Today in The Conversation Canada, we’re honoured to have Nobel Prize winner Donna Strickland write about why it's important for all of us to be interested in “science for science’s sake.” Prof. Strickland of the University of Waterloo was awarded the 2018 Nobel Prize in Physics for her work in high-intensity lasers. Research she began in the 1980s eventually had a practical application in laser eye surgery. But Prof. Strickland says scientists shouldn’t only be encouraged to do research with practical applications. “We must give scientists the opportunity through funding and time to pursue curiosity-based, long-term, basic-science research,” she writes.

Advances in technology can also lead to more potential privacy abuses. Andrew Thompson of the University of Waterloo says mass invasions of privacy are becoming a human rights issue “as governments gain a greater capacity to discriminate — or worse — across gender and sexuality lines, and stifle dissent, including through violence.”

Allyson Stevenson of the University of Saskatchewan tells us about the Saskatchewan Indian Women’s Association, an important Indigenous organization formed in the 1970s that has been “hidden from history.”

And finally…Joel Lexchin of the University of Toronto is back again to shine the light on the actions of Big Pharma. He and Itai Bavli of the University of British Columbia look at new evidence that shows opioid manufacturers fund patient advocacy groups in Canada and how that has distorted policies to protect public health.

Regards,