Commencement

Commencement Address 2008
Professor Shih Choon Fong
President, National University of Singapore
11 am, 7 July 2008, University Cultural Centre

Head, Heart, and Luck:
Reflections on Life

Mr Chancellor, President S R Nathan

Minister for Education, Dr Ng Eng Hen

Chairman of the National Research Foundation, Dr Tony Tan

Dean of Diplomatic Corps, His Excellency Sajjad Ashraf

NUS Pro-Chancellors

Chairman and Members of the NUS Board of Trustees

Distinguished Guests

Honorary Graduand Wee Cho Yaw

Graduands, Parents and Families

Alumni and Friends

Ladies and Gentlemen

Congratulations and Recognizing Students’ Contributions

Class of 2008, well done! Today we celebrate your commencing on a new phase of life. You have arrived at this milestone through your intelligence and perseverance. And behind each of you are families whose love, and in many instances, whose sacrifices, have helped bring you to this proud day. Congratulations to each and every one of you, and to your families.

Let me also thank you for contributing enormously to our university community in rich and diverse ways. Rich, because your intelligence and youth continue to challenge your professors. Diverse, because each of you brings something unique to our learning community. The different cultures and backgrounds you represent – close to 100 nationalities – contribute to our community’s intellectual and cultural vibrancy. Your creativity, energy and passion have done for us what rankings alone cannot do – you have contributed to the life and spirit of NUS. And to those of you who took up leadership positions in our Union, halls, clubs and societies, who gave energy to campus life, and who set traditions for those entering NUS, we thank you.

Moving On

You will soon be receiving your well-deserved degrees. You are stepping out into the world with all of its opportunities and uncertainties, bringing with you the knowledge you have gained here, to confront all that is changing rapidly or is still unknown. In this respect, you and I share something in common.

After 12 years of serving this University, with the last 8 as President, this will be my final Commencement Address at NUS. In December, I shall become the founding President of the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia. Like you, I too am setting out on a new adventure.

In my first Commencement Address, I urged the Class of 2000 to stay on the journey of learning and discovery, the journey to their dreams. Today being my last Commencement with you, I would like to speak from my heart and share some personal stories and reflections. As I look back on my own life journey, I recognize how I have benefitted from the interplay of head, heart and luck.

Head or Heart?

Moving on from NUS, you will have many decisions to make. Which job to take? Finding a life partner? Fulfilling family obligations? Pursuing your dreams? Or just toeing the line?

These are questions that have also gone through my mind. Indeed, a younger colleague asked me recently how I made the choices in my life. She was curious about how one might go about making some of the big decisions in life.

I said to her: “For big decisions, it is not enough to think with your head, listen also to your heart. If you want to buy a car think rationally, with your head – you pay daily for it. If you are deciding on a life partner, go with your heart. You live with that person for a lifetime.”

Someone else in the conversation disagreed with me. He said: “Use your head, be calculating and logical for marriage. You know, the passion ends after the honeymoon. Your spouse is someone you have to put up with daily, and pay for dearly. Now when it comes to buying a car, you want to be passionate and follow your heart. Because you aren’t stuck with it for life and it won’t argue with you.”

The question is: Use your head or listen to your heart? Be logical and calculating, or go with your instincts and intuitions? You most likely would have found yourself in situations where your head and heart were at odds. This is the perennial dilemma – the head or the heart?

I remember when I was being recruited from the US in the mid-90’s to come back to Singapore from Brown University. My friends and peers in academia urged me to be sensible, to think like a scientist, and not to be swayed by my feelings for home. They pointed out I would be giving up lifetime tenure at a world-class research university for a five-year appointment at a teaching-oriented university. Some called it “career suicide in a cultural desert.” My peers also questioned the kind of academic freedom I would have in a country that forbade the selling of chewing gum.

And now my friends in Singapore are saying similar things about my going to Saudi Arabia: “Here, you are on home ground. There, you will be in a real desert. Here, you are in a top university in Asia. There, it isn’t even built yet. And while you may not care much for chewing gum, you do like your wine.”

