At a recent forum of McGill’s Task Force on Respect and Inclusion, Associate Professor Laila Parsons defended the existence of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel at McGill. Parsons claimed that “BDS is a normal method of activism, [and] the University’s condemnation of the BDS [movement] exacerbated[Read More…]
Author: Simon Paransky
Textbook costs need more than a textbook solution
Post-secondary textbooks are expensive. Any McGill student can attest to this: For many, spending hundreds of dollars at the bookstore is an unfortunate reality of every semester. Others turn to scouring the internet for alternatives and older editions of required texts, or pawning off last year’s gargantuan, intro-level books on[Read More…]
Gender-neutral bathrooms have impact beyond the stall
In October 2017, the Social Work Students’ Association (SWSA) launched a campaign to designate the bathrooms in the School of Social Work’s Wilson Hall as gender-neutral, meaning that students of any gender would be able to use any bathroom they please. On Jan. 9, the campaign succeeded, and most of[Read More…]
Where do I begin: King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard
With a name like “King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard,” a band is likely to be either out-there and silly, or innovative and revolutionary. Luckily for the music world, this group delivers on both accounts. Formed in Melbourne in 2010, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard is a seven-piece ensemble[Read More…]
Reducing chemical waste through sustainable ketone-making
Pharmaceuticals, agrochemicals, and plastics all owe their existence to chemical synthesis. Ketones, a functional group with a central carbon double-bonded to an oxygen, are an important ingredient in a wide range of useful chemicals. Unfortunately, their synthesis is energy-intensive and requires many steps, creating significant chemical waste. Bruce Arndtsen, a[Read More…]
In celebration of ugly dancing
I would have loved nothing more than to see Lorde murder her Grammys performance on Jan. 28, and it broke my heart that she didn’t get to. After an exhausting six or so months of scandal, I had just about lost all faith in the entertainment industry. I was ready[Read More…]
The Coronas set to take North American stages by storm
In the summer of 2016, an indie pop rock band hailing from Dublin called the Coronas burrowed themselves in the quaint County of Dingle on the southwestern coast of Ireland. The work they created would eventually evolve into their fifth studio album, Trust the Wire, which made waves in both[Read More…]
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Cloning: A tale of two monkeys
At the end of 2017, researchers in Shanghai successfully cloned primates for the first time: Two macaque monkeys they named Hua hua and Zhong zhong. Published in the latest edition of the journal Cell, this was the first time that a Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer (SCNT)—a reproductive cloning strategy—was used[Read More…]
Tide Pods: Uncovering the science behind the meme
In an internet age that boasts impressively dumb viral video challenges—neknominations, the cinnamon challenge, and the Kylie Jenner lip challenge, to name a few—it takes both creativity and tenacity to rise above the rest. Enter the Tide Pod trend, the YouTube phenomenon in which challengers attempt to eat chemically toxic[Read More…]
