Research Express@NCKU - Commentaryresearch.ncku.edu.tw/re../commentary/c/20091009/1.pdf · Research Express@NCKU - Commentary Ladies and gentlemen, as you can see from the title of

Research Express@NCKU - Commentary

Research Express@NCKU Volume 10 Issue 10 - October 9, 2009 [ http://research.ncku.edu.tw/re/commentary/e/20091009/1.html ]

Global Brain Movement : An Asia Perspective Da Hsuan Feng Senior Executive Vice President ,National Cheng Kung University June 17, 2009

A speech delivered at Hong Kong Polytechnic University

Dr. Da Hsuan Feng

The great American novelist Pearl S. Buck, who has a well known Chinese name, Sai Zhen Zhu (赛珍珠), once said that "If you want to understand today, you have to search yesterday." Indeed, history embodies the profound nature of

the topic of today's discussion.

President Tim Tong (唐偉章), thank you so much for bestowing me the honor of speaking today to the communities of Hong Kong Polytechnic University on a

subject very dear to my heart. I am especially happy to see that you are now at the

helm of a great Asia Pacific institution. No doubt that while you will carry on the

great legacy of the institution established by your predecessor President Poon Chung-kwong (潘宗光), you will undoubtedly broaden and deepen the university contribution in Asia Pacific in its most critical

time, the 21st century.

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Ladies and gentlemen, as you can see from the title of my talk, Tim, a world class engineer and the

former dean of engineering of George Washington University, is the personification of the thesis of my

talk. In fact, I am excited to see in 2008 and 2009 many of my North American friends doing this "Brain

Movement" personification thing in the Hong Kong – Macao arena. They are Way Kuo (郭位), a world class engineer and former dean of engineering of the University of Tennessee, now president of Hong

Kong City University; Wei Zhao (趙偉), a world class computer scientist and former dean of science of RPI, now president of Macao University, and last but not least, Tony Chen (陳繁昌), a world class applied mathematician, former director of the Mathematics and Science Directorate of the National

Science Foundation and dean of science of UCLA, and soon to be president of Hong Kong University of

Science and Technology. It is interesting, especially for me, that Tony is replacing a good friend of mine

and a distinguished alumnus of NCKU as HKUST president, Paul Chu (朱經武), who is unquestionably a world class scientist and educator!

I should mention also that the President of NCKU, Michael M. C. Lai (賴明詔) was appointed in 2007, was also for 34 years distinguished professor of University Southern California.

Such nontrivial high caliber intellectual migration of university administration from North America to

Asia Pacific is demonstrating, in my mind, two important aspects. One is that their "return" to Asia is

globally and palpably showing the robustness of Asia Pacific higher education in the 21st century.

Another is a serious "loss" to higher education for the United States. These individuals possess profound

intellectual and administrative capabilities with deep understanding of Asia. Therefore if they were to

hold equally important positions in North America, they could surely have contributed profoundly to the

higher education landscape where there is strong call for deep and sustainable connection to Asia Pacific

in this century.

Something about NCKU

Ladies and gentlemen, I am not here to sell my home university, National Cheng Kung University.

However, as the senior administrator of the university, if I do not say a few words about it, my boss,

President Michael Lai, will surely be upset at me. So here goes. Also, allow me to show you the icon of

our university, the banyan tree that was planted by the Japanese emperor almost a century ago!

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Allow me also to place a few photos here depicting NCKU campus.

They are from left to right the College of Medicine (and affiliated hospital), College of Humanities and

College of Engineering complex, respectively.

By Taiwan's standard, National Cheng Kung University is a large scale university with a long history. It is

one of the four leading comprehensive and research-intensive universities in Taiwan, namely, the so-

called 台成清交(Tai-Cheng-Tsing-Chiao), which is short for National Taiwan University (NTU), National Cheng Kung University (NCKU), National Tsing Hua University (NTHU) and National Chiao Tung

University (NCTU).

For this talk, among many, there are two issues that are fundamental to and confronting NCKU in the

coming decades which I want to underscore, and they are directly or indirectly related to the subject

matter of my talk. Since time is short, I will merely mention the essence. I hope that with this truncated

discussion, I can stimulate more discussions from and among you so that you could deploy your wisdom

to assist us.

First is regarding the mission of our university. Education in general and higher education in particular

are built on the mission of improving humanity's quality-of-life. With this lofty mission, NCKU as well as

other Asian universities such as HK Polytechnic University are confronted with profound challenges by

the global circumstances in the 21st century. This is made even more so because we are becoming higher

and higher quality institutions.

Let me give you one palpable example. Some of you in Hong Kong may have heard that Taiwan's

Ministry of Education instituted the so-called 5Y50B program a few years ago. By that it means that

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starting in 2006, MOE has provided 10 Billion of New Taiwan Dollars (~ $340 Million US) of new

money per year for five years for 10-12 universities in order to spur them to become "world class," which

is a euphemism for higher intellectual distinction.

MOE designated NCKU as one of these universities. In fact, it receives the second largest share of this

funding. Receiving funding of this magnitude means that we must shoulder greater responsibilities in

ensuring the survival and prosperity of planet Earth. Thus, we must define one of our most critical

missions, if not the only mission, is to produce a large cadre of leaders with global perspective and

passion for service. If NCKU can maintain her status as the cradle for world class political leaders,

educators, scientists, entrepreneurs, and artists of all forms from all corners of the world who could

make life just a little bit better for humanity, such as our outstanding alumni Prof. Paul Chu (朱經武), Bruce Cheng (鄭崇華), the founder of a multinational high-tech corporation Delta Electronics, Lung Yingtai (龍應台), now a distinguished professor at Hong Kong University and who is one of the most powerful political and literary writers of Asia Pacific today, and Lawrence T. Wong (黃志剛), former CEO of Hong Kong Jockey Club and at one point was listed by the second largest English newspaper of Hong

Kong, The Standard, as one of the 20 most influential persons in Hong Kong, then the day which NCKU

can be a world class university is within reach.

Second is about university autonomy (大學法人化). Whenever one talks about autonomy, one cannot avoid also talk about "governance," "accountability" and last but not least "oversight." For brevity of this

speech, let me just refer to them collectively as autonomy.

