Physical labels no longer required for smartphones, wearable devices

Serial numbers no longer need to be visible on the surface of devices such as smartphones or wearable technology such as smartwatches in Canada, thanks to new electronic labelling regulations.

The new rules are "opening Canada's markets to the latest wireless wearable devices such as Google Glass and Apple Watch," Industry Canada announced in a news release today.

Previously, Canadian regulations required information such as serial or model identification numbers, registration numbers for terminal equipment devices and certification number for radio equipment to be printed directly on the device or attached with a sticker.

That meant some devices marketed in other parts of the world couldn't enter Canadian markets, the news release said.

Under new regulations effective immediately, high-tech devices with a non-removable screen can carry that information on an "e-label" instead.

Typically, that means it would be accessed through the device's software, either through its display or apps managing the device.

Devices that can carry e-labels include tablets, smartphones, smartwatches and wearable glucose monitors.

Steve Woods, engineering director of Google Canada, said in a statement that "the new generation of wearables places a premium on space and makes increasing demands of technology and design. E-labelling will produce cleaner products and make more information available for consumers." 

Industry Canada noted that the e-labels will be able to include information not included on physical labels, such as warranty information, and can be updated remotely if needed to address inaccuracies.

According to the Consumer Electronics Marketers of Canada, e-labels reduce costs and waste associated with physical labelling and etching and reduce the time it takes for new devices to go to market.

However, some concerns have been raised about e-labelling. For example:

The new regulations try to address these concerns by requiring:

• A copy of the e-label information to be printed on the packaging that the device comes in when someone buys it.
• Manufacturers to make sure e-labels can't be modified or removed during the course of normal activities that a typical user might perform, such as installing apps or accessing menus.

User manuals, packaging inserts and product websites will also be required to give users instructions about how to find the e-label.

Under the new regulations, users must be able to access the e-label without having to go through more than three steps in the device menu and without using any special access codes or accessories.

According to Industry Canada, e-labelling is already accepted in the United States, Australia, Japan, the United Arab Emirates and Costa Rica.

Google declined to comment on whether labelling regulations previously prevented Google Glass from being sold in Canada, saying only that "every electronic device faces regulatory requirements, including labelling."

However, Google Canada spokesman Aaron Brindle confirmed, "Glass has regulatory approval from Industry Canada and we're super excited to bring Glass north of the border."

He added that the company could not say when the device will be available in Canada.

In 2010, Canada began allowing e-labels for imported medical devices sold to health-care professionals, but not the general public. Those e-labels were allowed in the form of a CD or DVD accompanying the device.

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Water on Earth found to be older than the Sun

The water you're sipping may taste fresh, but a lot of it is very, very old — older than the solar system itself.

"Half the water in our oceans is in fact older than the Sun," science columnist Torah Kachur said in an interview with CBC's Homestretch.

"What that means is a lot of the water that exists on our planet was made before our solar system and it came from a different part of our galaxy altogether."

The sun is 4.5 billion to 4.6 billion years old.

Scientists led by Ilse Cleeves, a theoretical astronomer from the University of Michigan, figured out the approximate age of the water on Earth by conducting computer simulations of two chemical processes that are known to form water in deep space.

CBC science columnist Torah Kachur

One is a reaction between individual hydrogen and oxygen atoms that takes place on tiny dust grains. The other is a hotter reaction that takes place in stars and involves molecules of hydrogen gas.

The colder reaction generates water that contains more deuterium, a heavier form of hydrogen.

"Think of it as hydrogen's fat cousin," Kachur said.

When Cleeves and her colleagues compared the results of their calculations with the amount of deuterium on Earth, they concluded that 30 to 50 per cent of Earth's water was made through the cold process. That means it must have been made before the hot sun was formed.

They published their results in the journal Science.

Scientists have evidence that water was carried to Earth by comets that bombarded the planet about 3.8 billion years ago.

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Bees, birds may suffer long-term consequences from common pesticides

A raft of new research published over the summer is posing ever more serious questions about whether neonicotinoids, the most common insecticides in the world, are affecting birds and bees more widely than previously thought.

The research is looking into more subtle, long-term effects from the insecticides – rather than instant direct kills – that may still harm bird and bee populations.

Through a four-week study on bumblebees, Nigel Raine, an expert in pollinator conservation at the University of Guelph, found that the neonicotinoids, which are neurotoxins, affect bumblebees' ability to find and collect food.  

