his vow to make America great again has been delivered with many broken promises. It ranges from increasing the national debt while cutting taxes when he declared that he will lower the national debt, to forcing many Americans to sacrifice basic necessities of life to get medication after he promised that he will ensure every American can still afford golf. Psychological studies have shown that the human mind is not actually governed by rational thoughts. Rather, it is always subconsciously influenced by irrational motives. Michael Levine says, in “The Divided Mind”, that 80% of the decisions that Americans make are based on emotions. Only 20% of decisions are made with some degree of objectivity. Antonio Damasio did research on people with damage in the part of the brain where emotions are
generated. Interestingly enough, he discovered that these people were unable to make decisions. They were able to make rational descriptions of what they should do, but were frequently unable to make even the most simple choices in life, such as what to eat!
As much as we would like to think that we are rational beings at our core, we are most certainly not. Logic is a wall that we put up around ourselves to make us seem like humanity is a sophisticated species. Unfortunately, it is nothing but a facade. We are emotional beings, and
politicians know it. The end result is that we become puppets tied to our own heartstrings. It’s time that we cut those strings. Break free of the grip of political emotions and focus on what is truly important: the continued growth.
POLITICIANS OFTEN HAVE TO USE EMOTION TO COMMUNICATE THEIR MESSAGE CREDIT: NADYA ABDULLAH
4 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
OPINION
Smart Cities is Happenning, Are We Ready For It? CREDIT: RICK LIU
RICK LIU Cannon Layout Editor After the announcement of Quayside by Sidewalk Labs, a division of Google’s parent Alphabet Inc, the buzz for smart cities has grown. While many are thrilled for additional tech investment in Toronto, there is some opposition to the project, most notably from John Lorinc of Spacing Magazine, who collectively voiced concerns regarding the regulatory and data collection powers granted to Sidewalk Labs. This announcement brought smart cities, a vision of future cities using highly extensive data collection, to the forefront. University of Toronto itself recently announced the Institute of Cities, bringing together disciplines from Civil Engineering, Computer Science, Planning, Architecture and more, to partially research visions of the city in the future. While ridiculous looking in the present day, The Jetsons, and 2001 A Space Odyssey may not seem so futuristic after all. Smart cities are already happening and many smart city concepts have already been used in the transportation world for decades. The use of induction loops and radios to change traffic lights to green, especially for transit vehicles and low traffic routes, is a basic form of the concept already implemented in major cities such as Toronto. The
City of Toronto, Ministry of Transportation and many other North American jurisdictions also use Bluetooth readers, designed to capture MAC addresses in cars and phones, to estimate travel times across the GTA and adapt traffic signals to respond to major slowdowns. But companies like Google, Waze, and the former Nokia subsidiary HERE are stepping it up a notch by capturing real time volumes and travel times from mobile devices. This can create navigation guidance for consumers, but also be used to sell traffic data to municipalities. Some companies are dabbling in using video feeds analyzed by machine learning to also capture real time traffic data. It is not that inconceivable that these companies also use data for advertising and sell data to other companies. In addition, many cities are implementing Internet of Things technology (IoT) for vehicles, traffic lights, and bikes to conduct real time communication. Many vendors at the most recent 2018 Transportation Research Board conference, the foremost conference for transportation, were selling technology that they claim can change traffic lights, bike sharing stations, advertising, and eventually, routes of autonomous vehicles in real time. Toronto itself is launching a pilot on Sheppard where through machine learning of video feed, they
can adapt signals even on high traffic roads, increasing the intelligence of current signals using induction loops or radios, and reducing the need for operational personnel to manually adapt signals. While this sounds like it can dramatically change commutes for the better, other smart city concepts sound almost Orwellian. Uber’s power is being able to gather trip level data, something that no city can do without violating privacy laws, and target consumers through pricing, and even avoid law enforcement officials, through its blackball system, where it is illegal to operate. Amazon is further ahead of Google with two pilot projects focusing on smart cities technology. In Washington DC, consumers can sign up to receive automatic refills of basic household items based on their existing usage, such as detergent, and allow delivery workers to enter inside the house to deliver them. In Seattle, Amazon has its own convenience store where consumers do not have a traditional checkout line or payment area. Cameras constantly monitor consumer behavior and charge credit cards based off consumers taking items off the shelf and exiting the store. This is a huge ask of trust from Amazon, who not only can charge purchases with no verification, but can track the time any consumers spends looking at food, or their walking patterns
around the store, and has the chance to disrupt the entire retail industry. Companies who have the data collected through these activities are able to harness a lot more power than traditional brick and mortar stores. They are able to predict consumer behavior with high accuracy, and influence consumer choices for purchases or travel patterns using their harvested data. In a society where personal freedoms are highly engrained in the culture, and the right to privacy is enshrined in the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the ability of companies to infringe on these rights by influencing behavior is troublesome. Moreover, some methods of data collection, while legally collected, blur the line between private spaces and public spaces. The issue of consent has already come up in the European Union through the General Data Protection Regulations, and in many cases, consumers do not truly know how much power they grant companies, and government agencies through collected data. Once companies get the data, they also have power to sidestep regulations; this has happened not just with Uber, but with Facebook and others. And while Tom Cruise’s Minority Report might seem decades away, governments have already taken advantage of data collection. China in particular can harness the
power of multiple all-in-one apps like WeChat, which has functionality ranging from messaging to shopping to mobile payment, and can enforce its laws through it’s social credit and firewall systems, in a society with none of these privacy safeguards in place. Even in the western world, the US has already shown it has data accessed through telecom, search engines and social media companies. With smart cities allowing more data collection opportunities and different types of data, many jurisdictions will have ample opportunity to take advantage of the extra data and potentially abuse their mandates. There is no doubt some potential good that can come out of more smart cities technology, but today’s society is not ready to create safeguards against the current wave of data collection. There is also the fundamental question of whether cities really need to be smart cities. Many of the worlds great and liveable cities like, Amsterdam, Vienna, Sydney, do not have large scale data collection. And in Detroit, where cameras are being used to dynamically adjust signals based on traffic loads to create the “world’s smartest intersection”, it is questionable that it can become a world class city on smart city concepts alone. Rather, people have to decide about the tradeoffs of whether smart cities are worth the potential abuses of data.
