桥梁和重圆（中英文双语）

桥梁和重圆

——在林炎平中心（古代和现代世界的自由和全球秩序研究中心）成立仪式上的讲话

编者注：日前，林炎平博士为母校麦吉尔大学（McGill University）捐款340万元加币成立了“林炎平研究中心”。本文为林博士在中心成立庆典上的发言。他在文中回顾了自己与麦吉尔大学的深厚情缘，道出了其捐款义举背后深邃的文化与道德思考，并阐述了中心创办宗旨及未来研究方向。本微特刊发此文，使这些充满激情和哲学思辨精神的文字可以滋养更多的读者。

约翰•邓恩荣誉教授
院长哈德逊•米德威尔教授
院长吉姆•奈赛尔教授
中国驻蒙特利尔总领事馆领事熊胜先生
副校长马克•温斯坦先生
副校长和教务长克里斯托夫•曼弗雷迪教授
荣誉校董迈克尔•米恩先生
校长和副校董苏珊•福捷教授
全体教授们
我的宾客们
女士们，先生们：

谢谢大家前来一起庆祝这一时刻！

对我来说，在这里经历这样一个历史时刻是一个巨大的荣誉。

这不仅仅是一个中心的揭幕式和庆祝，也不仅仅是对某一个个人的致敬，而是对一个原则的庆祝，这个原则就是加拿大的价值。

我永远是欠债者

在此，我被称作捐赠者，但是在我内心深处我感到的却是，对于麦吉尔大学和加拿大我是一个永远的欠债者。是麦吉尔大学和加拿大给了我到这里来学习的机会并且使得我今天的所作所为成为可能。

我依旧清楚地记得我抵达加拿大的第一天，那是1986年8月24日。我身上只带了50美元和一张父母用毕生积蓄为我买的单程机票。

我也记得此前我是如何填写麦吉尔大学攻读博士学位申请表的：

在问题“你有多少钱可以用来支持你在麦吉尔大学的学习？”我的回答是“零”。

在问题“谁将给予你在加拿大期间的支持？”我写了“你”。但是我马上擦掉换上了比较礼貌的回答：“我没有钱，没有亲戚，没有任何资源，所以如果您不提供资助我就无法前来。但是我很希望来。您将不会后悔您给我的支持，因为我一定会回报。”

我仔细填写好表格，寄给了麦吉尔大学。

一个月后，我收到了振奋人心的回信：我已经被接受进入麦吉尔大学攻读博士学位并且给予我研究助理资助每年11,000加元；而且，我的学费全免。

对我来说，这是一个天文数字。正是这个资助使得我得到了签证并且来到了这里。

我非常感谢我的导师梅里克•阿克本教授，是她从众多的申请者中选择了我。她后来去了渥太华大学。她在数年前去世了。我绝不会忘记她。我也非常感谢史蒂夫•于教授，他在我的论文最后答辩的关头协助我正在生病的导师，从而使得我的博士答辩能够顺利完成。

在我麦吉尔大学的学习期间，我遇到了许多有趣的教授和同学，正是这些我学习生涯中的点滴细节使得我充满喜悦和热情。正是这些日常琐事使得我理解了麦吉尔大学和加拿大对于我的意义。这些事情有大有小，有重要的也有次要的，有开心的也有伤感的，有美好的也有糟糕的，有智慧的也有蠢笨的。

光阴荏苒，但是我从未忘记我关于”回报“的承诺。这个词我记得如此清楚和长久，以致最终成为了”救赎“。

毕业后我立即设法馈赠麦吉尔大学。我记得我的第一次捐赠不超过500加元，但是我马上收到了来自大学的感谢信，称谓我“新领袖之一”。我当然知道这是对我的过奖，但是也说明了大学知道如何鼓励捐赠。现在麦吉尔大学称谓我“缔造者之一”。我知道这是一种殊荣。相比“缔造者”，我更加喜欢被称作“新领袖”，因为后者生机勃勃，而前者则有点老气横秋。后者像是“女高音”，而前者像是“男低音”。但是我喜欢男低音，不仅仅是因为我曾经在渥太华大学合唱团唱过男低音，而且是我理解没有了男低音则会让女高音和整个合唱团失去魅力。

