The Young and the Idealistic

So I've been to all three of my formal classes so far. The other students in Ice Physics are mostly in glaciology, and it looks like it's going to be enjoyable as the theory in it seems to be about my level. Sam's dad is in the class with me. The prof is his adviser. He is also on my committee.

Math Physics is just as I knew it would be, since I first started the course in Fall 2006. It's giving me a warm fuzzy to pick up where I left off, after having taken two detours away from this class: Dan's cancer treatments and trying to take the class from the math department. Both calamitous, though on different levels and in different ways!

I am also auditing a course called Sustainable Energy Systems, which looks like it's going to be very enjoyable and informative. It is, like Arctic Engineering, a very large class. However, unlike Arctic Engineering, it is not a requirement for anyone's degree, so most of the students are personally or professionally interested in the topic. There are also quite a few undergraduate students, most of whom I had never met. The prof asked us each to introduce ourselves and state why we were in the class. The reasons most of the students gave were poignant and optimistic. Quite a few were passionate about environmental conservation. One kid actually said, "Someone's got to put Big Oil out of business. It might as well be me!" Awwwwwww!

Recently, I have begun to believe that the next generation really might right a lot of wrongs and fix a lot of things wrong with the world. Things like racism, sexism, homophobia, and the destruction of ecosystems. I remember once at one of my first jobs out of college, I was tinkering about in the lab, building and messing with prototypes. I was saving aluminum shavings and rivet pins in a small box, and when I was done for the morning, I looked around for what to do with it. I asked an older colleague, who is an otherwise very nice man, where scrap went. He smiled and said to me, "Just throw it away! We always throw it away! Only you young kids worry about recycling and saving the earth!" That made me sad. But thinking about that incident today, it makes me optimistic. Why? Because if we only win the minds of young people, that will be enough. Like quantum mechanics and gay marriage, environmental conservation as a value will one day gain acceptance by attrition. The next generation will not struggle with whether these things are right or moral. They will just accept them as what is.