In the summer of 2008, nearly after a year since I arrived at NCKU, I became palpably aware that

autonomy was more than a concept; it was Taiwan's Ministry of Education (MOE)'s "marching order" for

all national universities. MOE expects within a reasonable foreseeable future that all national

universities shall be operating under the autonomy status, which means that national universities in

Taiwan will undergo a metamorphosis. Not only will there be fundamental structural alterations of the

manner of how national universities are to operate, there will also be profound paradigm shift of how

they will be perceived within the society at large.

As it turns out, the perceived urgency of this "transformation" is even more acute for NCKU because it is

expected that one of the first, if not the first, universities to reach autonomy status is NCKU.

In last several decades of the 20th century, the world saw an explosive growth of quality and quantity of

Asian Pacific universities. Hong Kong Polytechnic University is certainly an example of this explosion.

However, in nearly all regions in Asia Pacific, this explosion was not accompanied by autonomy

transformation. For example, all national universities in Taiwan are tightly regulated by the Ministry of

Education. In fact, even private universities are nearly as tightly regulated as well.

Yet, suddenly in the 21st century, autonomy somehow becomes a major issue. One can only speculate

why that is the case. For example, in recent past, public universities in Japan and Singapore were

"corporatized" their nomenclature for autonomy status. As a good friend of mine who is well connected

to Korean national universities, they are also discussing with the government about some form of

autonomy status in the foreseeable future. Although in Mainland China with close to 2000 universities,

all of them in one form or another "national" in characteristic, there appears to be no movement as far as

one knows in rendering them to achieve autonomy status. However, one can envision that within the

foreseeable future, with Mainland universities' burning desire to become intimate and integral part of

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the global academic landscape, they too may have to face this reality.

Hence, by being the first university in Taiwan to achieve autonomy status, its success (because failure is

not an option) in making the transition will not only have implications and impact for all national

universities in Taiwan, it can also have implications/impact for Korean universities, and especially

because of cultural similarity, for the massive number of Mainland universities.

I would just mention that because of the gravity of this transformation, for NCKU in particular and

perhaps for Asia Pacific higher education in general, the president of NCKU Academician Michael M. C.

Lai has initiated a global blue ribbon panel to assist the university in this arduous transition.

20th Century is an Epoch Changing Century for the East and the West

Before I talk about the most important human institutions as far as "brain movement" is concerned,

namely universities, I like to set the stage by a discussion about the century that all of us has just

experienced.

I want to first point out that 20th century represents a special transitional way the "West" views the

"East." To show this, in my mind nothing can be more transparent and startling than the two "bylines" of

Asian literature Nobel Laureates, in the beginning and at the end of the 20th century.

Remarkably, only after thirteen years since the inauguration of the Nobel prizes in 1901, the first Asian, a

Bengali polymath named Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), won the Literature Prize in 1913. According

to the Nobel committee, Tagore won this high accolade "because of his profoundly sensitive, fresh and

beautiful verse, by which, with consummate skill, he has made his poetic thought, expressed in his own

English words, a part of the literature of the West."

On the last year of the 20th century, in 2000, another Asian, Gao Xingjian (b. 1940) (高行健), won the Literature Prize "for an œuvre of universal validity, bitter insights and linguistic ingenuity, which has

opened new paths for the Chinese novel and drama."

Even to the most casual observer, one could already detect the profound difference of the tone of these

two bylines. For the former, the tone was due to perhaps the Nobel endeavor was then a neophyte and

the Nobel committee did not realize that it could eventually become a global phenomenon, or perhaps at

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the beginning of the 20th century, the European colonial dominance of Asia was still raging. After all, the

termination of the British colonial dominance of India did not come until some thirty four years later.

For whatever reason or reasons, the byline, with the phrase "expressed in his own English words, a part

of the literature of the West" certainly has the full throttle of colonialism. Sadly, it was obviously

acceptable to the East and the West at that moment in time.

The latter at the end of the century, with the byline "has opened new paths for the Chinese novel and

drama" is an utter tone reversal from the former and is, in the current vernacular, absolutely politically

correct!

I believe the change of tone of these two bylines, separated by nearly a century, is perhaps the most

naked demonstration of the fundamental transformation of the West attitude towards the East. It is a

palpable demonstration that the 20th century is indeed epoch changing for both the East and the West.

Second Half of 20th Century is an Epoch Changing Half Century for Asia

Pacific

I certainly do not need to remind this audience that the second half of the 20th century is epoch changing

for Asia Pacific. Indeed, here we are in Hong Kong, the personification of this momentous change! In the

1950's, Hong Kong was the epitome of the British Asia Pacific colonial prowess, and today, especially

since July 1st, 1997, with reversal of sovereignty, it is a part of China, and is a global financial epic-center.

In preparing my talk, I was searching for a way to vividly describe this change. While there were infinite

and traditional ways to demonstrate this, I found a rather personal one. I hope you would allow me to

indulge a little bit of my personal memory lane here to illustrate to you the profound change of this half

century.

If I were asked to identify one singular Chinese who had the greatest and profound impact in the 20th

century, without the slightest doubt, I would have selected Sun Yat-sen (孫中山) to be that person. At the foot of one of the peaks of Mount Zijin (Purple Mountain) in Nanjing, there is the Sun Yat-sen

Mausoleum (中山陵). This structure allows more than a billion Chinese to place the memory of this man in their hearts. Since it is now such a touristic attraction, I have no doubt many of you must have visited

it at least once.

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The above two photos depict the majestic stone-gate of the Mausoleum. The one on the left, which shows

my family (and I will let you guess which one of the children was me) was taken nearly 60 years ago and

the one on the right is contemporary. What caught my attention of these photos were not the stone-gate,

which clearly has been well maintained, nor my family, which would only interest me, but the tree on the

left, just behind the stone-gate. Of course, as the two photos show, the tree has grown significantly, as it

should! Nature works!