"When the neonicotinoid-treated bees go out of the colony for the first time to look for flowers, something about their exposure to that pesticide means that they're less able to collect as much pollen as the bees that are untreated," he told the CBC Radio program Quirks & Quarks.

"And that impact only gets worse over time, because the untreated bees improve their performance and their ability."

The Ontario government is considering a plan to reduce or eliminate use of some neonics. (Reuters)

In turn, that leads to smaller colonies, which in turn means that fewer queens are produced, a phenomenon that decreases the number of new bumblebee colonies.

Pollinators, including honeybees and wild pollinators, are in decline around the world, Dr. Raine said, adding that a host of factors is thought to be responsible.

Pierre Petelle, vice-president of chemistry at CropLife Canada, told Quirks & Quarks that the industry's studies suggest that neonicotinoids are not one of them.

The insecticides — known as "neonics" for short — are responsible for some bee deaths in Ontario and Quebec in 2012, after dust kicked up from their application reached some colonies.

Petelle said both manufacturers and farmers are working to make changes to the way the pesticide is applied and are resolving those problems.

The European Community has banned some neonics for two years and the Ontario government is considering a plan to reduce or eliminate some of them.

Beekeepers in Ontario have launched a $400-million lawsuit against neonic manufacturers.

When it comes to birds, the question is whether neonics are such an effective insecticide that they are killing off the aquatic bugs that birds need to eat, leaving too little food for them.

Christy Morrissey, an ecotoxicologist at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, found last year that 90 per cent of prairie potholes were laced with small amounts of neonics in the spring before farmers planted their fields. That means the chemicals stay in the soil and then wash into the water through rain or snow.

"Insecticides or pesticides in general are not supposed to be on the market if they persist [in the environment]," Morrissey told Quirks & Quarks from her research site in Saskatchewan.

"We do not want chemicals that are designed to kill lasting in the environment for weeks, months or years. …You want pesticides to be applied, do their job, kill the pest and then be gone."

Now, Dr. Morrissey is in the midst of a study in the field studying exactly how different levels of neonics affect aquatic insects in prairie potholes, in tandem with a long-term study examining the health of tree swallows nearby.

It's a bid to examine whether neonics are affecting the bugs and, consequently, the birds that rely on them. Her early results show that birds living near treated fields are slightly delayed in laying their eggs, and the chicks are not as healthy.

'We do not want chemicals that are designed to kill lasting in the environment for weeks, months or years.'- Christy Morrissey, an ecotoxicologist at the University of Saskatchewan

A Dutch study by Caspar Hallmann ​at the Institute for Water and Wetland Research at Radboud University in the Netherlands,​ and others published this summer found larger annual declines in insect-eating birds in areas with higher surface-water concentrations of the most popular type of neonic, imidacloprid.

It concluded that the impact of the chemical is "reminiscent of the effects of persistent insecticides in the past."

CropLife Canada's Petelle said the concentrations of neonics Dr. Morrissey is finding in the field are too low to affect aquatic insects.

He said neonics are the safest chemical solution that has been introduced in a long time, one reason that agriculture has never been more sustainable than today.

"And so the studies that have been conducted on these products in field conditions show that at those concentrations, there is no risk for aquatic insects or other wildlife," he said.

Dr. Morrissey told Quirks & Quarks, however, that the industry is relying on studies conducted on the water flea, Daphnia magna, an aquatic crustacean.

While it is the industry standard for testing, it happens to be almost uniquely insensitive to neonics. Compared to other insects tested, it is an average of 1,000 times less sensitive, and compared to the aquatic insects birds like to eat, it is between 10,000 and 100,000 times less sensitive, she said.

Neonics, which are derived from nicotine, are the newest class of insecticides and they are used in a new way: as a coating for crop seeds rather than mainly as a spray on growing crops.

In Canada, all canola and corn seeds planted are coated, as well as half of soybeans and some seeds of other crops. They are systemic pesticides, which means they infuse every cell of the plant as it grows, right from the roots to the leaves, seeds, nectar and pollen.

And they are used as a prophylactic, whether there is a pest infestation or not.

An analysis of 800 studies released this summer, called the Task Force on Systemic Pesticides, concluded that the chemicals, including neonics, are having widespread effects on ecosystems around the world beyond their intended function of killing crop pests.