OCTOBER 2018
A Modern Day Tutorial Room By Nadya Abdullah
cannon.skule.ca
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6 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
International Exchange, A Chance to Explore SAMUEL BEGGS Cannon Contributor Students arrive at university with many hopes, ready to go out there and finally live the life they have been dreaming of for at least a couple years. Many have been constantly thinking of what will happen at this crazy place called university: “Maybe I will work for some huge tech company over the
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the classic idea of a university career tends to include some time spent abroad, learning a new culture, taking some coursework at a different university and getting outside of one’s comfort zone. Last year, according to the faculty’s annual report, of the 5300 students in undergraduate engineering, a paltry 10 participated in a semester or year long exchange program
and at the risk of sounding like the “kid coming back from exchange” meme I can unreservedly say that it was a great decision and all of the exchange students with whom I have discussed this topic have agreed entirely. Although you will surely get a great education in school while abroad, I can promise you that that will make up only half of the experience.
After all, the classic idea of a university career tends to include some time spent abroad, learning a new culture, taking some coursework at a different university and getting outside of one’s comfort zone.
summer“, “Perhaps I will join some intramurals”, “ How will I look after the Freshman 15? “, “Damn, I am going to miss Mom”, “How about going abroad?”. That last question, seldom posed here at Skule™, is a question that demands further inspection. After all,
for a rate of 0.3% - a dismal number when compared to the overall numbers of Australia (~10%), considering the multitude of benefits linked to student exchange. I went on exchange to the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland,
The cultural education you receive and the new friends you make are benefits that will be much more valuable, will be much harder to come by later in life, and are the reasons for which you should seize the opportunity in front of you now.
EXCHANGES CAN OFTEN TAKE YOU TO FAR FLUNG PLACES LIKE SINGAPORE CREDIT : SAMUEL BEGGS
With that being said, as a Skule™ student myself, I understand the weight of stress one feels just getting through the semester. The same pressure that stops many students from ever considering studying abroad, despite the well-researched benefits of going on exchange. Chief among these benefits is the opportunity to experience a new place without feeling like a tourist and instead experiencing the life of the locals firsthand. The rapid development of cross cultural understanding is personally enriching. Think of your life as a student at UofT. Chances are you have gotten to experience some pretty cool things in Toronto that only a local could take advantage of. Now imagine having the same advantages but as a student in London, Singapore, Sydney or Paris. Not to mention that while abroad, you also will have the ability to travel to places completely inaccessible to you while in Toronto. Most popular exchange destinations, like South East Asia, Australia, and Europe, have tons of tourist centres packed tightly together that are easily accessible by cheap modes of transport. The experience gained while abroad is also very attractive to potential employers. A fact that should not be lost on any student looking to find a PEY placement after their second or third year. The ability to adapt rapidly to a new culture and pedagogical environment, as one does on exchange, is a key skill with benefits in any industry and position. Compare all of the aforementioned benefits to the work that needs to be completed for a student to study abroad. Applying for exchange requires very little time and is non-committal until late in the process. It typically begins in second semester of second year in preparation for exchange during third year. Luckily engineering students have
the Centre for International Experience (CIE) who can help guide them on the exchange process. The entire application process is well detailed on the CIE website and requires, among other things, a short statement of purpose and budget for your time abroad. After checking out the process, many still fear things such as messing up their graduation or the prohibitive price, but from personal experience most students who go on exchange end up not having too many issues and do not regret a thing. The majority of students do not ending up taking any extra courses at UofT. Instead, they typically have an untraditional fourth year because they complete their requirements in a different order. In terms of cost, going on exchange is not as expensive as you might think and can even be cheaper than living in Toronto, especially when considering the fact that you are combining the costs of getting an education and travelling in an entirely new part of the world. Exchange opens you up to a lot of scholarships only for exchange students from the engineering Faculty, UofT, the CIE and often the destination school, which sometimes help offset any extra expenses incurred from the travel. Among other things, the fact that Toronto is already one of the most expensive places to live in the world provides enough of a reason to leave! If this article has inspired you to take a look into international opportunities of any kind (research, PEY, summer courses), please do not hesitate to contact me or check out a CIE workshop and the newly released learningabroad.utoronto.ca website where you can find a wide array of information on the basics of learning abroad with helpful tips on the application process, upcoming events, and budgeting for exchange.
cannon.skule.ca
OCTOBER 2018
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A GUIDE TO PEY
Is the Grass Really Greener On the Other Side? ANONYMOUS Cannon Contributor Your professional experience year (PEY) is a valuable undertaking. It gives you a chance to use your skills, a taste of what industry is like, a break from school and a steady income for a few months. You may have heard upper-years tell you that their PEY was amazing and they would do anything go back. However, the fact of the matter is that work life is a big change from student life and, like most change, the beginning can be hard. Working in a small company, I have always admired people who have the courage to move to Silicon Valley and work for well-known firms. I recently met up with one of my friends who had made this big leap. She still looked the same and as she sat there in the chilly fall weather, it was hard to think that it had been five months since I last saw her. Excited and ready to hear about her adventures and get some top notch tech news, I asked “So, how is your PEY going”? “It’s actually not that good”, she looked down and answered hesitantly. “Until
recently I had nothing to do, and most of the work I had been doing consisted of changing configuration files. Everyone in my team seemed to be busy and there was little guidance. I really don’t think I was working up to my potential.” She talked about how in the beginning of her placement she felt like she was not being given enough work. She said “At the end of one my oneon-one meetings with my manager, I got the message that she didn’t trust me to do any important work at the start of my internship and therefore only gave me simple and repetitive tasks. I was relieved that she had finally communicated this to me because I had been miserably doubting myself and the work I had been doing every single day for the first three months.” As she spoke, I let out a sigh of relief because she had been echoing the same concerns I had at my own job. So, it’s not just me? I was no different in my own company, a relatively small place that consisted of software developers and finance graduates. I remember staring at the set up documents on my
first day, afraid to disturb the developers around me to ask why my compiler was complaining about a missing folder during installation. I remember digging into the code for hours only to change one line of configuration. I remember standing there silently listening to colleagues talk about
struggle to put your best into everything that you do. So, understandably, when you get an internship, you are more than prepared to put your best foot forward, and when you feel like you’re not doing that, you feel disappointed, confused and a little worthless. What happened? This is not what we signed up
new systems. All my poking around is turning into valuable learnings that will be both useful for me and for the company. Unfortunately, our internship may not always live up to our expectations but at least we now have an understanding of what the industry is like. You are given a set amount of tasks
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PEY will not have any value if you are not actively seeking out opportunities and pushing yourself to ask for help and advice.