我坚持为麦吉尔大学捐赠，迄今已经有两个奖学金和一个基金，再加上今天捐建的中心。我捐赠不是为了别人，而是为了自己。因为我做了“回报”这一承诺，如果不兑现，便会夜不成寐。在承诺“回报”的时候，我从未想到后果如此严重。

这让我想到了一则电视广告：一位沮丧的男士坐在出租车里，好心但是丑陋的司机劝导说：“不要沮丧，买张彩票你就开心了，你也许会赢。”男士沮丧地回答：“赢了，我就请你去加勒比旅游。” 结果他真的赢了大奖。接着他还真的兑现了他的诺言，和这个出租车司机共游天堂般的加勒比。当然很不情愿。

因此，在你做出如此重大的承诺时，你必须确定对方是一位美丽的女士，这样你就不会后悔了。对我而言，麦吉尔大学就是这样一位美丽的女士。

麦吉尔大学

我们给予是由于我们受人之恩

我的父母是我的榜样，他们把毕生的积蓄都捐赠给了中国的一所大学。

我也绝不会忘记在我最艰难的岁月里，在中国荒凉的山村里一位老大爷和众多相亲帮助了我。

我们不可能给予社会多于我们从社会索取的，而我们亏欠最多的是对那些伟大的思想者。因此我们必须回馈给社会。

我们一直享受着这些伟大思想的恩惠，这些伟大的思想通过科学、技术和艺术，给了今天的我们所有精神的和物质的财富。

没有了这些伟大思想，今天的世界会是怎样一片洪荒？

如果没有毕达哥拉斯会如何？是他把音乐和数学联系起来。

如果没有阿里斯塔克会如何？是他测量了太阳、地球和月亮的相对距离后发现太阳比地球大得多，从而推出应该是地球绕太阳转而不是相反。

如果没有艾拉托色尼会如何，是他靠测量不同维度上的太阳阴影而计算了地球子午线长度。

如果没有德谟克里特会如何？是他提出所有物质都是由一种不可再分割的原子组成。

如果没有苏格拉底会如何？是他在雅典的大街上随机请人交谈并让对方发现其实他所认为的常识只是幻觉。

如果没有欧几里德会如何？是他把几何知识综合为“几何原本”，从而给予了人类最大的科学武器。

我还没有提到阿基米德、亚里士多德或者柏拉图等等，因为否则会冗长无比。没有了他们也许也不会如何，只是我们必然在暗夜中苦苦探索得更久，也许依旧。

对于这些伟大的思想，我们都是欠债者。这正是我们必须回馈社会的理由，只有这样，我们未来的后代才有可能受惠于我们今天的努力。

笛卡尔曾经这样说“我给，故我在”。哦，并非如此！他说的是“我思，故我在”。但是我们必须理解，思想是一种给予，而且是最大的给予。人类文明不是建立在劳力上，也不是建立在物质上，而是建立在思想上。

正是由于这个理由，我们可以说“我给，故我在”。

这是我们的国家

我必须对我们华人社区的同仁说几句。加拿大是我们的国家，我们必须参与到加拿大社会之中。加拿大不是宾馆。我对一些抱怨有所耳闻，比如说加拿大对华人有歧视。我必须说，我从未遭受到任何系统性的歧视，我从来不觉得我比欧洲后裔的加拿大人遭受更多的不公对待。我们必须理解，系统性的问题和随机性问题是完全不同的问题。

加拿大是如此伟大，以至于我们可以随心所欲地批判她的不足和问题。

在这个国家，你和政治家握手，那是他的光荣；

在这个国家，你批判她的问题，那是你的爱国行动。

作为来自不同文化背景的新移民和来了不太久的移民，我们确实有着许多需要理解和调整之处。我们知道，我们来自的东方和我们居住的西方之间有着不同。我们必须在这种不同之上用理解建筑一座桥梁，而不是假定由于文化的不同这样的桥梁不可能建造，从而把自己置于社会之外。

为什么要有这三座桥梁？

是的，我将讲的是桥梁，而且是三座桥梁：

在西方和东方之间的桥梁；
在历史和现代之间的桥梁；
在科学和人文之间的桥梁。

这些桥梁至关重要。对历史和现代的研究，将使得我们从时间上理解世界的发展；对西方和东方的研究，将使得我们从空间上理解世界的存在。而最终，是应该让人文和科学密切结合，因为，离开了人文，科学便失去了目的；而离开了科学，则人文失去了进步的可能。