The scientists who conducted the review study said governments should plan for a global phase-out or at least a plan for farmers to use them only when their crops are actually threatened by insects.

Listen to Quirks & Quarks here.

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Space isn't the place for international politics: Bob McDonald

The Canadian government has refused visas to the heads of the Russian and Chinese space agencies to attend an international space conference being held in Toronto this week. It directly contravenes the multinational partnerships that have been a hallmark of the space program.

In space, there are no borders. The International Space Station, by its very name, is a collaborative effort between Russia, the U.S., the European Union, Japan and Canada. At the moment, it has a crew of three Russians, two Americans and a German. And attached to the outside of the orbiting laboratory, there are currently five spacecraft: three Russian, one American and one European.

And, of course, Canada's own Chris Hadfield recently commanded the station. The whole complex has been a mini United Nations of space since its inception.

Meanwhile, India's first Mars mission just arrived on the Red Planet and they are sharing their data with NASA.

The spirit of cooperation?

Everyone who travels to space looks down on Earth and sees it as a single planet with no artificial lines drawn across it to define ownership. That borderless view is one of the most important messages to come from space exploration; we are all one species, living on a shared planet.

Too bad the same perspective doesn't apply on the ground. Earthbound politics are interfering with international partners who simply want to gather to discuss future plans.

Canada has been an active member in the space community from the very beginning, providing satellites, scientific instruments, expertise and astronauts. It is totally appropriate that we are hosting the largest international space conference in Toronto - but it is against the spirit of cooperation to ban certain members from attending.

The Canadian government's refusal to grant visas is most likely a reaction to Russia's activity in Crimea and human rights issues in China. Sadly, the space program has nothing to do with either of those issues, but space exploration is a highly visible pawn that can be used to make a political statement.

The case is most poignant for one of the banned delegates, Sergei Krikalev, head of the Russian Cosmonaut Training Center outside Moscow. He has spent more time in space than any other human (803 days) and is also known as the last Soviet cosmonaut.

In 1991, during his second flight aboard the former Russian Space Station Mir, the Soviet Union collapsed. After three months in space, there was no money to bring Krikalev down. He stayed up there for another three months, which he described as the equivalent to running a marathon, reaching the finishing line, then being told to turn around and run it again.

He has the distinction of being the only person to have left Earth as a Soviet citizen and returned a Russian.

Political barrier

Later, Krikalev became the first Russian cosmonaut to fly on an American space shuttle, then worked at NASA mission control in Houston.

During his time in space, Krikalev circled the Earth more than 12,000 times. Now, he can't get from Russia to Canada because of politics.

Science, whether it's about space or not, is a community effort that knows no borders. That's how humanity learns about nature and our place in it. Of course, it is affected by politics, mostly when it comes to funding. But it's one of the few institutions left that shows how people of different nationalities, colour, genders, political or religious beliefs become unified to accomplish a common goal.

We should let them get on with their work and keep the politics out of it.

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Monarch butterfly population rebounding after record low

Deforestation is down in the Mexican forest that is the winter home of Monarch butterflies, and scientists also hope to see a rebound in the annual migration after it fell to historic lows last year, an expert said Thursday.

Omar Vidal of the World Wildlife Fund said two to three times more Monarchs may arrive this year, compared to last year.

"The data from the United States indicates a light recovery," Vidal said. "They are calculating that we can expect at least double the number and perhaps triple."

Last year, the Monarch population dropped to the lowest level since record-keeping began in 1993, covering just two-thirds of a hectare (1.65 acres) in the pine and fir forests west of Mexico City.

But even if the number of butterflies triples, they would cover only about 2 hectares (5 acres). That would be just over one-tenth of the record high of 18.2 hectares (45 acres) in 1996-97.

Millions of the black-and-orange butterflies return to a reserve area each winter, clustering in trees in numbers so great that they are counted not as individuals, but by the amount of acreage they cover.

The same generation never lives to make the round trip to summer habitats in the United States and Canada.

More good news came from the annual survey experts perform using satellite photos and on-the-ground reconnaissance to check on tree cutting in the reserve.

Logging threatens the butterflies because it pokes holes in the canopy of fir trees that protect them from cold weather and freezing rains.

This year, Vidal said the reserve's 13,550-hectare (33,482-acre) core zone had no small-scale logging, the kind that happens when Indian communal farmers cut trees for their own use.

The communal farms own most of the property in the reserve.