All reasonable. All sensible. A scientist should think and act rationally. If this were the case, I would not have left the US to come home. I would not be here this morning. I would also not have made the decision to go to Saudi Arabia.

Singapore and Saudi Arabia have been two crossroads in my life. Each time, I have recalled something my mother taught me: “It’s very good to want something, but you mustn’t want something so much that you can’t bear to live without it. To go far, be ready to give up what you already have.” My mother was a Buddhist, and this was her understanding of the principle of non-attachment.

This principle has helped me through life. It taught me to be passionate, but not obsessed; to be determined, but not to define myself by either my successes or my failures. I have learned that non-attachment gives the mental and emotional resilience to get beyond failures and setbacks. You can also enjoy your successes without taking yourself too seriously.

I take comfort in knowing that ultimately, my decisions at each of the crossroads were not held back by the familiar, the comfortable, or attachment to what I might have accomplished.

Befriending the Unknown

In my work and life, I have often ventured into the unknown. Some may see it as going off the beaten track of logic and reason.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, scientific progress and breakthroughs don’t always occur with hard-headed logical analysis. There is a moment when all of a person’s training, all of the logic, all of the accumulated knowledge of an entire discipline, lead that scientist to the very edge of knowledge. Peering over the edge of the cliff into the unknown, all there is … is an abyss. The choice is stark – to stay put and tinker on the known side of the cliff or to take a leap into the unknown. In these leaps of faith and intuition, scientific breakthroughs take place.

You may recall a scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, where Indie comes to the edge of a cliff. It was only as he stepped into the dark void that a bridge appeared. I wish it was this simple to achieve scientific breakthroughs.

In your journeys through life, I am not asking you to leap blindly. I am saying that it is possible to jump, to leap, with both eyes open, and with open minds and open hearts. I first learned this not in the research lab, but during my childhood in Singapore.

The Singapore where I grew up in the 1950’s and 60’s was a Third World country. Like most people in those times, my family was far below the middle class of today. Upgrading for me was moving from sleeping on the floor to a canvas camp bed when I was 15. I trust that it’s neither my self-conceit nor my imagination when I say that my generation, who had so much less, risked more, in part because there was not much to lose. We had a shared attitude that things just had to be done, regardless of the potential setbacks. The motto of Singaporeans of the 60’s was “Just do it!” Nike adopted it later.

I have observed that your generation, especially those who have grown up in First World Singapore, tends to be more risk averse, content to ride the escalator of life, more inclined to preserve what you already have. I see many turning conservative too early in life. By conservative, I do not mean your political or social beliefs, but your more cautious and calculating approach to life, which we often associate with those who are much older or tied down with life’s baggage.

Conservatism strives to secure certainty. It attempts to offer a safe harbor from the unknown. But in these times, new uncertainties, new unknowns proliferate. There is no safe harbor from them. My hope is for you to befriend the unknown, rather than be intimidated; to explore life on your terms rather than those prescribed by others; to let go of parochial loyalties and let life’s experiences teach you.

As you journey forth, I know you will use your head. After all, you have a university degree. But I hope that when it comes to the big decisions in life, you might also make them with more of your heart. The heart alone does not guarantee you success. Marriages do fall apart, careers you love can come to a dead end, friends you trust can let you down. But if these were chosen with the heart as well, then the pain, while seemingly unbearable, at least helps you grow. You will come to know what matters most. You will know what true friendship is. You will come to know yourself better.

Know Yourself, Be Yourself

This brings me to my next point – know yourself. The Greeks inscribed at their temple at Delphi these words: “Know Thyself.” I would like to add: Don’t just know yourself; be yourself.

I like to think that from an early age, I was myself. As a young boy, I found joy in creating exciting experiences for myself rather than learning by rote in the classroom. I was curious. I also let myself be curious.