marriage and kids and something so distant that was almost alien to me. From talking to a lot of my fellow classmates, I have heard that a lot of internships start the same way. You have to learn to navigate through new waters and that can be scary. When you are a student, you are juggling so many things at once. You are used to not having a second to breathe and you
CREDIT : TELUS
for. We are Engineering students from the University of Toronto, the top Engineering school in the country. Aren’t we capable of more? “Maybe there’s someone out there that’s doing fantastic work for their team, we just haven’t talked to the right PEY student,” she said after I conveyed to her my own experiences at work. However, almost six months in to my PEY, I can say that things do get better. I encountered the same problems, but like my friend, I had a conversation with my manager. Maybe it’s the amount of determination in my eyes or he has recognized my hard work, but he recently suggested that I do a side project and has included me in all the design meetings. Things started to get better when I actively pushed for changes and asked why. I signed up to be responsible for system alerts, I proposed organizational improvements, and I will soon host my own meeting to share my findings for our
and, regardless of whether it is boring or up to your liking, you are obligated to complete them. PEY will not have any value if you are not actively seeking out opportunities and pushing yourself to ask for help and advice. And PEY is the best time for you to take care of yourself instead of coming home to review lecture notes and do assignments. Use that leisure time to develop hobbies, and by the end of it, you will look back and say “That was quite an experience”. So, my advice for you? Make sure you have an idea of what you want to get out of your internship experience before you start applying. Applying to as many jobs as possible is good, but definitely ask what the employers’ expectations are during the interview if their description is not clear. Also, do not expect too much work to be given to you on the first day. You are an intern and more work will be given to you once you prove you are capable of it.
8 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
Find study spaces
Near uoft engineering
1. Myhal Centre As I walked into the Myhal Centre, it seemed to me like a good place to study. Most of the tables are already occupied with people lost in their school work so the incentive to do work is high. On the higher floors, the view of downtown Toronto is perfect! The balcony that overlooks front campus is a great place to go for a study break. Pros: Lots of charging Cons: Too many people Nice view Lack of Water Fountains Lots of floors to choose from Lack of operational elevators
2. Chemical Engineering Common Room The best thing about this place is that there is tons of space to work! There is a separate room that has a big table that is perfect for group studying before a midterm. In the other room, there is an abundance of couches to take really good naps on or a nice spot to chat with your friends. Pros: Ping Pong Couches
Cons: Ping Pong
3. Sandford Fleming Basement (The Pit) I love everything about the Pit! People are always there so you are bound to see some friends. The food is also good. And Friday nights are the best! The Pit is always really busy so it’s super easy to relax and totally procrastinate on all the super unimportant work you have to do. Pros: Free entertainment and distractions Lots of food options Centrally located
Cons: Loud Bad lighting
4. Engineering and Computer Science Library The go to study location for most engineering students. This library, on the second floor of Sandford Flemming, features large tables for group work, individual cubicles, computers, and the books that are most relevant to engineers. The staff is very friendly and will gladly help you find anything you are looking for. Pros: Variety of study spaces Close to all your classes
Cons: Loud Extremely crowded Printing is not free
5. Goldcorp Mining Innovation Suite (MB 4th Floor) This is a hidden gem. This lab requires you to either be a CIV or MIN, or at least have one as a friend since the lab is locked at all times. The lab is in the attic of the mining building and features some unique scenery. The exposed wood work of the roof makes it one of the most beautiful study spaces. Pros: Open 24 hours a day Lots of computers and table space
Cons: Loud No food allowed Room and computers are discipline restricted
cannon.skule.ca
OCTOBER 2018 The Cannon staff takes a FLETCHER CLUGSTON RICK LIU DINA CASTELLO look at the most popular Cannon Photography Editor Cannon Layout Editor Cannon Photographer study spaces near campus, and rates each one out of 5.
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NAJAH HASSAN Cannon Editor-In-Chief
6. Robarts Library 12th Floor Robarts in general is a very quiet place but this floor takes things to another level. This is the place to go if what you need is a place to focus. If you manage to score a window seat then you can study and also get an unrivaled view of campus and the city. Pros: Extremely quiet Food options on the lower floors Nice views
Cons: Cell service is unreliable Elevators are slow
7. Gerstein Science Information Centre I have studied in this library for three years and still find new places to sit down. There is the majestic Great Hall immediately on the right as you enter that makes you feel like you’re at Hogwarts. In stark contrast are the hidden and somewhat industrial looking group study rooms in the basement. My favourite place to study however is among the bookstacks. There are tons of cozy nooks to study in. Pros: Quiet Cafe Plentiful water fountains
Cons: Finding the group study room you booked can be an adventure
8. Ryerson Student Learning Centre This would be a 5/5 if not for it being several kilometres from UofT. The SLC is an entire tower devoted to studying. Each floor is a little different. Some are traditional spaces with cubicles and desks while another is modeled after a beach and even has lounge chairs to go along with the theme. If you’re able to make the trek over to Ryerson, give this space a try.