如下是我关于这些“桥梁”的简要解释。

A. 西方和东方

1）古希腊剧场和东方剧场：

了解东西方不同的最好办法是比较它们的差异。比如，东西方的剧场有着极大的不同。希腊的剧场是半圆形的，舞台在圆心，是最低的地方。距离舞台最近的座位和舞台在同一高度，而随着座位和舞台之间距离的增加，其位置也越来越高。而东方的剧场则完全不同，其舞台在最高的地方，而观众却在最低的地方。剧场形式当然反映了社会现实。当一位古希腊政治家对听众发表讲演的时候，他是站在最低的地方，面对位置比他高的听众。而如此情形绝对不会发生在中国，因为没有哪个皇帝会容忍他的臣民坐在高处俯视着听他的讲演。

古希腊剧场

2）东西方之间的迁徙：

目前，这已经演变为了一场大灾难，而且无法用任何常规的办法进行制止。我们为什么不能让那些大规模输出难民的国家按比例放弃一部分领土给接收难民的国家。当然，这个原则是非常难以执行的。但是，如果我们有足够的政治动力，还是可以有所作为的。比如，如果一个国家的难民希望移民到德国，那么我们就在这个国家制造一个德国；如果你希望移民到加拿大，我们就在你的国家制造一个加拿大。这些国家并不会失去领土，而仅仅是在联合国的监督下由别的国家帮助其建设一个其人民向往的社会。这就如同别人免费帮助你在你的后院进行修整。

在东西方之间我们真的可以找到共同的价值吗？如果没有，那么我们就应该努力创造这种共同价值。这些共同价值就是建造东西方桥梁的基础。

B. 历史和现代

我们回顾历史就如同我们凝视镜子。我们努力地观察镜子，并非由于要看清楚镜子，而是要看清楚镜子中的自己。我们自己在镜子中的形象才是我们看镜子的理由。

如果不理解历史，我们就无法理解现代和我们自己。我们是否可以避免在历史错误上重蹈覆辙取决于我们多大程度上理解了历史。

为了看清楚历史这面镜子中的我们自己，需要有一面准确的不变形的完美镜子。我们必须制造这样一面镜子，亦即，我们必须重现历史真相。我们必须让这面镜子准确地反映我们当代，而不是制造一面刻意变形的镜子来美化我们这个时代和我们的行为以及造成的后果。虽然我们不能穿越时空回到从前去劝导我们的祖先什么该做或什么不该做，但是我们可以在历史中寻求那些他们当时无法理解的答案。

这是一座必须建造的桥梁。由于时间不可回流，因此受益者只能是生活在时间更晚的一方。因此我们也把将来作为我们的考虑，因为对于将来，我们就是历史。我们建造的桥梁也将是为了子孙后代。

我们见证了某些利益团伙为了其利益而篡改历史。我们非常理解，当某人歪曲历史的时候，他一定是为了窃取当下。而那些损害当下的人，一定会篡改历史。

毋庸讳言，历史曾经被篡改以符合某些人的当代利益。而我们的责任则是把歪曲的历史纠正过来。我们的使命是为将来留一面准确的精密的和完美的镜子。

这就是建造横跨历史和现代的桥梁的意义。当然这对将来也极具意义。

C. 科学与人文

在两千年前的古希腊，科学和哲学是不分家的。古希腊人给我们展示了科学和哲学应该如何密不可分以成为一体，而不是彼此分离各自独立。这个传统在牛顿时代依然是成立的。他的《自然哲学的数学原理》同时是哲学的也是科学的。但是，我们今天只有PhD（哲学博士）这一个名词可以作为那个遥远时代美好传统的回声。在大学里，哲学属于人文而人文不包含科学。同时，工程仅仅和机器和机械有关而失去了人文意义。在今天的大学校园里，把工程和艺术放在一起似乎听起来都觉得别扭。