By any standard of history, 60 years is merely a blink of an eye! After all, a great university such as

Oxford is nearly a millennium! Yet, in the intervening 60 years for the two photos, the transformation of

Asia Pacific is nothing short of spectacular. Think about it, the little tree of 60 years ago "knew" what we

now regard as "ancient" and maybe even forgotten history:

● Nearly all of Asia Pacific were economically in, at best, the third world, Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and the KMT were still more or less in control on the Mainland, with the civil war between the

Communists and the KMT raging,

● Macau was a colony of Portugal, and Hong Kong, Malaya and Singapore were colonies of the

British Empire,

● Research in universities in Asia Pacific, except for those in Japan and except for specific areas

pertaining to Asian culture, were not in the least blinking on the global intellectual landscape,

● The world then was NOT IN THE LEAST FLAT!

Compare the above to what the "big" tree of today in the flat world knows! Little did the "little" tree knew

60 years ago, that a few years later, China would be experiencing a thunderous change in 1949, in the

60's and 70's, it went through a decade of the devastating "cultural revolution," and several decades

later, much of Asia Pacific would be lifted out of poverty, such as the economic miracle of Taiwan and

South Korea since the 80's and the rapid ascendancy of the China Mainland as a global economic power.

Indeed, Asia Pacific has become one of the world's bright spots of economic and intellectual progress.

As you can see, a tree can grow and mature in 60 years. By the same token, can Asia Pacific grow, which

it did in multi-dimensional manner, and mature as well in 60 years? By mature, I mean if Asia Pacific

can reach economic and intellectual maturity, can it assume the responsibility of a "grown up" and

assume the world's well being be its own? Any time one talks about "brain movement," it is worth

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bearing in mind this historical perspective!

History of Universities

My discussion will more or less be science and technology centric, but I am confident that it is more

generic than specific.

It was claimed that the genesis of universities could be traced as far back as the Athenian School of Greece in BC 384-322 and the

Confucius School (孔夫子) of China in BC 551-479. The more modern form of university came almost a millennium and a half later, with

the founding of the University of Bologna and the University of

Oxford in the 11th century.

There is an important sidebar of this discussion. Roughly around the

same time (1130-1200), the great Confucianist Zhu Xi (儒學大師朱熹) was the Subprefectural Registrar of Tong'an (同安縣主簿).

Tong'an is on the Mainland in what is now a prefecture of Fujian

Province (福建省), and is adjacent to the cities of Quemoy (金門) and Amoy (廈門), and directly across the Taiwan Strait by about 100 miles from Taiwan. Zhu's distinction as a significant Confucian scholar and teacher had rendered that region one of the centers of Confucian

studies, and many organized schools were started then, and continue even to today. In fact, on the island

of Quemoy, there are still such schools, some built over 500 years ago. If I go by the self-evident truth

that the mission of university education is to enlighten and improve the quality-of-life of humanity, then

what Zhu did then and what followed for the subsequent millennium could also be regarded broadly as

such.

Regarding universities in the "West," many historians indicated that universities and cathedral schools

before Renaissance were simply a continuation of the interest in learning promoted by monasteries.

These "universities" were by and large for the purpose of producing clergies and religious scholars.

While such a mission was not unreasonable, it probably would not fulfill the mission of rendering

universities as intellectual and economic engines in the broader sense of the words.

I should mention that there were (at least) two historical episodes which gave the indication that Asia's

intellectual and technological strengths may be more open and advance than Europe before the

Renaissance!

For openness, the best example is perhaps the recording of the first supernova event known to

mankind. Today, it is called the crab nebula (蟹皇星). A supernova event, using modern scientific term, is the remnant of a thermonuclear

explosion, many orders of magnitude larger than

the one mankind exploded in Hiroshima and

Nagasaki at the end of World War II (WWII).

Chinese astronomer/astrologers carefully

recorded its appearance in 1054 AD. This star,

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according to the records, was visible during

daylight for 23 days and visible at night for almost

two years.

What is remarkable about this event in 1054 AD is

not that it occurred at all. After all, it was "merely"

a celestial event. What was amazing that despite its incredible brightness, there was complete absence of

record of the event in the West! The only known record came from the Chinese and the Arabs. The lack

of any Western record was even more amazing, considering that not too long after the event, Oxford

University was founded. One could only speculate why that there was "utter silence" in the West. For

whatever the reason was, it clearly demonstrated that the astronomers/astrologers in China and the

Middle East were not constraint to record any observation of nature as was! To me, this was a profound

intellectual approach to observation, the first step towards a proper scientific methodology.

For a demonstration of Eastern technology advancement, an excellent example was the naval power

during the Ming Dynasty (1368 – 1644). In the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, there was a famous

Admiral named Zheng He (鄭和)(1371-1433) who commanded seven massive naval armadas to South East Asia and Indian Ocean. In fact, the armada, the largest armada has nearly 400 ships (called junks)

and went as far west as the East Africa coast. The ships he constructed were enormous compared to

some of the ships of the West. In the following diagram, a comparison is made between Zheng's ship

(400 feet) with contemporary ships of Christopher Columbus (1451-1506) ship (85 feet).

When a ship is an order of magnitude larger, the technology associated with all aspects must also be

significantly more advanced.

The superiority of the East began to wane as soon as the Renaissance began to set in. Indeed, the real

transformation of universities came with the European Renaissance era, which occurred between 14th

and 17th century. In this period, giant intellects began to emerge in the West, and many are still

household names today. For example, the works by luminaries, such as Francis Bacon (1561-1626),

Rene Descartes (1596-1650), Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543), Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519)

and Martin Luther (1483-1546), are studied by students in all educational institutions, East and West,

of today. With intellectuals such as this, universities began to mature rapidly.

Let me focus on Cambridge University as an example.

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A good friend and colleague of mine, the late Alan Macdiarmid, who received his Ph.D. from Cambridge

University and was the 2000 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, often mentioned that "science is people!" The

greatness of a university is measured by the people that are/were associated with it. Based on this

criterion, Cambridge University is manifestly great.

For example, while the greatness of the individuals I listed before requires no further illustration, I

would, however, like to specifically underscore the ageless phrase uttered by Bacon, who was associated

with the Trinity College of Cambridge. It was in Latin "Scientia est potential," or in English "knowledge

is power!" Associating knowledge with power is and must surely be the central theme of modern form of

democracy, and remarkably Bacon recognized it nearly half a millennium ago, probably well before the

concept of democracy was even conceived!