CREDIT : MACKENZIE BROWN
Pros: Has something for everyone Tons of space
Cons: Extremely far from campus You might stand out
9. Bahen Centre for Information Technology 3rd Floor Bahen is not the first place that pops into peoples’ mind for studying at UofT. The third floor is a hidden gem however. There are group work spaces in the corridor that feature comfortable seating and even your own chalkboards, just make sure you bring your own chalk. These areas are great for group projects or even just studying that might require some teamwork. Pros: Chalkboards Great space for group work
Cons: Loud Very busy First come first serve
10. Engineering Science Common Room The EngSci common room is probably one of the biggest ones in the Engineering faculty. They have computers, a dedicated area with tables and chairs, couches, and a nice view of St.George street from the second floor. There’s also a back room with foosball tables, study booths, and Smash Bros. tournaments at any time of the day. Pros: You can always find help Will always be able to find a place to sit
Cons: May smell funny Usually does get very loud in the evenings
10 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
What’s the Deal with Astrology? MARGUERITE TUER-SIPOS January 1st and January Cannon Senior Editor 8th are Tuesdays. You have a serious drive to Our horoscopes can express yourself and you inform us on everything dislike work that won’t from our personalities to allow you to show off all of our ultimate career path, those talents! You’re also but do they really make organized. Show off that sense in a society where awesome organization our decision to work hard by keeping your notes in can lead to our success their correct folder all (remember that fool- month long! proof American Dream™)? Taurus: Your lucky Will our hard work or days are Friday AND our natural-born-Leo- Monday, and your lucky leadership-quality drive numbers are 2, 6, 9, 12, us to get that promotion and 24. November the 2nd we so rightly deserve? At is a Friday and November the root of this question the 12th is a Monday so lies another: how is our November will be a good future determined? Does month for you – expect our future follow some big things. You have predestined path out of great will power and are our control, or is it a self- reliable. Stand up for what determined path forged by you believe in your group our own grit. project and if others Luckily for us, and disagree, show them how the massive consumer right you were when you industry that creates these follow-through with of all horoscopes, the jury is still those promises. out. Even the great minds Gemini: Your lucky day of philosophy cannot is Wednesday and your agree on the controlling lucky numbers are 5, 7, force of our actions and 14, and 23. November will their outcomes. Are we be awesome for you since truly autonomous beings, November 7th and 14th or is it possible we are are both Wednesdays. You a part of some massive are very adaptable and simulation controlled by a require a healthy amount tyrant child? of intellectual stimulation We can all fall on unlucky – finding a new study times, and whether or not space will really help get our actions contributed to your work vibes flow and the outcome of that Calc improve your study mojo! II test we didn’t actually Cancer: Your lucky study for, sometimes it is day is Monday and your nice to consider what else lucky numbers are 2, 3, might have been the cause. 15, and 20. December will You know it really is hard bring your great joy since to focus while Mars is in December 3rd is a Monday. retrograde (whatever that You are a dynamic thinker actually means)... with good initiative and Remember to work have a knack for managing hard always but in case money. Maybe it’s time you need some more you took on a financial justification, enjoy these role in your next group 2019 horoscopes to guide project. your academic success. Leo: Your lucky day is Aries: Your lucky day Sunday and your lucky is Tuesday and your lucky numbers are 1, 3, 10, numbers are 1, 8, and 17. and 19. February 10th is January will be a great a Sunday and therefore month for you since both February will be awesome!
CREDIT : RANDY GLASBERGEN
You have a great drive for self-expression and are a natural born leader. Capable of uniting people toward one shared cause, perhaps making a study group to help you friends pass exams is the right move. Virgo: Your lucky day is on Wednesday and your lucky numbers are 5, 14, 15, 23, 32. November might be time to try something new since November 14th is a Wednesday. You are both practical and resourceful making you an excellent Boy/Girl Scout leader. Sadly you’re an engineering student, so instead, take your joie de vivre and go do that homework set one more time. Libra: Your lucky day is Friday and your lucky numbers are 4, 6, 13, 15, and 24. For you, January will be your time for new beginnings since January 4th is a Friday! You are a dynamo at socialization with the initiative to back it up. Put your highly social aura to good use and organize a social for your lab group – they’ll appreciate it!
Scorpio: Your lucky day is Tuesday and your lucky numbers are 8, 11, 18, and 22. December should be extra special for you since both December 8th and December 11th are Tuesdays. You are a passionate person and love to be right – some might say you are passionate about being right! While this is an awesome quality to have, it could be better channelled in a debate club rather than your next design team meeting. Sagittarius: Your lucky day is Thursday and your lucky numbers are 3, 7, 9, 12, and 21. Both February 7th and 21st are Thursdays which means February should be bringing good things your way. You have a great sense of humour and are able to quickly move from thought to action. So stop thinking about studying for that midterm – just go do it! Capricorn: Your lucky day is Saturday and your lucky numbers are 4, 8, 13, and 22. December seems to be a special month for you since both December 8th and December 22nd are Saturdays! You are
renowned for your discipline and self-control and can’t help yourself but make solid and realistic plans. Maybe it’s time you had some fun! Aquarius: Your lucky day is Saturday and your lucky numbers are 4, 7, 11, 22, and 29. Just like your Capricorn friend, December is going to be your lucky month since December 22nd is a Saturday. You are a deep thinker with progressive thoughts and a drive for humanitarian work. Use your high emotional intelligence to put yourself into you teammates shoes when they forget to work on your group assignment. Pisces: Your lucky day is Thursday and your lucky numbers are 3, 9, 12, 15, 18, and 24. For you, January is going to be extra-special since January 3rd and January 24th are both Thursdays. Your combination of compassion and intuition means you are a high authority on giving your friends advice so do them a favour and remind them to study for exams!
cannon.skule.ca
OCTOBER 2018
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World Outside the Filter PRERNA ANAND Cannon Senior Editor Let’s start with this simple question. What is the first thing you do when you wake up? Do you brush your teeth? No, you don’t. 99% of the time you look at your phone. Phones have become an integral part of our daily lives. We spend hours on multiple apps but never realize how these apps are affecting our thoughts, actions, behavior and personality. We are part of this social media culture where our lives are on public display. People go on vacations, trips, or to “hip and happening” places with the hopes of getting pictures for their Instagram stories. For our generation, our life revolves around social media. We have stopped living the moments as we are busy trying to show them to the entire world. You might have heard these arguments multiple times, but you have
not paid attention to the mental effect these ten second snaps have. There are two kinds of people on social media platforms: the ones who post and the ones who look at the post. The group of people who post about how great their job or their vacation is, tend to mask a lot in their pictures. They create this different persona of themselves which makes everyone believe that they are doing great, even when they are not. Creating a virtual persona that is extremely different is one way for some people to be someone they wish to be, but do not have the guts to be in real life. They start living behind the filter as life becomes about an Instagram or a Snapchat story and they start believing that all is good if it is good on social media. On the other hand, the other category comprises of people who see these posts and start comparing their
lives to it. It takes them ten seconds to evaluate every decision they have ever taken. They compare their success, their experiences, and even their value, eventually getting depressed as they try their best to compensate for what they feel they did not achieve. The mental impact is usually overlooked as this is a vicious cycle where both categories heavily overlap. The person posting might become the person comparing the very next day. There is a high chance that at times you might get overwhelmed by the things your peers or colleagues post but you need to realize that you are doing good. Push yourself to do well. Go out with friends because you want to, not because social media demands it. If you feel like you are becoming a victim of this pressure, take a break from social media. Leave it for a week and see how it feels. It will give you time to think
about what is in store for you in the future rather than focusing on how to prove yourself to everyone else in the present. During this week, enjoy every moment without thinking about which part of a room has the best lighting. If you ever feel overwhelmed by such things, follow these three steps. 1. Take a deep breath and think about what you are doing.
