Win ‘ validates investment Canada has made in research’: Governor General

Two years ago, Governor General David Johnston publicly lamented that, while Canadian scientists were among the world’s keenest minds, they were woefully inept at winning major international prizes.

Johnston pointed out that between 1941 and 2008, Canadians received 19 of the top international awards in science.

Australians received 42. Americans 1,403, and the Brits 222.

Johnston hoped to fix this imbalance by launching a “global excellence strategy,” a national initiative begun in 2013 where Canadian research agencies and scholarly bodies would push worthy Canadian scientists, with brilliant ideas, forward for major international prizes — including the Nobel.

Then, on Tuesday, a Canadian won the big one, as Queen’s University physicist Arthur McDonald captured the Nobel Prize for physics. The Governor General spoke with the National Post.

Q You wanted to boost the number of Canadians winning major international prizes. Now we have Arthur McDonald and his Nobel. Is the strategy already paying dividends?

A There is not a direct link between that specific strategy and this prize. The direct link is Art McDonald’s transformative science that has won him — and Canada — a Nobel Prize. Our strategy is attempting to create a better environment to promote Canadian excellence and to celebrate it, but I think with any Nobel Prize it is usually a process of some years. My guess is that this prize had been several years in the generation among Art McDonald’s peers around the world.

Q How important is a Nobel for Canadian scientists as a whole?

A It validates the investment Canada has made in basic research. And this is a very unusual one — because it is the identification of neutrinos having matter — and it was done on the basis of experiments carried out in a lab at the old Inco mine in Sudbury ( Ont.). It took a pretty substantial Canadian investment to turn an abandoned mine shaft into a lab that explores the fundamental questions of physics.

Q How do we get more Canadians on the Nobel ticket?

A There is a number of roads to Rome or roads to the Nobel Prize committee. In the case of Nobel, you just don’t send the application off to the committee and hope that they read it. The application has to be sponsored by an eligible partner, and in enhancing the application you need to be sure that is not unduly parochial. It is probably not a good idea having only Canadians promoting a Canadian. What you want to do is identify the leading people in a particular sub- discipline around the world, and determine whether they are prepared to support the nomination.

Q Is there something in the Canadian psyche that makes us prize- averse?

A We have a culture of humility and restraint, which serves us in some respects. But when one is competing for the great prizes for excellence, we should put some of that culture aside and be very ready and willing and imaginative in identifying and promoting our best. That is what the global excellence strategy is intended to do: We want to reinforce a culture of excellence and aspiration in this country.

Q You refer to McDonald as “Art,” and not Arthur. Do you know him?

A I know him well. He is one of those wonderful Canadians you get to know. We share a passion for hockey. I was born in Sudbury, in Copper Cliff, and Art’s drive each day to the neutrino lab goes right by the little town where I was born.