As a physicist, I would be horribly remiss if I did not stress the fundamental importance of Sir Isaac

Newton (1643-1727), who came along roughly a century after the above mentioned great men. Everyone

who is even slightly educated in science nowadays would recognize that Newton published his epic work

Principia Mathematica in 1687. This work launched the world into a new era of scientific methodology.

However, few people today know that Newton held the distinguished chair in Cambridge University

known as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics. What is remarkable is that this position is currently

occupied by Steven Hawkings, the world renowned astrophysicist. It was also once held by P. A. M.

Dirac, who was one of the physicists responsible for inventing quantum mechanics, a field of physics

which defined 20th century intellectual and economic achievements.

The above information underlines an important lesson for higher education. In today's fast-paced world,

with "instant gratification" as the norm, the accepted age old concepts of "lineage" and "tradition" to

build the underpinning of excellence have often fell by the wayside. This is especially true today in the

world of ranking of universities, at times the ranking is carried out by for-profit company or companies.

In the prestigious position of the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics of Cambridge University, the

holders almost began with Sir Isaac Newton nearly 500 years ago to P. A. M. Dirac in the early 20th

century to Steven Hawkings of today, and other great scientists in between. Both Dirac and Hawkings

refused the knighthood and thus could not and cannot be addressed as "Sir" respectively. All were men

of supreme intellectual excellence. As I mentioned earlier, it is "eternally" known that the intellectual

creation of Newton and Dirac literally turned-the-page of humanity's existence.

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The above are the photos of two important men from the East and the West. On the left is the photo of

Sir Isaac Newton. On the right, is Shunzhi Emperor (順治帝), the first Qing (清) emperor from 1644 to 1661. There would be no reason to place these two individuals side-by-side, except for the fact that

Newton was born in 1643 and a year later, 1644, the new and last feudal dynasty of China began. Indeed,

Qing Dynasty, which closed China's door to the change that was occurring in the West, would rule China

for nearly three hundred years. This coincidence was as if history was playing a joke on the East and the

West. With Newton, it was a signal of the birth of an era of open scientific methodology and the rise of

Western dominance of science and technology. With Qing Dynasty's close door policy, it signaled the

downfall of China's global leadership of science and technology!

19th Century

By the time 19th century rolled around, after the intellectual brewing of several centuries of the

Renaissance, European intellectual achievements literally reached their crowning moments! European

universities were supreme, par none. The achievements were not confined to science and technology. In

the artistic creation, European achievements also reign supreme.

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The above two sets of photos are both serious and amusing.

The first set of photos in my mind represents two of the most remarkable individuals who define 19th

century intellectual achievements. Both lived short lives, and yet both would live in the hearts of

humanity worldwide and eternally! Both stood on the underpinning of several hundred years of the

Renaissance.

On the left is James Clark Maxwell (1831 - 1879), whose contribution to human knowledge was the four

elegant, almost simple looking mathematical equations (see the differential-integral equations depicted

in a cup in the second set of photos) that totally describe one of the most elusive behaviors of nature,

"light," or in more technical terms, electromagnetic radiations! These four equations are known to the

world of science and technology as Maxwell Equations.

Perhaps the highest compliment of Maxwell's work came almost a century later by Albert Einstein who

said in 1954, a year before his death, that "…At that thrilling moment he (Maxwell) surely never guessed

that the riddling nature of light, apparently so completely solved, would continue to baffle succeeding

generations…."

On the right is Frédéric Chopin (1810 - 1849) whose beautiful and monumental musical creations are

considered as eternal by humanity worldwide then, now and probably forever! No compliment can beat

any audience who were, are and will be moved at the level of the "soul" by Chopin's music.

To me, the intellectual achievements of these two individuals, both as deep as any human being can

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achieve, deserve to be mentioned in the same breath! For that, I put Maxwell Equations and a music

sheet of one of Chopin's Nocturnes side-by-side, signaling that they are equally important for humanity.

20th Century

Europe and North America

I mentioned earlier that 20th century is epoch changing for East and the West. But there is something

even more profound that occurred in the first half of the century. Indeed, if I am asked to give a knee-

jerk perception of the first half of the century, it will be World-War I (WWI) and World-War II (WWII).

The following haunting photos depict those two horrible human events. The one on the left showed the

military hard wares of WWI and the one on the right showed the singular event that shook humanity,

and that is the mushroom cloud of the thermonuclear explosion of WWII in Japan.

In hindsight, besides the horrendous human toll, I thought WWI and WWII gave rise to the most

massive and profound "brain movement" the world has ever seen. Nor will it be repeated again!

As I mentioned earlier, in the 19th century, the

intellectual fervor of Europe was second to none.

Universities in Europe were housing the best of

the best the world had to offer. If Europe could

remain as stable and as vibrant in the first half of

the 20th century, there was every reason that such

fervor would not diminish in the least. Yet, WWI

and especially WWII, with Hitler's unimaginable

hatred of the Jews, made it virtually impossible

for Europe to continue its great intellectual

growth which it enjoyed in the previous four to

five hundred years.

Meanwhile, while Asia and Europe were devastated by the scales of war human had not seen before,

North America was like a castle protected by a "moat" called Atlantic and Pacific oceans. It was the place

on earth that was a pillar of stability.

The best manifestation of the "moat" protection

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was the aerial attack by the Japanese on Pearl

Harbor on Sunday, December 7, 1941. As the

architect of the Japanese naval commander

Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto said after the attack,

"I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping

giant and fill him with a terrible resolve."

My guess is that the reason the Japanese military

machine attacked Pearl Harbor and not San

Francisco is simply because its military might just

could not reach the west coast of the United

States. For the military technologies at the time,

the Pacific Ocean was de facto a perfect protective

moat for the US Mainland from the Japanese, just

like the Atlantic Ocean was one from the Germans.