2. Focus on the things around you. Participate in events and activities. (Be part of the Skule™ spirit!) 3. Think about the bigger picture. Remember that memories last forever and the best pictures are always the ones in which you are lost in the moment.
CREDIT : PEXELS
12 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
7 Myths About Mental Health ALYSON ALLEN Cannon Contributor Being in an extracurricular with things that I love should be easy, right? I should be motivated and inspired, especially when it comes to writing an article to share with the Skule™ community. Except, that is not the case. This was a constant battle between me wanting to do something and not being able to do so: my mind did not want to let me. Other things I love in life also end up being a drag, despite my constant fear of failure or that my life is not going as planned. I never show up to events that have a lot of people and even missed out on my own F!rosh Week from being too overwhelmed. I thought I had no reason for this; then I learned that I experience mental illness. Mental illness is any disorder that affects mood, thinking, and behaviour, including depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder and more. According to Youth Mental Health Canada, all Canadians will have or know someone with mental illness and 15-24-year olds are most likely to have them. A study done in 2016 by the National College Health Assessment on post-secondary students in Ontario, found that 46% had depression symptoms that affected their life and 65% had overwhelming anxiety in the past year. Overall, it is easy noticeable that students are those who may experience this the most, and yet there are still stigmas and misconceptions surrounding it all. We need to make sure that it becomes easier to speak of these topics, and to get help. To accomplish that, we must uncover facts and myths. Myth: People with mental illness are “crazy” Reality: Those who experience mental health
problems are people who are part of your everyday life. You should not perceive them differently. Another misconception is that those who experience schizophrenia are violent, but they are not and rather may just act unpredictably. Myth: You need to have a reason to have mental health complications Reality: Anyone can get affected for different reasons, through genetics or experiences. For mood disorders, a shift in mood can happen unexpectedly. You are valid for your experiences and there is no need to compare yourself to others. Myth: Depression is just sadness Reality: Depression symptoms vary from person to person and can include trouble concentrating, lack of motivation, feeling of helplessness and physical symptoms including fatigue, appetite changes, constant aches and pains. Myth: Anxiety is just improper stress management Reality: Anxiety includes extreme worry and fear in certain situations for no logical reason. Symptoms are often physical including nausea, shaking, and increased breathing. There are many types of anxiety disorders, including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and Panic Disorder. Myth: Being bipolar is just constant mood swings Reality: It is instead a cycle between manic periods (high energy and energized behaviour) and depressive periods (hopelessness, sadness) that can last weeks. Myth: You are lazy and selfish if you take “mental health days”, or if you claim to not have motivation Reality: Mental health can affect productivity, interest in activities and make it
difficult to simply get out of bed. There are often no explanations why certain days may be like this, but it is completely okay to take a day off to rest your mind. Myth: “Just get help” Reality: Almost half of people who have experienced symptoms of anxiety or depression have not seen a professional mostly due to stigma around it. It is currently not as widely accepted to seek help for mental health as it is physical and takes a lot of courage to seek assistance even if many
resources are provided. There are many other misconceptions surrounding mental health, and it is incredibly important for us to get informed. With my own experiences, I was always afraid that people would perceive me differently, and that it was selfish to focus on myself. We need to discuss this now in order to help students. Our lives are very busy and stressful, from things surrounding homework, work, living, extracurriculars, and more, but we need to ensure there
is time available for our own health. It is necessary to understand that everyone is in a different place in their life and each of us faces challenges differently. We should not compare ourselves to others and are valid for our feelings. Our mental health should always come before school despite how hard it may be to realize that. Checking up on friends and classmates is key to making a step in the right direction. Mental health affects your entire life. Let’s make it a better conversation.
cannon.skule.ca
OCTOBER 2018
• 13
OPINION
Is Twitter a Good Medium For Diplomacy? RUKNOON DINDER Cannon Senior Editor A dispute that sparked on Twitter two months ago, over a controversial issue, now threatens to compromise diplomatic ties over the entire North American bloc, once considered to be one of the most stable in the world. This brings with it an important question: in a world increasingly dependant on social media, should social media be a platform for diplomatic interactions? And, if so, to what extent? While Twitter has long been a megaphone for American President Donald Trump’s various opinions, they were often overlooked because of his status or the USA’s ties to other nations, and some simply dismissed as crazy ramblings. But when the Canadian government decided to join in on the game and criticised Saudi Arabia via Twitter, they quickly realised that they were playing a game very much out of their league. On the 2nd of August 2018, Canadian foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, expressed her alarm over the “Draconian crackdown of Saudi government on women’s rights activists” as stated by Amnesty International. The next day, the Canadian foreign policy account on Twitter backed her claim and urged Saudi to release the female activists. Saudi Arabia waited two days before unleashing a blitzkrieg counter on Canada by cutting diplomatic relations, ordering the Canadian Ambassador to leave the country, suspending all trade and investment, and pulling students and patients out of Canada, all in a span of a month. At the same time,
Saudi Arabia repeatedly threatened Canada and told them to stop interfering in Saudi matters. At one point, an image was released by an account affiliated with Saudi Arabia that depicted a 9/11 style attack on the Toronto skyline. While the image was soon taken down, it shocked the world at the ugly turn matters had taken. Amazingly, both the USA and UK, two of Canada’s closest allies, each a bastion of women’s rights, refused to support Canada in this feud and chose to remain neutral. This may have nothing to do with the fact that Saudi Arabia offered trade deals it took away from Canada to them, but it reveals a sad truth: at the end of the day, peoples rights only matter after national interests have been met. Canada failed to see this and found itself alienated by the world. Yet, such double sidedness has always somewhat existed in the political arena. Why is this suddenly being presented for the public worldwide? The answer to that is social media. In the past, mass media was often not privy to the actions of our world leaders or they were sufficiently pressured to not make everything public for the sake of national interests. That is how many nations have preserved years of uneasy peace. But suddenly, everything we’ve decided to turn a blind eye to is open for all eyes to see. Now everyone can clearly see that the USA is not the so-called saviour of the world, Saudi Arabia is very much a radical nation and that the Canadian foreign office is currently the laughing stock of the world. Now that there is nothing left to hide, what stops nations from publicly fighting amongst each
THE AFFORMENTIONED TWEET BY MINISTER FREELAND CREDIT : TWITTER