"This demonstrates the commitment of the land owners," Vidal said. The Indian communities receive government support to conserve the forests, and they make some money from reforestation projects and tourists who come to see the butterflies.

However, Vidal noted there had been an outbreak of commercial logging in one mountain community, where about 5.2 hectares (13 acres) of trees were cut. Drought killed off nearly three hectares (7.41 acres) of trees, for a total loss of forest cover of about eight hectares (20 acres) in the reserve. That is down from 16.6 hectares (41 acres) of tree loss last year.

Vidal said concerns remain about the destruction of milkweed — the plant on which the butterflies lay their eggs — in the United States and Canada. The three countries formed working groups this year to confront problems facing the butterflies, but Vidal said that "in reality, we have not seen concrete actions in the United States and Canada."

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Thousands of uncharted sea mountains revealed in new map

Scientists have devised a new map of the Earth's sea floor using satellite data, revealing massive underwater scars and thousands of previously uncharted sea mountains residing in some of the deepest, most remote reaches of the world's oceans.

'We know much more about the topography of Mars than we know about Earth's sea floor.'-  Dietmar Müller, University of Sydney

The researchers said on Thursday they used gravity measurements of the seafloor from radar equipment aboard the European Space Agency's CryoSat-2 satellite and NASA's Jason-1 satellite to capture underwater geological features in unprecedented detail.

"The pull of gravity reflects the topography and tectonics of the seafloor," said David Sandwell, a geophysicist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego who led the study.

University of Sydney geophysicist Dietmar Müller, another of the researchers, said about 71 per cent of the Earth's surface is covered by water and roughly 90 per cent of the sea floor is uncharted by survey ships that employ acoustic beams to map the depths.

Brittle stars and deep-sea corals cover a known seamount in the western Pacific Ocean. Prior to the new map, the vast majority of other seamounts were uncharted. (NOAA)

"We know much more about the topography of Mars than we know about Earth's seafloor," Müller said. "The disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 earlier this year has heightened global awareness of the poor knowledge of our ocean depths."

The map reveals major sea floor and sub-sea floor structures. They include a mid-ocean ridge beneath the Gulf of Mexico with a length about equal to the width of Texas as well as another ridge under the South Atlantic west of Angola about 800 kilometres (500 miles) long that was formed just after the continent of South America separated from Africa.

Such "spreading ridges" are cracks in the Earth formed where the planet's tectonic plates moved apart and molten material called magma came up to fill them, the researchers said.

"Knowing where and when such ridges existed is essential for deciphering planet Earth's geological past," Müller said.

The new map also provides details on thousands of undersea mountains, or seamounts, rising 1.6 kilometres or more from the sea floor, the researchers said. Some are covered by many kilometres of sediments, they said.

In addition to the pure scientific value, the new map could have applications for militaries and for oil exploration, Sandwell said.

Müller said the conclusions the researchers made about seabed topography may be less accurate than acoustic beam methods employed by ships.

"But the global coverage is much better and our method is much cheaper, especially as we are mostly using satellite data that were collected for another purpose," added Müller, who estimated that a complete survey of the deep ocean using ships would cost between $2 billion and $3 billion and would take many years.

CryoSat-2 was dedicated to monitoring changes in the thickness of marine ice floating in the polar oceans and variations in the thickness of the vast ice sheets that overlie Greenland and Antarctica. Jason-1 was dedicated to map the change in the topography of the oceans due to ocean currents.

The study was published in the journal Science.

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FireChat lets protesters chat without Wi-Fi, cell service

FireChat, an app that lets users chat without a cellular or internet connection, has been downloaded more than 100,000 times in Hong Kong amid mass pro-democracy protests. Here's what you need to know about it.

What is FireChat?

FireChat is an iOS and Android app that lets smartphone and tablet users chat even without a cellular or internet connection. That's why it bills itself as "off-the-grid."

However, it can also be used to chat over the internet, via its "everyone" mode.

The app was developed by a San Francisco-based company called Open Garden.

How does it work without an internet connection?

A screenshot of the FireChat app is seen from the Apple App Store. Open Garden says FireChat is ideal for situations where Wi-Fi and mobile phone coverage aren't available, such as on the subway or in the wilderness. (Open Garden)

In "nearby" mode, the app uses Bluetooth to connect to nearby phones that also have the app installed. If lots of people have the app, they form a "distributed" or "decentralized" network. A message can be passed from phone to phone in a daisy-chain-like fashion, connecting users who are farther away from one another. The company describes it as "crowdsourcing the connectivity of those around you."

