Benoit Mayrand

Just a regular person who likes travelling and outdoors.

[Gary Marcus @GaryMarcus]

Imagine how much everyone would rightly be freaking out if we discovered that Chinese AI did what OpenAI is doing.

[Angus Reid Institute @angusreidorg]

New: Ballot Backlash: BC Conservatives open 8-point lead after snap election call, but electorate far from locked in

https://t.co/FDfy7V2eOQ

[Benoit Mayrand @BenoitMayrand1]

@richardhetu Petit typo dans le texte: Jason KeNNEy

[Benoit Mayrand @BenoitMayrand1]

@hassinhadi @PaulPlamondon Pour "le détail de la liste des contre-tarifs canadiens", c'est publique depuis l'annonce:
https://t.co/Xl8xGIBxog

[Josh Wingrove @josh_wingrove]

Mood check: Canadian uncle sent me this

[Benoit Mayrand @BenoitMayrand1]

@HOUSEPORN___ This is made with AI...

[Editorial & Political Cartoons @EandPCartoons]

Bill Bramhall @BillBramhall

[Benoit Mayrand @BenoitMayrand1]

Le cri du cœur du petit propriétaire : d’investisseur à bouc émissaire
https://t.co/PwaAviOfFG

[GardeCôtièreCAN @GardeCotiereCAN]

En attente toute la nuit avant de déployer un enregistreur acoustique passif pour contribuer à la surveillance des baleines, l'équipage du NGCC J.P. Tully a mis ses talents de navigation à l'épreuve en transformant sa trajectoire en... baleine! 🐋

Photo 📷 : The Marine Detective

[Benoit Mayrand @BenoitMayrand1]

@INTERIORPORN1 This is low, promoting a pedophile for money.

[Prof. Katharine Hayhoe @KHayhoe]

How much is Canada responsible for the wildfire smoke reaching the U.S.?

Right now, nearly 900 wildfires are burning across Canada. Last week, Toronto's air quality was the worst of any major city in the world. But as the smoke spread south to the U.S., many politicians began blaming Canada for poor forest management.

It's true that local and regional forestry practices matter. Leafy deciduous trees hold moisture and can act as natural fire breaks; so clearing them for conifer monocultures can leave forests at higher risk to burn. But fire suppression, a big issue in the dry forests of the western U.S. where putting out frequent fires let fuel pile up, isn't a major factor here. Canada's remote boreal forests already burn naturally, in less frequent but higher-intensity fires.

The single biggest reason for the record-breaking *increases* in the area burned by wildfires that are causing all this smoke isn't land management. It's human-caused climate change.

As the world warms, winters are no longer cold enough to kill off tree-eating beetles. Their populations explode, leaving millions of acres of dead trees ready to burn. Warmer winters also mean less snowpack, so soil dries out earlier and the fire season runs longer. And climate change has more than doubled the frequency of hotter, drier fire weather across Canada and increased the frequency of the lightning strikes that spark most fires in northern Alberta and BC.

Every one of those four dials is being turned in the same direction by the same thing: the heat-trapping gas emissions from burning fossil fuels. And that's where the numbers start to tell a different picture.

The United States has emitted more carbon than any country in history: around 435 billion tonnes since the 1800s. That's close to a quarter of all the carbon humans have ever put into the air, 12 times Canada's total and still 50% more than China's 285 billion tonnes.

Look at it by company instead of by country, and 88 of the world's largest fossil fuel producers are responsible for the emissions that led to more than a third of the forest area burned across western North America since 1986. At the top of that list is Saudi Aramco, followed by US companies Chevron and ExxonMobil. The first Canadian company, Suncor, doesn't appear until number 76 ... but that could change, as Canada is building more pipelines!

Bottom line? If politicians want to clear the smoke from our skies, tell them the most effective place to start is by cutting the emissions that are driving these fires - no matter which side of the border we're on.

Sources, I'm a scientist so you know I have them: Doubled fire weather risk (World Weather Attribution, 2023). Fire suppression near communities (Parisien et al. 2020, Nature Communications). Climate-beetle-fire connections (e.g. Woo et al. 2024, Ecosphere). Climate-driven lightning increases in northwestern Canada (Burrows et al. 2024, Atmosphere-Ocean). Cumulative CO₂ by country (Our World in Data). 88 producers behind 1/3+ of western N. American area burned (Dahl et al. 2023, Environmental Research Letters). Company ranking (Carbon Majors). And for an exhaustive review of how we know human emissions are driving climate change, see the next post in this thread.

https://t.co/Spedt9SMaI

[Benoit Mayrand @BenoitMayrand1]

This should not exist.

[INTERIOR PORN @INTERIORPORN1]

Billionaire displays his F1 race car in his mega yacht in Monaco

[Canadian Mortgage Trends @CdnMortgageNews]

Here’s where the big banks currently see the @bankofcanada policy rate heading through 2027.

#CdnEcon #MortgageRates #BankofCanada #RateForecast

[Hadi Hassin @hassinhadi]

🚨 Depuis le 2 mars, 2167 personnes ont été tuées dans les frappes israéliennes au Liban, selon le ministère libanais de la Santé. Parmi les victimes, on compte 172 enfants et 91 secouristes.

[Anne Applebaum @anneapplebaum]

Orban concedes defeat. The support of Trump, Vance, Putin, Lavrov, Weidel, Milei, Le Pen, Fico, Babis and many others could not overcome Hungarian anger at a stagnant, corrupt regime

https://t.co/yfMCWUFk34

[Morgan Cameron Ross @Morgan_C_Ross]

The very first moments of Terry Fox's Marathon of Hope in St John's, Newfoundland 46 years ago this morning. The Marathon of Hope has raised over $1 billion for cancer research so far. credit: Terry Fox Foundation 🇨🇦

[NASA @NASA]

Hello, Moon. It’s great to be back.

Here’s a taste of what the Artemis II astronauts photographed during their flight around the Moon. Check out more photos from the mission: https://t.co/rzM1P0QbOl

[Niall Stanage @NiallStanage]

The scale of the destruction in Lebanon deserves more attention. More than 800,000 people displaced.

[Aaron Blake @AaronBlake]

“The Justice Department has withheld some Epstein files related to allegations that President Trump sexually abused a minor, an NPR investigation finds.” https://t.co/r3VrzYppaG

[Haven Harms @haventropy]

“I’m not worried about AI because you could just shut it down. Just unplug it!”