As I mentioned, while the human toll of WWI and

WWII is unparalleled in the history of humanity,

North America, especially United States benefited

greatly in one of the world's most massive "brain

movement" because of them. Indeed, thousands

upon thousands of the best of the best, in nearly

all fields of the intellectual world, from the artistic

to the scientific, were lifted lock-stock-and-barrel

all across Europe and in a short period of half a century to be literally "dumped" on United States,

especially on campuses of many universities.

If there were an individual who absolutely epitomizes this massive "brain movement," surely Albert Einstein, who needs no

introduction, would "fit the bill!" If not because of the thunderous

reputation of Einstein who rendered everyone else pale in

comparison, scientists such as John von Neumann from

Hungary, Herman Weyl from Germany, Theodore von Kármán

from Hungary, Edward Teller from Hungary, Eugene Wigner

from Hungary, and Samuel Goudsmit from Holland, Konrad

Bloch from Germany, Rudolph Schoenheimer from Germany etc.,

would be also blinking on the radar screen of the intellectual

landscape. The presence of any single one of these intellects

would bring supreme excellence not only to the university they

were associated with, but the United States in general.

I am confident that if there were no WWI and WWII, who

literally reduced Europe to ashes, intellects such as those I listed above would not be building their

careers in North America. Although the reasons why the US research universities became envy of the

world in the early 20th century are complex and multidimensional, one of them would undoubtedly be

the fact that they were utterly impacted in a highly nontrivial manner by intellectuals with supreme

excellence. A good friend of mine once said that "any one of these powerful and awe inspiring intellects

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could transform a mediocre university into a great one!"

Asia and North America

Asia at the beginning of the 20th century was a completely different story from Europe. Except for Japan,

who initiated a social and political reformation by Emperor Meiji 明治維新(1868-1912) in the mid-19th century, all of Asia were either under European colonial domination, such as India (whose territory

includes what is today Pakistan and Bangladesh), or at the verge of the collapse of feudalism, such as

China. Higher education infrastructures, especially in Asia Pacific, were at best fledgling, if exist at all.

Let me say a few words about Meiji reformation. The impact of this reformation was, and still is, deep

and broad and deserves much in depth detailed discussion. Let me just say here that this effort led to

something great and something horrible.

"Great" was because one of its aims was to create wealth. Although it did not utilize the modern concept

of creating a knowledge economy to create wealth, de facto it did that by creating universities. Two of

them are today Asia's most outstanding universities of the 19th and 20th century. They were the former

Imperial University of Tokyo and Imperial University of Kyoto (now both dropped the prefix

"Imperial"). Today, they are regarded some of the top universities in the world. Many leading scholars

and political leaders of Japan were products of these two universities, such as the first two Japanese

Nobel Laureates and truly great scientists Hideki Yukawa (湯川秀樹) (Nobel 1949, left of the below photo) and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga (朝永振一郎)(Nobel 1965, right of the below photo) and the most recent three Nobel laureates in physics, Yoichiro Nambu (南部陽一郎), Makoto Kobayashi (小林誠) and Toshihide Maskawa (益川敏英). Talk about "lineage" and "tradition"!

"Horrible" was because one of the aims of the reformation was to build a modern military power.

Without proper constraint, this runaway military engine caused untold human toll in the world in the

20th century.

I would like to give two interesting individuals in this early period whose information I am familiar with

which will show that the change in Asia Pacific is beginning to emerge.

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The first is a Chinese gentleman named Yung Wing (容閎). He is depicted on the left of the above two photos. Yung was, as far as one knows, the first Chinese student to study in a US university, and

graduated from Yale College in 1854, well before the Civil War (1861 – 1865), and slightly before Meiji

reformation and China was still ruled by the last feudal dynasty Qing (清).

According to Yale's website ( http://opa.yale.edu/news/article.aspx?id=3595 ):

"….After returning to China, Yung Wing established the Chinese Education Mission, through which 120

Chinese students came to the U.S. in the 1870s. Most of these students went on to play important roles

in China's modernization."

This was clearly the greenest of green shoot of the transformation of Asia Pacific!

The second whose photo was depicted on the right of the above two was a gentleman named Wong Tsoo

(王助). Wong was born in 1893 in Peking (Beijing) and died in 1965 in Tainan, Taiwan. In the last ten years of his life, he was a faculty member of my university. In those ten years, he educated nearly 500

outstanding engineers and industrial leaders of Asia Pacific. One of them is Lawrence T. Wong (黃志剛) whom I mentioned in the beginning of my talk.

In many websites in China, Wong Tsoo is known as the "Father of Boeing" (波音之父). In 1997, in a speech to the National Academy of Engineering, Boeing's then CEO Phil Condit made the comment that

"Bill Boeing… hired (1916) Tsu Wong as the company's first aeronautical engineer to replace Boeing's

original business partner, Conrad Westerveldt. An engineering graduate from the Massachusetts

Institute of Technology, Tsu Wong became the first chief engineer at Boeing." (I should mention that

the official spelling of Wong's name was based on the way his name was spelled in his Master of Science

thesis at MIT.)

Wong's life was truly legendary and could be the theme of not only a speech, but a conference! Let me

just be brief here and outline the relevance of this talk.

First, I find it fascinating that in 1916 Wong received a Master of Science degree in aeronautics from

MIT. Two aspects of Wong's achievement deserve a few comments. First, one should remember that it

was merely 13 years before, in 1903, that the Wright Brothers demonstrated to the world that man could

fly with mechanical machines. And yet, a decade later, MIT had already developed an educational

program to educate and train future aeronautical engineers. This tells me more about MIT as a fast-on-

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http://opa.yale.edu/news/article.aspx?id=3595


its-feet and forward looking institution then the subject of aeronautics. This is a lesson for any aspiring

university today!

Second, young Wong did not come to MIT to study something more traditional and probably safer as far

as a future career was concerned, such as mechanical engineering. He came to study something so new

and certainly perception wise, maybe unsafe as a career. This could indicate that these younger

generations of Chinese in the turn of the century, and Wong was as good a representation as one could

find, were very hungry for new and cutting-edge knowledge and were already looking for technological

challenges. This group of young Asians was gazing at the Western scientific and technological prowess

and was hungry to find the first opportunity to join this intellectual march. This was indeed an

indication of what were to come in the 20th century and why Asia Pacific could transform so rapidly as

soon as the conditions were ripped!