然而，我们不断地同时面临来自人文和科学的挑战，亦即来自艺术和工程的挑战。

1）全自动汽车：

用不了多久，你将坐进你的轿车，告诉它你想去哪里，然后轿车就会自行开往你的目的地。只有乘客没有司机，你的车就是你的司机。但是，这个行车软件将如何编制不仅仅是一个工程任务而且是人文任务。在某些场合其需要的人文更多于工程。比如，当你的车面临这样的紧急状况时它将如何抉择：只有两种可能的结果——牺牲车内乘客的生命或者是车外路人的生命。面对这样的情况，我们会如何让车做出选择？过去，我们可以隐匿这个悖论，让那面临这样不幸状况的倒霉司机自己去选择。但是，现在我们必须编出程序，我们不再能假装我们不知道。我们到底是选择拯救车内的乘客还是车外的路人？我们到底是否准备选择杀死少数以保存多数？我们到底是否选择保护特定的几个而不顾其他？还没有人高调声明这个程序将如何编辑，但这对工程师们来说是一个无法避免的挑战。这更多的是一个道德问题，而不是工程问题。在这个意义上，我们理解了：分割工程和人文是不可能的。

2）人文是工程的目的，因此工程从来都伴随着人文。回顾人类文明的历史，它们的名字本身就是证据：旧石器时代、新石器时代、青铜时代、铁器时代、钢铁时代，等等。人类使用的材料和工具便是文明的名称。

在学术界，科学和人文的桥梁更加重要。没有科学的哲学总是倾向于制造头脑发热的狂徒，而另一方面，没有人文的科学总是导向冷酷无情的社会。

我们不希望把工程教育变成就业训练班，也不希望让人文教育输出热情澎湃但是理性缺失的毕业生。

我们希望怎样的未来？

如果我们不努力，未来则不乐观。我对未来悲观大于乐观。近几个世纪来的巨大物质成就造就了东西方之间、历史和当代之间以及人文和科学之间的巨大鸿沟。我们见证了大学丢弃了古典教育，我们见证了世界范围的民族主义狂热，我们见证了精神对于物质的退却……人类文明在这样的趋势下还能够坚持多久？

巨大的物质成就使得我们忘记了它们背后的伟大思想，如同我们为辉煌的建筑倾倒，却忘记了其建筑师。

贝多芬的第九交响曲的主旨在于“重圆”，我不知道何时得出了这样的结论：第一乐章表现了抗争，第二乐章表现了冲突，第三乐章表现了反思，第四乐章表现了乐曲的宗旨——重圆。对我来说，“重圆”是具有深刻和广泛含义的：不同民族之间，不同时代之间以及科学和人文之间都需要重圆。而我所说的“桥梁”只有一个意义，那就是“重圆”。

我记得那是我到蒙特利尔的第二年，在蒙特利尔艺术馆举办了“达芬奇工程展”。这是我第一次在书本和图片之外看到了达芬奇的作品。他设计的飞机就在展览上，他的各种各样的工程设计都展示在那里。

达芬奇是把科学和人文，以及工程和艺术，结合在一起的完美的典范。

他的《蒙娜丽莎》一直在卢浮宫微笑，这也是我朝拜卢浮宫至少30次的理由之一。这著名的自信的微笑已经持续了500多年，在《蒙娜丽莎》面前，每天都有成千上万的人怀着赞叹和好奇的心情瞻仰这幅作品。而达芬奇的科学思想和工程设计也激励了一代又一代的人们，而且至今依旧在我们之中。

《 蒙娜丽莎》

我们热爱这些伟大的思想者，正是他们证明了我们人类有着不可置疑的共同点——热爱美好，诉求正义，追寻理性。

毕竟，如果我们可以继续思想和给予，这个世界就不会走向黑暗。

谢谢大家！

现在让我们欢迎专程从旧世界赶来新世界参加这个庆祝的思想者，英国科学院院士，剑桥大学的荣誉教授，我的朋友约翰•邓恩教授。

附：讲话英文原文：

Bridges and Reconciliation

The speech at the inauguration of
The Yan P. Lin Research Center
for the Study of Freedom and Global Orders in the Ancient and
Modern Worlds

Professor Emeritus John Dunnl
Dean Prof. Hudson Meadwell
Dean Prof. Jim Nicell
The consul of the Consulate General of PR China to Montreal Mr. Xiong Sheng
Vice-Principal University Advancement Marc Weinstein
Provost and Vice-Principal Academic Prof. Christopher Manfredi
The Honourable Chancellor Michael Meighen
McGill Principal and Vice-Chancellor, Suzanne Fortier
All the professors
and my guests
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Thank you for being here to celebrate together!

It is a great honour for me to be here to experience such a historical moment.

I understand that this inauguration and celebration is not only for one center, and this tribute is not for one person, rather it is a declaration of a principle, which is the principle of the value of Canada.

