fighting forest fires, saving people from floods, rescuing people at sea, finding people lost in the wilderness
all acceptable
all acceptable
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Beer. 
This question asks for a blanket assumption about all Canadians' willingness to die. It depends on the person, their personal situation (married with children or single), their personal feelings about the government. It also depends on whether they are in the armed forces or not, where you are expected to fight and maybe die if ordered.
A person may not want to sacrifice even their time to defend the country, but could jump into the harbour to save a drowning dog.
One never knows, do one?
This question asks for a blanket assumption about all Canadians' willingness to die. It depends on the person, their personal situation (married with children or single), their personal feelings about the government. It also depends on whether they are in the armed forces or not, where you are expected to fight and maybe die if ordered.
A person may not want to sacrifice even their time to defend the country, but could jump into the harbour to save a drowning dog.
One never knows, do one?
Agreed!Beer.
:clap: I think this is a very perceptive assessment. What one is prepared to give all for does depend a lot on situation. The blanket question is a bit unfair (no flaming pls) because it is too general. On a situation by situation basis, I can think up a lot of scenarios that I would be prepared to go to the wall for... home and family, obviously but others are more difficult. For example, usually I am very wary of walking/standing on the 2 lane highway around here, but coming across a crashed/injured motorcyclist I found myself standing in the middle of the highway in the dark flagging down trucks without really thinking about it - a gut response.
Other situations are more intellectualised. For example, I firmly support the idea that the Taliban/al'Qeda need to be stopped, that citizens of the world have a responsibility... I'd go myself if the powers-that-be would accept a 61 year old in full knowledge of the potential for death.
A pretty complicated question really.
Either that or I recognize how utterly useless I would be in any kind of physical conflict.
Humans have a strong evolutionarily programmed instinct for violence. It's how we've kept our population under control since we outsmarted our predators.
Nevertheless, fighting almost never solves any problems, and almost invariably creates more. The first and often only priority should be to prevent armed hostility from occurring. When it has already started, the only useful contribution I can see Canada making is as part of an International Peace-keeping force that serves to stabilize a ceasefire.
Getting rid of organizations like the Taliban is going to require decades of internationally-coordinated social engineering: Don't buy their heroin (we can grow our own), broadcast lots of western media and free educational programming into their airwaves, surround and inundated them with examples of the wealth and freedom enjoyed by citizens of western democracies and let their own human nature overthrow the theocratic rule of small-minded zealots.
In contrast, bombing the crap out of their subsistence-living, killing their children and trying to force them to change is just going to drive them into the arms of the leaders they know, regardless of how much they may not have liked them in the past.
Cheers
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