other and creating global conflicts? Do not get me wrong, the question is not about if what our leaders are doing is right or wrong. Rather, it is about how the inclusion of social media into these dealings changes the dynamic of how nations interact with one another on a large scale. Politicians have the ability to stir emotions and achieve specific reactions from people or groups. They also have the power to exert their opinion, but in a more cohesive manner, or to bring about action on specific issues, something I believe should be separate from outlets similar to Twitter. Following the US election and Trump’s shocking victory, Twitter seemed to be a new platform where politicians could express themselves without begging for support from mass media. However, many, including myself, hoped that he would lead by example and put his smartphone down before matters got out of hand. This was not the case. The Trump administration opted to push away mass media, labeling them ‘fake news’. This played beautifully with many members of public who had always remained
suspicious of the media, further increasing the support Trump gained, all in the wrong way. It is now safe to say that more and more politicians are taking to Twitter as a means to express themselves rather than traditional outlets including newspapers, articles, public statements, etc. If there is anything I know from writing articles, it’s that people use predictive text a lot more when typing on their phone compared to when they are writing a more formal document on a computer. As a result, there is a complete lack of censorship and discreteness in tweets, posts and social media updates. For a platform built on the idea of connectivity between people and ideas, Twitter seems to have led to inadvertent division. Politicians on Twitter have polarised users for many reasons including those mentioned above. Prior to the election and the insurgence of the political sphere on Twitter, many of the users were of my generation and not involved as much in the political scene. With constant pressure from both politicians and parties on the platform, it has exposed a greater audience to politics. And while the involvement of the younger
generation is important to politics, social media has become a platform of “drama creation” for many of them to enjoy. As with any drama, everyone takes sides without understanding the true gravity of the situation. As we can see from the internal division within the USA itself, people divided along ideological lines will never opt for peace as they do not attempt to understand the stance of the other side, an important step towards conciliation and diplomacy. By contrast, in countries where Twitter is not a dominant form of public communication, such as Germany or Japan, the general populace does not simply abide by the emotional whims of its leaders to the same extent. Politicians are leaders, not entertainers. Placing much at risk just to gain a few more likes and shares is not what they were chosen for. With the constant mockery of each other and, more importantly, of diplomacy and civil behaviour that our leaders are practicing, I shudder in anticipation of the day when politicians start applying phrases and behaviour one only sees in a Netflix special or reality TV shows. Personally, I would not like my country to be run based on either of those.
14 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
OPINION
Artificial Intelligence or Artificial Injustice? NAJAH HASSAN Cannon Editor-in-Chief
The judicial system of a country has an important role to play in society: to deliver justice by convicting and punishing the guilty. They aim to protect the innocent, ensure safety for everyone and keep away people that will cause harm. It is not an easy job. Especially, if you think about cases where people are wrongly accused or unfairly convicted. Just spending a few months in jail can cause damage to your credit history, your job security and your family life. So, naturally, this important decision on how your life will play out is left in the hands of important people: the court judges. However, humans can be unfair. When making decisions, they may be influenced by their own prejudices or biases and may not reach a fair decision. What qualifies a court judge whom you have never met to decide whether you are innocent or guilty? Then again, what qualifies a computer algorithm to do the same? As artificial intelligence seeps its way into our world and becomes more of a norm, there are repetitive questions arising and discussions taking place around what they really
should be doing. Anyone who has seen Robocop will definitely have an opinion about technology being used in the judicial system. While some may see it as a good idea, others may view it as unethical. Yes, theoretically speaking, the possibilities are endless. AI can do anything. But, should it? In 2013, Eric L. Loomis was sentenced to six years in prison for evading the police in La Crosse, Wisconsin. He had been charged with five felony-counts in a drive by shooting case and had an additional record of past convictions. The judge who sentenced Loomis said that his verdict was aided by the results of an algorithm known as Compas. Compas is an algorithm developed by a private company, Northpointe Inc., that calculates the likelihood of someone committing another crime and suggests what kind of supervision a defendant should receive in prison. The results come from a survey of the defendant and information about his or her past conduct. Compas assessments return a score of how high a risk the defendant poses to their community. The company claims that its algorithm is supported by the necessary research to ensure
a just sentencing. However, the input, weightage, and factors of decision making remain a secret, which is understandable since the algorithm is proprietary and releasing it to the public could undermine their business. Nevertheless, the company does acknowledge that men and women receive different assessments, as do juveniles. Other than that, the remaining decision making factors are kept secret. Loomis attempted to plead his case by saying that using Compas to make a verdict was a violation of his rights. The primary reason being that he did not know how he was being assessed. How do you argue your case when you do not know what it has been based on? He also argued that the algorithm was biased because of his gender whereas some others argued that it was justifiable and a good thing that the algorithm took gender into account. Predictive policing, which is the ability to use predictive and analytical algorithms to identify potential criminal activity, claims to be the next innovation of crime analysis. There are several arguments in support of it. Firstly, by giving the judges all the information they would need, it saves time, allows them to reach a
decision faster and enables them to go through more cases. Additionally, and the one that I am more skeptical about, it eliminates personal bias and prejudice on the judge’s part. The algorithm supposedly makes a decision based on past convictions and excludes race as one of the factors, something that may subconsciously factor in to a judge’s final decision. However, there is no guarantee that that the algorithm has not been trained based on the biases and values of its developers, which would essentially make it biased as well. As much as I hate to play devil’s advocate, I do not think we are ready for criminal convicting algorithms in our police system. Autonomous technologies and artificial intelligence are better suited for tasks that require repetition and pattern matching. They are used to make generalizations, assumptions and final decisions based on large amounts of historical data. Are we really ready to start doing that to people? Every criminal case is different because every person is different. There is no way for you to guarantee that a person who has committed a crime poses less of a risk to society because this is their
first offense. Alternatively, you cannot sentence a person based on their past crimes. For starters, they may not even be guilty. They could have been framed or just been caught at the wrong place at the wrong time. One thing that autonomous technologies and artificial intelligence lack in, at least for now, is empathy. They do not have feelings and for jobs like this, empathy, patience and understanding are crucial. Your one conviction could change a person’s life. It could change a community. To make a well-informed decision, you need to hear all the sides of the story. There is no formula for tasks like this. So, why are we trusting an algorithm? At the end of the day, I think defendants do have a right to know what their verdict has been based on. I understand that your algorithm is proprietary and you want to protect it, but everyone should be given a fair chance to defend themselves. Artificial intelligence definitely can do wonders in criminal justice, but we need to tread through it carefully. At the end of the day, your algorithm may be “very clever” and “time efficient” but it may not be ready to assist in a decision that could change the lives of an entire community.