Pursuing my curiosity meant sometimes missing classes and exploring the longkangs to catch fish and going into the forest to catch spiders for spider fights with other boys my age. It also meant creating my own learning experiences, such as going to the library to find out how to build an antenna to improve reception on my short-wave radio. It meant poking a hole through the roof of my house to affix that antenna, to the horror of my mother when it next rained.

Admittedly, Singapore of the 60’s was a less orderly place and far less structured. Yet, it had more space, more freedom, to do my own thing. My preference for exploring the longkangs, instead of devotion to schoolbooks and passing exams, did lead to mediocre grades. Although they got me into trouble, my childhood escapades helped me develop my own interests, which would serve me well later as a researcher.

My boyish delight in taking things apart in order to understand what held them together led me to the emerging field of fracture mechanics. It has since become a key area in engineering science impacting the design of high performance structures, such as in nuclear reactors, aircrafts, and Formula One race cars. Many of my peers had wondered about my choice of specialization. To them, it was not in the mainstream and could have a short shelf life. If I had had a more calculating mind, I might not have chosen fracture mechanics. But, I wanted to be myself. Driven by curiosity and passion, my play became my work and my work became my play.

I hope that in your time here at NUS, you have developed an inkling of what stirs your heart. When you begin to know yourself, you also begin to discover where you can do well. Should your work and play become one and the same, I believe you will excel in extraordinary ways and accomplish the exceptional.

Luck

Let me now turn to luck.

Where does luck come from? Some say it comes from the supernatural realm, like spotting the right questions for an exam you are desperate to pass. Others feel that luck is pure chance, of being in the right place at the right time. As for me, I see that luck can be created.

This kind of luck comes from connecting with people. People can open doors and help you see windows of opportunity. The Chinese call this yuan fen （缘份）– when something is created out of serendipitous encounters. When Bill Gates, Paul Allen and Steve Ballmer met in school, this was yuan, or chance encounters. When they became friends, sharing ideas and dreams, this was yuan fen.

In my own life, yuan fen too played a role. Some of you would be aware that I don’t have a bachelor’s degree. I’m probably the only faculty member here without a first degree. I could say that I didn’t apply to the University of Singapore, predecessor to NUS. The fact is I was not even eligible. I spoke earlier about my lack of interest in school, spending time instead discovering the world outside the classroom. I paid for my unquenchable curiosity with mediocre O-level grades. They were not good enough for me to take what you would now call the junior college track. I ended up going to Singapore Polytechnic.

During my Poly days, on the occasions I ran into the principal, Robert Edis, I would take the opportunity to share my ideas with him. He found them interesting enough to ask a visiting professor from McGill, Raymond Yong, to look at my work. Sufficiently impressed, Dr. Yong offered me a research assistantship at McGill.

From there, I went to Harvard, where my PhD advisor, John Hutchinson, would not only become my mentor, but my lifelong friend as well. John was brilliant and working in an emerging area of fracture mechanics, which fascinated me. He was one of the youngest full professors at Harvard, and close in age to me – only six years older. It was not just our youth which we had in common. We recognized in each other a shared passion. We reached out and connected with each other. John gave me the space and support that I needed to be myself, and thus, to be my best. Meeting John was my yuan. Working with him was yuan fen.

Closing

Graduands, today you become part of the NUS alumni family. You are moving on from NUS, just as I am. This University has been a big part of our lives. We leave with a warm spot in our hearts for the memories we share and the friends we have made here at NUS.

You are connected not only with your classmates, but also with generations before and after you. As you commence, let yuan fen work for you. It is people connecting with one another, sharing ideas and dreams, which enhances luck. The key is not how much attention you can get from others, but your giving regard to others – your engagement and interest in them.

We tend to have fixed ways of seeing people who are different. I hope we can let go of our preconceptions, our prejudices and even our conditioning. By taking a second look, in revisiting our assumptions – about people, places and ideas – in being open to the unknown, we improve our luck.

As you journey into the future, you will surely forget much of what I have said today. I do hope that as you go about life you will remember the interplay between head, heart, and luck. May your head and heart, powered by luck, bring you great success.

Congratulations on your Commencement.