When might you use a service like Firechat?

According to the Open Garden, FireChat is ideal for situations where Wi-Fi and mobile phone coverage isn't available, such as on the subway or in the wilderness, or in crowded places such as concerts or protests where cell towers may be swamped.

The device also allows you to connect anonymously to strangers around via "firechats" – live group discussions of up to 10,000 people.

How close do users need to be to one another?

When the iOS app was first released in March, Open Garden  wrote on its blog that the nearby mode works best within nine metres of your location. The description for the Android version of the app in the Google Play store says nearby mode can be used up to 60 metres away. However, users can connect over longer distances via other users.

In 'nearby' mode, the app uses Bluetooth to connect to nearby phones that also have the app installed. If lots of people have the app, they form a 'distributed' or 'decentralized' network that allows messages to be passed from phone to phone over longer distances. (FireChat)

How popular has the app been among Hong Kong protesters?

The company's co-founder and CEO told the South China Morning Post that 100,000 people in Hong Kong had downloaded the app in 24 hours from Sept. 28 to Sept. 29.

"What we're seeing right now is beyond anything we've seen," Christophe Daligault, the marketing officer for Open Garden, told Reuters on Sunday.

According to the Post, protest organizers encouraged demonstrators to download the app after hearing rumours that the Hong Kong government would shut down cellphone networks in the district where the protest was taking place.

Reuters reported that Hong Kong's wireless networks were disrupted Sunday night, possibly from being overloaded.

The app had previously also been used to some extent during internet blackouts in Iran and Iraq earlier this year.

What is the app being used for?

Reuters says FireChat was used as an alternative to send updates about the protest and the latest police movements.

However, critics such as Masashi Crete-Nishihata, research manager at the University of Toronto-based Citizen Lab who goes by the Twitter handle @grayops, note that its functionality is limited.

The Citizen Lab, based at the university's Munk School of Global Affairs, conducts research on information technology, human rights and global security.

One review on the Google Play store notes that FireChat is "more a chat room" than an instant messaging platform.

Is it secure?

No. According to a Citizen Lab report posted in July, it's "highly insecure for sensitive communications." The information is not encrypted, and is stored on a person's device, allowing anyone to easily display recent messages. The app also makes it "relatively easy to impersonate another user without authorization," CitizenLab says.

Open Garden has warned Hong Kong protesters not to use their real names.

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Hong Kong protests: China may be spying with smartphone apps

The Chinese government might be using smartphone apps to spy on pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong, a U.S. security firm said.

The applications are disguised as tools created by activists, said the firm, Lacoon Mobile Security. It said that once downloaded, they give an outsider access to the phone's address book, call logs and other information.

The identities of victims and details of the servers used "lead us to believe that the Chinese government are behind the attack," said a Lacoon statement.

China is, along with the United States and Russia, regarded as a leader in cyber warfare research. Security experts say China is a leading source of hacking attacks aimed at foreign governments and companies to computers in China.

The Chinese government has denied engaging in cyberspying and says China is among the biggest victims of hacking attacks.

Lacoon said it found two similar "malicious, fake" apps that appeared to be related. One targets phones that run Apple Inc.'s iOS operating system; the other is meant for phones using Google Inc.'s Android system.

The "very advanced software," known as an mRAT, or multidimensional requirements analysis tool, "is undoubtedly being backed by a nation state," the company said. Lacoon said it was calling the software Xsser.

"The Xsser mRAT represents a fundamental shift by nation-state cybercriminals from compromising traditional PC systems to targeting mobile devices," the company said.

Such "cross-platform attacks" that target both Apple and Android phones are rare, which adds to signs a government is involved, Lacoon said. It said the app might be the first spyware for iOS created by a Chinese government entity.

In May, U.S. prosecutors charged five Chinese military officers with cyberspying and stealing trade secrets from major American companies. A security firm, Mandiant, said last year it traced attacks on American and other companies to a military unit in Shanghai.

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Why our brains aren't built for democracy

While electing a mayor or prime minister can often be a head-scratching process, a provocative new thesis from the University of British Columbia suggests our brains may not be cut out for the political system we've created.

We may, in fact, be too dumb for democracy.

