Shuttle astronaut will perform York professor’s experiment

Canadian astronaut Dave Williams and six other astronauts are scheduled to blast off from Florida on Aug. 7 aboard the space shuttle Endeavour for a flight to the International Space Station, reported Broadcast News July 12. The trip is his second space voyage. But it’s his first visit to the space station, where he’ll be involved with continuing construction. He will help install a truss segment on the station and perform a Canadian experiment to test eye-hand co-ordination in space. The experiment was developed by York’s School of Kinesiology & Health Science, in the Faculty of Health.

  • Canadian Press noted July 12 that the experiment, called Perceptual-Motor Deficits in Space, was developed at York University [by York Professor Barry Fowler of the Faculty of Health], and looks at the reduction of hand-eye co-ordination using an experiment that resembles a computer game.

Pay off mortgage faster by merging debts

Professor Moshe Milevsky of York’s Schulich School of Business conducted a study in 2005 on how Canadian’s manage debt, wrote the Kelowna Capital News July 11. His conclusion was that Canadians can improve their asset and debt management strategies. You can pay off debt or a mortgage faster with the same amount of out of pocket money.

Milevsky observed diversification of debt by "space". This means spreading debt over several different components; for example, mortgage and several different credit cards or consumer loans. On the other side of banking is discretionary income and savings sitting for days, months or years earning minimal interest (if any) while interest owed on debt accumulates at higher rates.

Often people delay paying off non tax-deductible debt even when sufficient money sits idle in their accounts. His advice is to eliminate as many banking products as possible by consolidation of debt. The solution to paying down debt faster is to consolidate debts at one low interest rate in a line of credit and use their short-term assets – including income and short-term savings – to pay those debts off.

York’s Durie makes his Argos debut

York University product Andre Durie will make his CFL debut with the Toronto Argonauts tonight, but as a special teams player and not at running back, wrote the Toronto Star July 12.

On air

  • Native land claims expert Shin Imai, a professor in York’s Osgoode Hall Law School, spoke about the possibility of another Day of Action by Canadian Native groups, on AM640 radio (Toronto) July 11.