OPINION
Op-Ed: Is It Time for the BFC to Become a Relic? multiple occasions. The author and their sources stand by the statements as a The information in the true representation of events, article below represents the based on their knowledge experience of particular and experience. Since the members of the SkuleTM BFC remains a secret group community. The statements with secret members, it is made throughout the article impossible to corroborate are based on interactions these details with concrete directly between the author, evidence such as emails or the author’s sources, and meeting minutes. members of the BFC. The It’s Thursday night of author has attended BFC your F!rosh Week and pranks as a volunteer on you’re about to head out to a ANONYMOUS Cannon Contributor
non-sanctioned event, where you will “officially” meet the third member of the Trinity of Skule™ Spirit. The night begins as a mysterious person reminds you of the two (EngSoc affiliated) pillars of Skule™ spirit that you have already gotten to know - The Lady Godiva Memorial Bnad and Ye Olde Mighty Skule™ Cannon. Now that they have your attention, you are introduced to the ever-elusive Brute Force
Committee (BFC), a group of anonymous Skuligans who have “earned [their] place as the sworn protectors of Skule™ spirit and the spirit of Lady Godiva.” Over the next few years, you will come to know the BFC as a group of selfserving people in search of an ego-boost. A group who likens its members to gods of Skule™ but will spend hours insisting that their anonymity means they
can’t be gods. A group who claims to be the only reason UofT engineering pranking culture continues to exist – but will also tell you there is no value in being a member. A group that will promise continuous improvement for its community, but refuses to offer any evidence that they are doing anything at all. The BFC is not a protector Relic continued on page 15
OCTOBER 2018 Relic continued from page 14 of Skule™ spirit, it is an inhibitor. The operating principle of this non-sanctioned event, known as DisOrientation, or DisO for short, is that there is an element of excitement in its mystery that makes it worthwhile. The event only works if people (F!rosh and upper year leaders alike) are invested in the idea of the secret society. Thus, the BFC begins to breed a culture of their own worship in F!rosh week. If you buy in, by the time you reach second year, you’re excited to show your dedication to the organization and you become a leader for the event. Of course, it probably never occured to you that you have spent the previous three days building trust with F!rosh and you’re now about to betray that by leading them through the act of illegal trespassing without so much
as a heads-up. Rest assured that when the campus police discovered students trespassing in the Bahen Centre this September, the Ministers’ secret identities couldn’t have protected anyone but themselves from legal action. According to their website, the BFC has 23 active Ministers, all of whom were hand-picked to assist the organization in a specific way. Many ex-Ministers have said that being a Minister does not matter, and the volunteers are the ones who do the work. This is indeed exemplified in prank meetings and builds, where volunteers in this community step up and take leadership positions for the duration of the prank, from brainstorming to completion. This, of course, begs the question: what is the point of having Ministers? Many have argued that the need for these Ministers is in the fun that their physical
presence brings to events, and yet many Skuligans dress as Cannon Guards and Bnad members without being a part of an exclusive group. It has been argued that these people are doing a lot of grunt work behind the scenes, but the secrecy has us taking them at their word on that one. In recent years, the aforementioned DisO has been dubbed “DisOrganization” because somehow this group of 23 leaders in the community can’t put together a logistically successful three hour event. Perhaps the reason for their general incompetence stems from their hiring process. The sitting committee reportedly votes on new recruits from a constantly changing list of the most dedicated volunteers at Skule™ events (as evaluated by, you guessed it, themselves). There is no formal application process or even any consideration
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DisO has been dubbed “DisOrganization” because somehow this group of 23 leaders in the community can’t put together a logistically successful three hour event.
that these people might not be interested in running with the gods of Skule™. Thus, within a year, a number of Ministers have lost the motivation to put effort into working with the organization for their common goal... whatever that may be. Those who still care spend their meetings discussing their own importance and pointing out the reasons that arguments
like the above have no merit. They lie to their closest friends and make mysterious remarks that make others feel lesser than them. Skule™ would be a better place without the BFC. There are many engineering schools with no secret organizations and their spirit is much healthier than ours, so what is holding us back?
What the Heck is Egoistic Altruism? ZAEEM AMJAD Cannon Senior Editor Before I answer that question, some knowledge of human history is necessary to understand the full meaning of the term. Since the dawn of time, until recently, the world has been built upon the fundamental concept of economics: supply and demand. The vast majority of the human population was content with meeting their needs and scraping by. The economic progress of human civilization was stagnant. But recently, with the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, the economic growth completely changed. With the development of machinery and research in key sectors, productivity skyrocketed. Suddenly, the economic progression increased exponentially leading to more supply (production) than demand. The fundamental
concept was no longer valid, and this changed everything. How does this relate to engineering and academia? Well, at the core of this transformation was innovation. Creative and curious minds propelled society to better solutions for existing infrastructure and solutions to problems that did not exist yet. This cycle continued until the problems became more complex and interesting. This is how innovation always works. As the needs and wants of society change, new problems are discovered that need corresponding solutions. When the corresponding solutions are found, scientists and engineers continue looking for more efficient solutions to the same problem. This cycle works due to the fundamental concept mentioned above; when more people are educated, they will
have more to contribute to various research fields that exist, which will lead to an increase in supply of ideas. This happens when people use education to become inventors, researchers and engineers and come up with new ideas. On the other hand, the demand of ideas increases as more people become rich and can pay for solutions to their problems. The inventors, researchers and engineers create new and interesting solutions to the problems with money as an incentive. And this cycle continues until the supply or demand runs out. So, by educating more people around the world, it has a double effect to the supply and demand concept. The more people who are educated, the more the demand for ideas increases, while simultaneously making it easier for ideas to be produced.
So then, in the grand scheme of things, it is in everyone’s self-interest that every other human is well off and prospering. This is a genuine selfish argument for helping others. It is referred to as Egoistic Altruism: “The more people you help and the more people who are well off, the better it is for you.” Take cancer research as an example. There are more than billions of dollars spent into cancer research to help find a cure to cancer. However, this money is coming from a minority of the world’s population. In 2017, a report by Credit Suisse concluded that 1% of the world’s population had more than 50% of the world’s wealth while 70% of the world’s working class has only 2.7% of the world’s wealth. Imagine if more people had access to wealth, meaning more people were educated which would then lead to more supply and more demand.