I am forever indebted to McGill and Canada

Here I am praised as a donor and a giver, but deep in my heart I feel forever indebted to this great university McGill in particular and this great country Canada in general. It is McGill and Canada that offered me such great opportunities to come and study here and made it possible for me to do what I do today.

I still remember the day when I arrived in Canada, which was Aug. 24, 1986. I arrived at Montreal airport, carrying less than $50 with a one way ticket bought by my parents with their lifetime saving.

I also remember how I filled my application to McGill for my PhD program.

On the question “How much money do you have to support your study at McGill”, my answer was “0”;

On the question “Who will support you during your stay in Canada?” I wrote “you”. Then I erased it and changed it into something more polite, but the meaning was the same: I have no money, no relatives, no any resources, therefore, if you don’t give me financial support then I cannot come. But I really want to come. You will not regret supporting me because I will reciprocate your support.

I filled the form as carefully as I could and sent it to McGill.

A month or so later, I received the wonderful reply that I was accepted as PhD student with a “Research Assistantship” of $11,000 per year. In addition, my tuition would be waivered. That was an astronomical figure for me and it was that money got me the visa and got me here.

I thank my supervisor, Prof. Melek Akben, for choosing me out of many applicants. She later moved to Ottawa Univ. She passed away many years ago. She will never be forgotten. I also thank Prof. Steve Yue for stepping in at the last stage of my PhD program due to the heath issue of my supervisor.

I met so many wonderful people during my study at McGill, professors and fellow students alike. It is these details of my journey that made me carry on with great enthusiasm and pleasure. It was these daily events, big and small, great and trifle, happy and sad, wonderful and awful, brilliant and dumb, that all taught me the Canadian values and made me understand what McGill and Canada meant to me.

Time passed fast, but I have never forgotten my promises. “Reciprocating” is the word I always remember, with time passing by, it slowly became “Redemption”.

Immediately after I graduated from McGill, I tried to find a way to deliver my promise.

I remember my first donation was no more than $500. Soon after, I received McGill’s reply, praising me one of the “new leaders”. I am sure that they were over generous on this, but it was a good tactic to encourage graduates to give. Now I am told that I am in the category of “founders of McGill”. I still prefer “new leaders” to “founders”, because the former sounds so fresh and the latter a bit old. But I like both, though more former than latter. The “New Leader” sounds like soprano and the “founders” sounds like bass. I like base too, not only because I was singing at Ottawa Univ. choir as a bass, but also that without bass soprano would lose her beauty.

I continued. I did not donate for anyone else, rather I did it for myself. If I don’t deliver my promises, I have problem of sleeping. At the time when I made the promise of “reciprocation”, I never thought the consequences could be that serious.

That reminded me a TV commercial: A taxi driver found his passenger depressed, cheering him that he could win the lottery. The passenger responded hopelessly with a promise that if he won the Jackpot then he would take the driver for vacation to Caribbean. Then he won. And he did take the driver to a beautiful island for vacation. And he was painfully reluctant. You know that when you make some big promises like this, you should make it to a beautiful lady, then you will never regret.

For me, McGill is that beautiful lady.

Why should we give? Because we have taken

My parents set an example by giving all they had to a university in China.

I will never forget that remote village in China, where an old peasant among many helped me during my most difficult years. He died before I had ability to help him, leaving regret that I can never recover. I rebuilt his tomb, which is never enough for me.

We have to give back to the society when we can and it is impossible for us to give more than we have taken. We are forever indebted, especially to the great minds.

We are given a free ride by these minds. What we have both in spirit and material today were created by great minds, through science, technology and arts. Without them we would still be in Neolithic Age.

What would be the world if Pythagoras did not connect music and mathematics? What if Aristarchus did not measure the relative distances between the Earth and the Sun and the Moon then found that the Sun was much bigger than Earth so as to propose that our Earth must be circling around the Sun rather than the other way around? What if Eratosthenes did not measure the Sun shadow differences to calculate the earth’s longitude? What if Democritus did not hypothesize that all the materials were made of some basic indivisible elements called atoms? What if Socrates did not fetch randomly the pedestrians on the streets of Athens to make them realize their common senses were actually illusions? What if Euclid did not bother summarizing the great “Elements” to give us the most powerful scientific method of thinking?

I did not even mention Archimedes, Aristotle, Plato or other great minds because the list would otherwise go endless.