Tsung-Dao Lee 李政道 and Chen-Ning Yang 楊振寧

It is impossible for me to talk about the emergence of Asia Pacific without mentioning Lee and Yang, the

two gentlemen whose photos I presented below (Lee on the left and Yang on the right.)

I would be dishonest if I did not say that they have influenced me and my generation of scientists,

especially physicists, profoundly and directly or indirectly. After all they were the two Chinese whose

monumental work was awarded the 1957 physics Nobel Prize. But that is not the reason why I wanted to

specifically say a few words here about them. After all, since 1957, many other Chinese (or more precisely

Chinese Americans) also achieved this great scientific milestone with equally profound discoveries.

What Lee and Yang did, and I am quite sure that was not the reason they pursued the physics which won

them the accolade, was far more than physics. They touched the soul of an entire generation, or several

generations, of Chinese worldwide. Remember, they won it in the mid-fifties. As I mentioned earlier, in

the first half of the 20th century, the world was in turmoil. Asia Pacific was no exception. On top of that,

after centuries of falling behind in nearly all aspects of intellectual efforts, science and technology for

sure, and economically the Continent was in tatters, Asians had sunk into a third world mentality, a

mentality where one would assume that great things could not happen here or to us!

Therefore, what Lee and Yang did was exactly "what the doctor ordered" at that moment in history in

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Asia. The announcement of the two winning the Nobel Prize froze the time! It was a shot of supreme

confidence in the arms of all Chinese, wherever they were and whatever political persuasion they

adhered to! Since Lee and Yang, no Chinese scientists winning any accolades in any fields could achieve

such profound impact on the entire generation.

Thus, to paraphrase what President Roosevelt said on the day after the Japanese assaulted Pearl Harbor

that December 7 1942 is "a day which will live in infamy," I would say that the day which the 1957 Nobel

Prize in physics was announced, it is "a day which will live in fame!"

Peking University

Peking University (北京大學) is one of the premier universities of Asia Pacific in the 20th century. It was founded in 1898. There is a point I like to make about this university which I believe maybe an

important lesson for universities in Asia Pacific even today.

I am sure you all are aware that Asian universities are heavily under the grips of "global rankings" of one

sort or another. There are basically two that the academic world talks about. One is carried out by the

Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Education (SJTU) and the other was originally carried out by the

Education section of London Times, and now has transferred the effort to a for-profit company known as

QS. In one of the recent rankings, Peking University was ranked somewhere between 203-304 and 36 by

SJTU and London Times/QS, respectively. With such a significance difference between the two rankings,

the information transferred is what we scientists may refer to as having a "very low signal to noise ratio."

In a speech I delivered in SJTU in 2005, I made the following comment about ranking, specifically about

Peking University. I especially underscored the importance of two early presidents of Peking University:

Cai Yuan-Pei (蔡元培) (on the left below) and Hu Shi (胡適) (on the right below.)

Both held the position of president of Peking University in 1916-1927 and 1945-1948 respectively, and in

my opinion not only transformed Peking University, but laid the foundation of higher education of

China. It is worth emphasizing that during Cai's reign at the helm, Hu was already a member of Peking

University and was personally deeply involved in many of the moments that made deep impact on

Chinese culture in the 20th century. I said that

"Indeed, with Cai's leadership, Peking University became not just the soul of Chinese universities, but

in fact Chinese history and culture of the 20 century. How do we measure the "intangible impact" of

Peking University on the culture of China, with Bai-Hua (白話modern Chinese) movement, May 4th

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movement (五四運動), and so on. Is it even logical to consider that Peking University is not a "World Class University" when it has profound impact on Chinese culture, with nearly quarter humanity, for a

century?"

Tsinghua University, Peking Union Medical College, National Cheng Kung

University,… United States' "Super Marshall Plan of the 20th century,

without a plan and without credit!"

Just as Peking University, Tsingua University (清華大學) and Peking Union Medical College (北京協和醫學院) are also two outstanding Chinese universities. The fact that they are outstanding is well known. What is less well known, or not known at all, by many people in China and/or United States is that both

are in fact founded by the United States, either by US Government funding or by an NGO.

My point here began with two photos. On the left is the main building in the "old" campus of Tsinghua

University in Beijing. On the right is the main building on the Mall of the University of Illinois in

Champaign/Urbana. The fact that they look virtually identical is NOT an accident.

According to Tsinghua's website, "Tsinghua University, located in the northwestern suburbs of Beijing,

was established in 1911 on the site of "Qing Hua Yuan" - a former royal garden of the Qing Dynasty.

Funded with part of the "Boxer Indemnity," it was at first a preparatory school called "Tsinghua

Xuetang" for those students who were sent by the government to study in the United States." In fact,

some of the Boxer indemnity was used to build the building shown above and the architectural drawing

was based on the one in Champaign/Urbana. This tells us that one of the best universities of China today

was founded by the United States government! I suspect that few, if anyone, in the US State Department

today are aware of this fact!

Another remarkable but not well known history is the founding of China's best medical school, Peking

Union Medical College (PUMC). Throughout the 20th century, PUMC produced many main medical

personnel of China. According to Wikipedia, "The Rockefeller Foundation…. in 1913 - 1914 ….

(recommended) that the Foundation - through a subsidiary organization, should assume financial

responsibility for the College.….." On the left of the following was a photo I took at the main hallway of

PUMC's main building. As you can see, it has a bust of Mr. Rockefeller! Once again, the best medical

school of China today was founded by the Rockefeller Foundation, an NGO of United States.

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According to a recent press release of Purdue University, "Purdue was chosen through the Foreign

Assistance Act of 1950 to help provide assistance to developing countries…. When asked to choose an

American university to work with his institution, the college president at the island's Tainan Provincial

College of Engineering (now NCKU) picked Purdue because of its engineering and science reputation

and because of its graduates who had returned to China to make significant contributions."

So for the period between 1950 and 1962, with a grant of $3 Million (today equivalent of somewhere

between $30 Million to $60 Million), Purdue University sent some 20 faculty or so annually to NCKU,

erected some state-of-the-art buildings, and instill in the university the culture of a modern university.