Currently, there exist very few hotspots of innovation. With more educated people, there would be many hotspots of innovations contributing to the growth of human civilization. Imagine a world where the hubs of research and innovation were no longer primarily in North America. Rather, it was many places all over the world. As people who are involved with an academic institution, it is our responsibility to spread knowledge all over the world by whatever means we have. The percentage of population that is not educated is overwhelming. As an extreme example, CIA World Factbook estimates that in Africa literacy rates are estimated to still be less than 50%. Being selfish may normally be a bad thing, but in this context, exercise Egoistic Altruism and help yourself by helping the world.
16 • THE CANNON
OCTOBER 2018
Thank You, SkuleTM support system through my first year. However, I didn’t realize how good of a support TM Dear Skule , system I truly had until I really You are the most kind, needed it. welcoming, and inclusive During my time here, I’ve community I’ve ever been sexually assaulted. I encountered. When I first was, in a word, devastated. I stepped on campus, I was felt ashamed and didn’t feel I greeted by alarmingly excited could confide in anyone, let purple people, and I wasn’t alone report it. But when I quite sure what I was in for. couldn’t speak up for myself, Not only did I get a crazy and SkuleTM stepped up and fantastic week, but an amazing protected me. Friends and ANONYMOUS Cannon Contributor
acquaintances tried to do their best in making me feel safe, supported, and welcome on campus. No one ever pried or disrespected my privacy. I can’t express what it meant to me that people in SkuleTM would go out of their way to help someone in need. Despite having a lot of self doubt and not believing in myself, they helped me believe I wasn’t alone.
Recovery is an ongoing process and I’ve experienced some setbacks. One night, I took a knife from the kitchen, locked myself in the bathroom, and had every intention of hurting myself. In my distress, I was interrupted by a SkuleTM notification on my phone. It was a seemingly inconsequential thing, but in that moment, I was reminded of the wonderful community of people who had my back.
Bit by bit, the community in SkuleTM has pulled me out of my isolation. I have been surrounded by incredible people who I don’t want to leave. Some days are good, but I still struggle from time to time. I hope to give back to this community which threw me the lifeline I needed while I was drowning at sea. I’m proud to be a Skuligan. Thanks for saving my life, SkuleTM. I owe you one.
Charles Aznavour: 1924-2018 HARRY KHACHATRIAN Cannon Senior Editor Charles Aznavour (Shahnour Vaghinag Aznavourian), the Paris-born Armenian singer-songwriter, actor, and diplomat, who was known as “France’s Frank Sinatra”, died this month, on October 1st, 2018. Born in 1924 to Armenian immigrants who fled to France amid Turkey’s perpetration of ethnic cleansing and genocide against Armenians in the early 20th century, Aznavour was raised by a family of artists. His father, a singer, performing in French restaurants prior to opening his own. Aznavour dropped out of school at a young age of nine to pursue his career as an entertainer -- before his 10th birthday, he had already starred in a movie and a theater production. Despite his young age, Aznavour insisted that he was never pressured or forced to become a performer. To him, it was a natural calling. “People say that they put me on the stage, but I put myself there. It was natural. It was what I wanted to do.” Aznavour later shifted his focus to professional dancing. He didn’t write his first song until the age of 24 in 1950. He got his big break when he began opening for the
legendary French singer, Edith Piaf. After his distinctive rich, mellow voice caught her attention, Piaf took Aznavour under her wing, mentoring the young virtuoso. Piaf advised Aznavour to pursue a singing career. Aznavour went on to command a career lasting 80 years. He wrote a whopping 1000 songs, sold 180 million albums, and dazzled audiences in sold-out auditoriums well into his 90s. He sang in an astounding 8 different languages: French, English, Italian, Spanish, German, Russian, Armenian, and Neapolitan. Aznavour’s music knew no boundaries, touching upon an eclectic range of themes. He wrote songs that by any standard were ahead of their time. In “What Makes a Man” (1972), Aznavour sang about a gay transvestite. The lyrics are overall great but especially outstanding are the lines, “Nobody has the right to be; the judge of what is right for me; tell me if you can; what make a man a man.” In 1974, Aznavour topped UK charts with his number one hit “She”. One of the most beautiful love ballads ever written, with lyrics such as, “She may be the beauty or the beast; may be the famine or the feast; may turn each day into a Heaven or a Hell”. The following year, in 1975,
he wrote a song dedicated to the victims of the Armenian Genocide titled “Ils Sont Tombés” (They Fell). Despite being born in France, Aznavour always remained true to his Armenian identity. In 1979 he proudly proclaimed, “I am Armenian. Everybody figures that I am a Frenchman because I sing in French. I act like a Frenchman and I have all the symptoms of a Frenchman, but my parents are Armenian.” Aznavour founded the charitable organization Aznavour for Armenia following the tragic earthquake that shook Armenia in 1988. In 1989, Aznavour wrote and dedicated the song “Pour toi Arménie” (For You, Armenia) to the estimated 50,000 victims of the earthquake. Following Armenia’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, Aznavour began traveling to his homeland of which he was named the ambassador to Switzerland in 2009. The following year he was granted Armenian citizenship by presidential decree. In 1998, Aznavour was named Entertainer of the Century by CNN – now that was not fake news. Through most of Aznavour’s childhood, Europe was immersed in war.
CREDIT: LE TELEGRAMME
Amid the German occupation of France, Aznavour and his family rescued and hid Jews from the Nazis. His selfless, altruistic actions awarded him the Raoul Wallenberg Award in 2017. Israeli president Reuven Rivlin extolled Aznavour’s music, calling Aznavour’s 1965 hit song La Boheme – a beautiful ballad about a nostalgic artist – his favorite song. Receiving his award, Aznavour said, “We have so many things in common, the Jews and the Armenians, in misfortune, in happiness, in work, in music, in the arts and in the ease of learning different languages and becoming important people in the countries where they have been received.” In August of 2017, Aznavour joined the reams of distinguished entertainers from around the globe on
Hollywood’s Walk of Fame when he was awarded his own star. Eschewing early retirement, Aznavour lived doing what he loved to his last day. This past summer, months before his death, he had announced a world tour for his 95th birthday including stops in Ukraine, Israel, and Switzerland. Through his poetic prose and velvety tenor tone, Aznavour touched countless lives. For nearly a full century, he lent his voice to the voiceless and fought for the persecuted. From hiding Jews from the Nazis in WWII to his unyielding fight for the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, Aznavour made the world a better place. Charles Aznavour is survived by his sons Charles, Patrick, Misha, Nicolas, and daughters, Seda and Katia.