David Moscrop, a Ph.D political science candidate at UBC, points out that modern democracy was built on the idea that citizens are rational and autonomous.

But he says voters across the political spectrum are more likely to vote with instinct than reason.

"We're motivated by our so-called 'lizard brains,'" says Moscrop.

He says the voting public isn't encouraged to wade through political platforms to make informed decisions.

"It's about messaging and name familiarity. And it reflects our own vulnerability to being manipulated -- which is why attack ads work and sound bites work."

Mental limitations

Is it the media or our 'lizard brain' that has more impact in how we vote? (Bullit Marquez/Associated Press)

​

The "lizard brain" is a catch-all term for the areas of our brain that developed between 500 million and 150 million years ago and are primarily responsible for instinct, emotion and recording memories, as well as visceral feelings that influence or even direct our decisions.

The neocortex, on the other hand, is the area of our brain responsible for reason, language, imagination, abstract thought and consciousness. Scientists say the neocortex has only been around for two or three million years.

When it comes to understanding the workings of the human brain, it's worth remembering that only a small percentage of our active brain is conscious.

It is impossible to quantify, but scientists say roughly 95 per cent of our brain activity is subconscious or unconscious.

"It is flawed to think that we're fully in control," says Tanya Chartrand, professor of neuroscience and psychology at Duke University.

"We don't have the mental capacity to process everything in our environment with conscious awareness and intent, so we pay attention to a small percentage of the environment at any given time. But in the background, we're non-consciously processing much, much more. And non-conscious processing later influences the decisions we make."

Chartrand points to a famous study published in 1996, in which psychologist John Bargh and his team at New York University assigned research subjects the task of reworking sentences.

The subjects working with words associated with the elderly – words such as "retirement" and "Florida" – left the research lab walking more slowly than their counterparts who were given neutral words.

Psychologists refer to this effect as "priming," and this experiment is just one of many that demonstrates our susceptibility to suggestion.

Political preferences are pre-formed

Many experiments have demonstrated our susceptibility to suggestion, according to neuroscientist Tanya Chartrand. (Bill Bamberger, Duke University)

​

"You would think that for high-involvement situations, like deciding on who to vote for, we should be creating spreadsheets of pros and cons and deliberately considering the pros and cons of candidates' platforms," says Chartrand.

But the truth is, most of us don't.

Moscrop says that election campaigns are run on a presumption that voters' political preferences are already formed.

A campaign, then, isn't really about engaging citizens in a rigorous exchange of transformative ideas, but rather reaffirming people's existing ideological biases and mobilizing citizens to vote for their respective camp.  

If the goal of democracy is to engage in a rigorous exchange of ideas that results in a greater good for all citizens, one of the first things to do is downplay the role of television ads during election campaigns, says University of Toronto philosophy professor Joseph Heath.

"Reason resides in language and our ability to explicitly articulate how we get from point A to point B in an argument," says Heath.

Philosopher Joseph Heath say election ads on TV encourage gut reactions, rather than reason. (Oscar Heath)

​

"If you're trying to communicate through visual stimulation, it won't encourage a rational appreciation of things, and that has a bunch of implications. Reason is very, very slow. Speed encourages gut reactions."

Heath also thinks it would be a good idea to get rid of cameras in the House of Commons.

"The way we organize Question Period in Canada is ridiculous," he says. He believes providing MPs with questions in advance of Question Period, for example, would foster a reasoned exchange of ideas.

Right now, he says, "It's gotcha moments -- questions are not provided in advance. The goal is to catch the minister unaware. And that degrades Canadian political discourse."

Designing a 'user-friendly' democracy

In his recent book, Enlightenment 2.0: Restoring Sanity to Our Politics, Our Economy, and Our Lives, Heath argues for a re-think of the expectations we have of individual citizens as well as the democratic structures we operate in.

"We've tended to think of human rationality as something located deep inside our brains. Whereas new psychological research shows that rationality is achieved through collaboration with people in groups and in a particular environment," says Heath.

Heath says that the political system should be conceived with our cognitive limitations in mind. He puts an emphasis on design. Two-year-olds can figure out how to operate an iPad, for example, because it is designed in a way that plays on human instinct.

"I would love to see a discussion about social institutions that could be built to better suit the way we operate," he says.