We are indebted to these great minds, and the great minds after them. This is the reason that we should give back to our societies so that the generations to come will enjoy our contribution.

Descartes said “I give, therefore I am.” Oh, no, of course not accurate. Rather “I think, therefore I am.” But we have to realize that thinking is giving, and thinking is the greatest giving. Our human civilization is not built on labour, not on materials, but on mind.

In this way, we say “I give, therefore I am”.

This is our country

I have some words to my fellows in Chinese community. Canada is our country. We must be involved ourselves into the Canadian society. Canada is not a hotel. I heard someone complaining about discrimination in Canadian society. I have to say that I have never encountered any systematic discrimination in this country and have never felt that I was unfairly treated than my fellow European Canadians. We have to understand that there is a huge difference between a systematic problem and a random problem.

Canada is such a great country, so much so that we are allowed to criticize her imperfections and problems.

In this country, you shake hands with a politician, that is his honour;

In this country, you criticize her problem, it is counted as your deed of patriotism.

As new comers, and even not so new ones, from a different culture, we do have a lot to understand and adjust. Building a bridge of understanding is the best way to make the individuals in society successful, thus the whole society.

I know that between East where we are from and West where we live now, there are differences. We have to bridge them by understanding rather than isolating ourselves by assuming that the cultural difference cannot be bridged.

Three bridges and why?

Yes, I am talking about a bridge. I actually will talk about three bridges, which are the purposes for me to support the research center.

1)Between West and East;

2)Between the past and present;

3)Between science and humanity.

It is important for us to have these “bridges”. The studies of the past and present will make us understand the development of the world in terms of time; that of West and East will make us understand the difference in terms of space; eventually, humanity and science should be inseparable twins in academy, for humanity is the purpose of science and science is the best way to enhance humanity.

Here are some examples to explain why it is so.

A) The West and The East

1) The theaters in Greece and East

To understand the differences between West and East, the best way is to compare them. There is an astonishing difference in theaters of the East and West. The Greek theater, which is the ancestor of the Western theater, has its stage at the center but the lowest position. The audience seats are circularly arranged with higher position as the increase of the radius. The theater in the East was completely the opposite, with its stage at the highest position and the audience is at the lower ground.

This arrangement of the stage and audience seats reflects the political and social reality. When a politician in ancient Greece talked to his fellow citizens, he was on the lowest position, facing the citizens sitting higher than him. This would never happen in the East, because it was impossible to ask an emperor to stand lower position to face his subjects sitting higher than him.

2) Migration from East to West:

It has been a disaster as the Syrian refugee floods into Europe. It is impossible to stop such human migration by any conventional measurements.

A bridge must be built, which is the bridge of culture and trust. The countries that produce refugees should give up their lands proportionally to the countries that accept them. This principle is very difficult to be applied, because the people escape a country and those who rule it belong to totally different interest groups. However, there is something that can be achieved as long as we have the political will. The countries of the migration source should be forced to lend their lands to the countries of immigration destination. For instance, if you like to move to Germany, we build a Germany for you in your land. If you like Canada, we build a Canada in your country. It is a development exemplary for the problematic countries. The land will not be taken by any foreign countries. It is like that you let other people to enter your backyard to renovate it for free.

Are there common values for both the West and the East? If we have not had it yet, we must find it or create it. These common values are the base for the bridge.

B) The Past and The Present

That we look into history is like looking into a mirror. We look hard into a mirror, not because we want to only see the mirror itself, rather we want to see ourselves inside the mirror. It is ourselves in the mirror that is our ultimate purpose of looking into it.

Without the understanding of history, we would lose the understanding about ourselves in the present. How much we understand the history decides how we can avoid repeating the same historical mistakes.

To see ourselves inside the mirror as we really are without distortion, we need a perfect mirror. We must build the perfect mirror, which means we need to restore the history as it was. We need to make the mirror accurate so as to reflect our present time, but we cannot distort the mirror to beautify our time and our activities and the results from them. We cannot go back time to tell our ancestor what to do or not to do so as to achieve more and fail less. But we can search the answers that they did not have thus could not tell us because they did not understand then.

Since time does not flow back, the beneficiary can only be the ones on the side of later time. We also have the future in our mind, because we will be the past in future and we are building the mirror for the generations to come.

