Archives for May 2021

by Jarrett Seto

More must see titles from Kanopy, an on-demand streaming video platform available for all students and staff.

The Pollinators

Beautifully shot, this cinematic odyssey follows mobile beekeepers as they haul their precious, albeit unusual, cargo from orchard to farm and onwards. The honeybees, whose numbers are in peril, are essential workers for helping to pollinate many of our staple crops. The Pollinators is surprisingly heartfelt and highlights issues with our current agricultural system with its reliance on chemicals and reduced crop diversity. By the end of its hour and thirty-two minute run time, you’ll have nothing but respect for the workers (both human and Apoidea). This is definitely a unique take on pollination and how some of our staple crops are grown and harvested.

Food Evolution

Narrated by Neil deGrasse Tyson, Food Evolution shows the often heated debate over genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and how it affects our food,or at least our perception of it. Science has been used and misused in the issues surrounding GMO foods for decades now. This documentary shows how scientific analysis and literature have been utilized to try and offset campaigns of misinformation on the alleged health risks for using GMO products. It displays both arguments, and science, with respect. But who is correct when people on both sides of the aisle are saying that the science is on their side? Watch and find out.

 

Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken

Fifteen years after the groundbreaking original, Martin Spurlock returns to the world of fast food. Be prepared to be enthralled and horrified at many aspects of the lack of control chicken farmers have over their employers. That’s one of many hidden ingredients to your McChicken meal. It should come as no surprise that many fast food products that are labeled as “healthy” are, in fact, not. With predatory industrial giants, fried chicken versus grilled chicken, and the guise of market research, sit down, relax and have a very healthy salad as you watch this.

Available for streaming here.

by Jarrett Seto

Kanopy is a multiplatform streaming service that has partnered with public libraries, universities, and post-secondary schools to deliver independent films, educational content, classic movies, quality documentaries, and other enriching programs to your screen. You can view fantastic and captivating material any time you’d like. Kanopy promotes exciting, well crafted, and relevant documentaries on contemporary and pressing issues of all calibre. Here three new titles I’ve chosen because I believe that they should be viewed immediately.

 

Capital in the Twenty-First Century | Kanopy

Thomas Piketty is the closest thing to an academic rock star that an economist could ever hope to be. Based off of his monumental and world renowned book, Capital in the Twenty-First Century translates perfectly to the screen for this informative documentary. The true scale of global wealth inequality is staggering and hard to comprehend. This documentary is a journey from the French Revolution to modern times, following the ebb and flow of wealth and power. Terms like corporate welfare, inherited wealth, estate tax, and income gaps have never been so in vogue, especially when you learn about the absurdities of wealth distribution among the most fiscally powerful nations.

 

Misinformation and the Brain | Kanopy and The Misinformation Threat | Kanopy

Although short in time, these under 30 minute Great Courses documentaries are rich in content and incredibly applicable to our current political climate. Learn how confirmation bias works, how we are all affected by it, and what the real world consequences of this are. Sure, we like to think that we’re rational beings, acting with the best information at hand. But the stark reality is, no matter how good you think you are at fact-checking and disseminating information, you still possess biases that affect how you consume it. We all fall victim to this, and it’s not our fault. It’s a mixture of the wiring of our brain and the design of and role technology plays in this. Our smartphones, social media sites, and the algorithms they use continue to divert our attention, promote our most base and reactionary instincts, and drive wedges into our splintering societies. In these documentaries, prepare to be disturbed by fake news and how true and false information can be molded to create confusion. See how these deliberately manufactured falsehoods are designed to incite an emotional response so our critical appraisals are compromised. Be alarmed that this is a major threat to democracy, as misinformation is hard to correct once it spreads.

 

The Future of Work and Death: The Impact of Technological Advances on Human Life

The Future of Work and Death is a deeply philosophical documentary, which covers the nature of what work exactly is to us and where it’s headed. It also discusses the future of death, and if there will even be death in the sense that we currently think of it. The scale of technological revolution and its effect on automation in technology is exponential and this means in the near future the division of labour will be predominately automated in many industries. The nature of work is changing faster than we can understand. What will come after complete automation of most jobs and what is our potential?

The second half of The Future of Work and Death is just as interesting. Will we eventually overcome our biological limitations and be blessed with superintelligence and extreme longevity? Will this change what is fundamentally important about being human? There could be a point in the near future when we are composed of mostly inorganic material, and possibly live on after our organic bodies die, with our consciousness’s uploaded onto a cloud storage system. The implications, both legal and moral, of near immortality in one form or another, have vast repercussions for who we are as a species and a society.

Available for streaming here.