In our visit to Purdue University recently, President Lai of NCKU said to President Cordova:

"Unquestionably, the decade of Herculean intellectual and material assistance from Purdue University

to National Cheng Kung University in the early 50's transformed it to play a fundamental role as a

powerful economic and intellectual engine during Taiwan's miracle growth in the late 20th century

and build the foundation to become one of Asia Pacific's research intensive comprehensive universities

in the 21st century." So the underpinning of NCKU as a modern university was erected by Purdue

University, well before globalization was even a concept!

Prior to 1949, the Christian missionaries founded thirteen universities in China. They are in North

China: Yenching University (now the campus of Peking University) and Cheeloo University (Jinan,

Shandong Province), in East and Central China, they are: University of Nanking (Nanjing), Ginling

College (now the campus of Nanjing University), Soochow University (Suzhou), University of Shanghai

(Shanghai, my mother's alma mater), St. John's University (Shanghai, my brother-in-law and sister-in-

law alma mater), Hangchow Univeristy (Hangzhou) and Huachung University (Wuhan, middle part of

Yangtze River). In Western China, there is West China Union University (Chengdu, Sichuan Province)

and finally in Southern China, there are: Fukien Christian University (Fuzhou), Hwa Nan College

(Fuzhou), and last but not least, Lingnan Univeristy (Guangzhou). It should be that the legacy of these

universities was spilled over to Taiwan after 1949. For example, one of the best private universities in

Taiwan, Tunghai University (東海大學), was founded by this legacy. These universities pumped out a significant number of economic and intellectual pillars of China.

Literally hundreds of thousands of students in the 20th century received either US Government or

universities scholarships to pursue advanced degrees in US universities. This trend is continuing even in

the 21st century. While many remained in North America after they completed their studies, many did

return to their native countries in Asia Pacific. In fact, the economic and intellectual miracle growth of

Taiwan and South Korea, two economic tigers of Asia, in large part is due to the returning students'

contributions to their native lands in the latter part of the 20th century.

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After WWII, United States initiated a very successful Marshall Plan to "reconstruct" Western Europe. It

was a US Government plan, with a name, Marshall, the US Secretary of State under President Truman,

attached to it, and a well defined funding of $13 Billion associated with it. For that, the United States

received full credit. Yet, the effort I mentioned here about US assistance to Asia Pacific throughout the

20th century, which de facto is a "Super Marshall Plan, " without a plan, had no name attached to it, and

no designated funding from the United States Government, was in fact a disorganized but massive effort

that transformed the landscape of Asia Pacific in a hundred years. It is difficult to imagine what Asia

Pacific would be like today if United States made a concerted effort in the 20th century not to allow this

"Super Marshall Plan" to be carried out!

There is another very important paradigm shift in the 2nd half of the 20th century which profoundly

affected all aspects of life in Asia Pacific today. The best picture to depict this shift is as follows, it is the

hand shake of President Nixon and Premier Zhou En-Lai in Beijing Airport on February 21, 1972.

Compare this with the refusal of handshake by Secretary John Foster Dulles with Zhou nearly 20 years

before, this was indeed the handshake of the century! As the old saying that "a photo is worth a thousand

words," I do not believe I can come up with another photo to better depict perception of "sweeping away

of the Red menace." Please remember that this photo was taken in the beginning of the 70's. Is it totally

serendipity that all the economical development of Asia occurred after that "sweeping?"

I say not!

With improved economy throughout Asia Pacific, and with modernizing political systems, it was only

inevitable that for a region where education reigns supreme, better universities can and will be created.

So it is not surprising that Asia Pacific universities are today blinking on the global higher education

radar screen. We are in the lecture hall of one of them here!

Therefore, with Asia Pacific now emerging as one of the intellectual and economic powerhouses, one

could ask the following intriguing question: Is it possible in the 21st century to duplicate or have another

Super Marshall Plan? For example, is it possible that with many of the newly founded intellectual powers

such as Tsinghua University, PUMC, NCKU, and Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and many others in

the entire Asia Pacific, collaborating with traditional US intellectual powerhouses, it is conceivable that

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one could transform other less fortunate nations/regions, or another continent, such as Africa, in the

21st century? Since "Super Marshall Plan" had proven to be so successful in the 20th century, there is no

reason to doubt that it might not work in the 21st century!

Immediately after his election as the President of the United States, Barack Obama pronounced that one

of his missions is to rebuild United States reputation worldwide as a proactive nation to assist humanity

to achieve better quality-of-life for all. It does seem obvious that relearning what United States had done

for an entire century in Asia Pacific via the "Super Marshall Plan" and projecting what such a plan can

impact humanity in the new century could be a very important and giant step in that direction!

The Flat World Landscape

We entered the 21st century literally with a "bang," with new global challenges facing humanity's

survival. It is also a century of the "Flat World," as Thomas Friedman would say. Unlike a century ago,

many Asia Pacific universities are now an integral part of the global elite academic institutions. In this

scenario, do we need to bear additional responsibilities? If so, what are they?

In the final part of my talk, please allow me to touch on a few issues. I raise them for the sake of, as the

old Chinese saying, "拋磚引玉" or throw out a brick to attract a jade. The issues I will discuss here are by no means exhaustive. They merely represent some that are on top of my mind at this point.

Understand the New Position of Higher Education

A successful higher education institution is a robust and dynamical human organization. It is constantly

evolving and transforming. To be great, it needs not only to keep abreast with societal demands and

changes, it must be ahead of them. To use a well used cliché, it must be relevant! Let us compare the two

universities I mentioned earlier as the first universities the world had known: Oxford University and the

University of Bologna. Both have nearly a millennium of history. In perception and in reality, Oxford

University still remains as one of the great universities of the world. Why is that? Well, the reasons are

complex and multidimensional. One of the reasons, I am sure, is because Oxford University has been

able to adapt its operations to the demands of the modern world. It can move with the dynamical

changes that are required for being a world class university of today. The ability to reinvent itself is

clearly a lesson to be learned by all fledgling and aspiring universities in Asia Pacific today.