We have seen time to time the histories were revised for the sole purpose to benefit some interest group’s purposes. We can well understand that when someone wants to distort the history, his purpose is to sabotage the present. When someone wants to hijack the present, he has to distort the history.

We know how history was edited to fit someone’s interest today. It is our duty to correct the distortion. It is our duty to leave an accurate, refined and perfect mirror to the future.

This is the meaning of the bridge between the past and the present. Certainly, it is also meant for the future.

C) Science and Humanity

Science and philosophy were not separated over 2 thousand years ago in Greece. The ancient Greeks showed the way how science and philosophy were supposed to be together, not to be independent to each other, but combined as a unity. This tradition was still evident in Newton’s time. His “The Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy” is as philosophical as scientific. However, today we have only the name of “PhD”, Doctor of Philosophy, to echo the beautiful tradition. In universities, philosophy belongs to faculty of humanity and science is not included. At the same time, engineering becomes something related to machine and mechanics without humanity interactions. Engineering and Arts become such an odd pair that they do not even sound right when together on our university camps.

However, we constantly face the challenges simultaneously from humanity and science, from arts and engineering. Here are some examples.

1)Automated car: Soon we will be able to get into our car and tell it where you want to go and the car will drive you there by itself. No driver, but only passengers. The car is your driver. However, making the driver software is not only a task of engineering but also humanity. In some sense it is more humanity than engineering. For example, when the car faces a critical situation that will have only two outcomes, the death of the passengers inside the car and that on road, how do we program the car to act? Before, we hide this dilemma and leave to the driver who unfortunately faces these choices. Now we all have to know what we as a society and collectively want to choose. We can no longer pretend that we do not know. Do we choose the lives of the passengers in the car over the lives of the people outside of the car? Or we choose to kill a few so as to save many? Or we choose to save certain people by sacrificing the others? No one has openly declared how the program will be written, but it is an inevitable challenge facing the engineers. It is more a moral issue than an engineering one. In this sense, we know that separating engineering from humanity is impossible.

2)Humanity is the purpose of engineering, thus engineering should always be associated with humanity. Look back the human civilizations eras, their names are evidences. Paleolithic Age, Neolithic Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Steel Age, etc. The materials and tools that we engineered are the titles of our civilizations.

In our academy, it is even more important to bridge science and humanity. Philosophy without scientific thinking tends to produce hotheaded fanatics, on the other hand, science without humanity leads to heartless society.

On our campus, in engineering, we don’t want to become job training workshop; in humanity, we don’t want our graduates to only have passion but without sufficient rationality.

What future do we want?

The future does not look very promising if we don’t work hard. I am more pessimistic than optimistic. The recent centuries of huge successes in terms of materials have generated growing gaps between West and East, between the past and the present, between science and humanity. We have seen the abandoning of classics on campus. We have seen the national fanatics all over the world. We have seen the recession of spirit versus material in our society… How much longer can our human civilization last if the trends of such continue?

The great material successes made us forget the great minds behind them. It is like that we saw the magnificent building, but we forgot the architect who designed it.

But we do have hope and we do want to work.

I don’t know how I come to the conclusion that Beethoven’s symphony No.9 is about human struggle (1st movement), confliction (2nd movement), reflection (3rd movement) and reconciliation (4th movement). For me reconciliation means a lot, between peoples, and between science and humanity. The bridges that I mentioned here mean only one thing, which is reconciliation.

I remember that it was the second year after I came to Montreal. Montreal Fine Arts Museum hosted the exhibition of Leonardo Da Vinci in Engineering. It was my first time to be exposed to some real items beyond books and pictures. His design of airplane model was there. His many drawings of various engineering designs were there.

Leonardo Da Vinci perfectly combined Science and Humanity as well as Engineering and Arts.

His “Mona Lisa” has been smiling at the Louvre, which was one of the reasons for me to visit there so far over 30 times. This famous smile with great confidence has been lasting over 500 years. His engineering designs have been inspiring generation after generation and are still among us. In front of the painting everyday there are thousands people to pay their respect with wonder and curiosity.

We love these great minds, which show that we human beings have something in common - loving beauty, seeking justice and searching reasons.

After all, if we can still think and give, the world will not go dark.

Thank you!

Now let us welcome a thinker who traveled from Old world to New World to attend this ceremony. He is British Academy fellow, Emeritus Professor at Cambridge Univ. My friend Prof. John Dunn.