David Moscrop, who's working on his PhD in political science at UBC, says that if we acknowledge our mental limitations, we can design a democracy that takes into account our cognitive flaws. (Drew Gough)

​

Moscrop is a strong supporter of the idea of "deliberative" democracy, providing resources and incentives to citizens from all political stripes so that they can gather to discuss and advise on policy, using the results to influence politicians and also educate other citizens.

Such a practice, Moscrop hopes, would build civic engagement better than the current game of party politics, with its narrow focus on the ballot box.

He believes that if we acknowledge our mental limitations, we can design a democracy that takes into account our cognitive flaws.

"You change the structure, and the way things operate is going to change. But at the moment, the incentives are all there to do things at a base level."

Listen to the Ideas documentary Too Dumb for Democracy on Thursday, Oct. 2 at 9:05 p.m. ET on CBC Radio One.

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CRTC to Netflix: Since you won't co-operate, we'll ignore you

Canada's broadcast regulator is hitting the "delete" button on Netflix and Google, telling the online video services their submissions at hearings into the future of television will be ignored.

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission wrote to the companies Monday, saying it will remove presentations made by the two companies from the public record.

As well, any information or statements from the companies would not be considered in the CRTC's conclusions on whether television industry regulations need to be changed.

The letters were a response to the refusal of Netflix and Google to provide supporting evidence to back their claims that Canadian content is thriving online.

Effectively, it's as though the companies never offered any comments or appeared before the CRTC panel that has been looking into how Canadians receive and pay for TV programming.

The CRTC had promised both companies the same confidential treatment for their data as it gives all other sensitive information provided to it by other companies.

But Netflix in particular said it had concerns that its sensitive corporate information could eventually be made available to its competitors to exploit under a public interest test.

CRTC secretary general John Traversy said the companies' refusal to provide any supporting evidence means it cannot evaluate the strength of their arguments. And he said it undermined the authority of the regulator.

"The Commission views such actions as a direct attempt to undermine its ability to serve Canadians, as well as impair the procedural fairness owed to all participants," Traversy said in a letter to Netflix global public policy director Corie Wright.

A Netflix spokeswoman said the company would not be commenting on the content of the letter.

'Anecdotal evidence' won't guide policy

Meanwhile, Google said it saw nothing wrong with what it provided to the CRTC.

"We stand by the submissions we made in this process and believe we made a positive contribution to the discussion," a Google spokesperson said in a statement to The Canadian Press.

During two weeks of hearings earlier this month, Google said "compelling Canadian content succeeds online — all without broadcasting regulation," and that "Canadian creators, both emerging and established are building global audiences and earning revenue without having to work through intermediaries."

But Traversy said the commission cannot carry out its duties based on "mere anecdotal evidence."

"By refusing to provide any supporting evidence, the Commission cannot fully test and evaluate the strengths of Google's argument," he said.

The regulator has powers similar to that of a superior court, granted to it under the Broadcasting Act, and could have taken both companies to court.

But the CRTC chose not to take that route to save taxpayers a lot of time and money, said spokesman Denis Carmel.

The regulator had ordered Netflix to provide confidential information related to its business operations in Canada, including the number of Canadian subscribers and how much money it spent producing Canadian video content.

It had also asked Google to spell out the amount of content uploaded by Canadian users of its service, by how much it expected its advertising to grow and what advertising revenues it generated in Canada.

Both companies had appeared voluntarily before the commission but said they had concerns about whether the information could be kept secret.

Online video not regulated

Netflix also questioned the very authority of the regulator to impose demands on it, suggesting that the video streaming service did not fall under the Broadcasting Act since it is not a conventional broadcaster.

Netflix quickly became the centre of attention at the hearings when Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his heritage minister stated they would not allow the regulator to impose levies on Internet-based video services, something Harper referred to as a "Netflix tax."

The government statement, made as the hearings were just getting underway, came after the Ontario and Quebec governments, along with the CBC and some cultural organizations, suggested that Google, Netflix, YouTube and other online video streamers be regulated to help pay for production of Canadian TV content.

Marisa Monnin, a spokesperson for Heritage Minister Shelly Glover, told CBC News late Monday that "this specific issue is between Netflix and the CRTC in the context of the Let's Talk TV process, and it is up to those two parties to settle this dispute."

Monnin said that the CRTC operates independently and at arm's length from the government, but added that the Harper government supports the regulator's position not to regulate online video services.

"We will oppose any new regulations or a Netflix tax, like those‎ proposed by Liberals," Glover's spokesperson wrote.

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