To build modern universities requires the development of new areas/disciplines. I mentioned early in

my talk that to recognize and move quickly to develop new and relevant disciplines marks the success of

MIT as an outstanding institution.

Let me mention one area which in my mind is critical for a modern university to be relevant. For the

entire 20th century, one of the priorities in higher education in Asia Pacific was science and technology.

This was perhaps partially due to the fact that the East was so far behind the West in this area and thus

there was great enthusiasm to want to "catch up." In fact, immediately after the collapse of the "Cultural

Revolution" era, the motto in China was 科學救國or "let science save the nation." With this "call to action," it is not a surprise that many higher education institutions in Asia Pacific deployed "science"

and/or "technology" (such as the one I am speaking at today, University of Science and Technology of

China, or USTC, in Hefei, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, or HKUST, in Hong Kong,

Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, or KAIST, in South Korea, Nanyang Technological

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University, or NTU, in Singapore and National Taiwan University of Science and Technology, or NTUST,

in Taipei) as names of their universities, thus signaling their primary but not exclusive concentrations of

development. Indeed, it is clear to the world that the scientists and engineers produced by Asia Pacific

universities now are plentiful and by and large of high quality. Indeed, the economic successes of the

past several decades of the region are partially related to this production.

In the 21st century, although universities in Asia Pacific should continue to pursue with vigor science and

technology as a mission, it is apparent that with the dynamical changes that are occurring in the region,

such emphasis is no longer adequate. The economic and intellectual transformation of the globe in

general, Asia Pacific in particular, is placing new, broad and deep demands on universities in the

production of new workforces often beyond science and technology. For our discussion, please allow me

to point out one particular demand. The demand is to educate and train a new workforce which

recognizes the importance of public policies.

Perhaps the best example of an outstanding public policy decision was the formation of the National

Science Foundation of the United States. Right

after WWII, a great American named Vannevar

Bush, a US senior science and technology

administrator who was responsible for the War

Weapons program called Manhattan Project

during WWII, realized that to sustain R&D for the

United States, which was important for the

country's education and economic well-being in

the post-war period, successfully convinced the

administration to create what is now called the

National Science Foundation whose mission was

to fund "curiosity driven research" in US universities.

Bush realized that in order to promote research excellence in universities, Federal Government should

and must play a pivotal and fundamental role. There is a well known cliché which says that "imitation is

the best form of flattery." Indeed, if you look around Asia, where the National Science Council of Taiwan,

Natural Science Foundation of China and National Science and Engineering Foundation of India all have

NSF flavor, you would immediately realize how fundamental is the concept of having an NSF-like

institution for any aspiring nation!

The Dean of the School of Public Policy and Management of Tsinghua University (Beijing) Dr. Xue Lan

(薛澜) made the following succinct statement to define the discipline of public policy: "As a discipline it seeks to offer answers to fundamental questions such as how best to mobilize and allocate public

resources, organize and coordinate public organizations, formulate and implement effective public

policies, and provide quality public services."

The above mentioned example tells us in a most transparent manner that making the right public policy

could be as important, if not more important, than science and technology. I am pleased to notice that

there is now increasing recognition of the importance of this area in Asia Pacific universities. Most

recently, for example, Li Ka-Shing Foundation (李嘉誠基金會) has bestowed 100 Million Singapore Dollars as endowment to the Lee Kuan-Yew School of Public Policy of the National University of

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Singapore. These fledgling activities all across Asia Pacific, exemplified by NUS and Tsinghua University,

are pointing to the recognition that as relevant universities in the 21st century, to ignore the importance

of public policy will be at the detriment of the institutions.

New Opportunities for Asia Pacific Universities

After I arrived in Taiwan nearly two years ago, I discovered to my utter amazement that there is a great

deal of opportunities awaiting development. Let me give you one such example. It is an extremely

interesting story and the content deserves a talk by itself.

For me, the story begins with the third Presidential debate between Nixon and Kennedy

on October 13, 1960. The theme of the debate was

about two little islands off the shore of the

Mainland called Quemoy and Matsu (金門-馬祖). These two islands were part of the territories of

the Republic of China then, and still are now. I

counted from the text of the debate (and I hope I

did not miscount) that Quemoy and Matsu were

mentioned sixteen times by the two debaters. It's

sort of the "Joe the Plummer" of the 1960's!

As I have touched on in the beginning of the talk,

Quemoy had a history almost a 1000 years. As an amateur historian, I have divided it into four main

eras.

The first era is what I refer to as "ancient southern Fujian culture," which centers on Zhu Xi (朱熹). Zhu's presence in the region made the region then, and now, one of the centers of Confucius studies.

The second era is what I refer to as "ancient southern Fujian culture," which centers on General Cheng

Cheng-Kung (鄭成功) (1624-1662). General Cheng's base was around Quemoy and Amoy (廈門), which is now called "Kin-Xia 金廈," where he was able to dominate the maritime at that time. In 1687, Quemoy established a Wu Jiang College (浯江書院) to revere Zhu Xi. I mentioned earlier, Sir Isaac Newton also published his epic mathematic treatise Principia in 1687. Finally, although National Cheng Kung

University was named after General Cheng Cheng-Kung, interestingly, not everyone at NCKU is aware of

this legacy.

The third era is I call it "modern southern Fujian culture," which begins with the latter part of the 19th

century to the 21st century. During late 19th century, which was near the end of the Qing Dynasty, life

was extremely hard for southern Fujian people. Hence many immigrated to Southeast Asia to seek a

better life. Today, a significant fraction of the overseas Chinese (華僑), while most have become loyal citizens of their country of residence, still maintain deep emotional ties to their ancestral homeland,

such as Quemoy!

The fourth era is the complicated and ever evolving relationship between Mainland China and Taiwan,

which started in 1949 and is still one of the most intriguing spots of the world today. The debate between

Nixon and Kennedy was about one of the episodes of this period. Recently, Prof. Michael Szonyi of

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Harvard University wrote a book about Quemoy with the title "Cold War Island." It gives a very

interesting and complete historical account of Quemoy.

Quemoy today is like the economic seat of a three legged stool, permeating in the deep cultural heritage

of a thousand years of Confucius studies. The three legs are Mainland, Taiwan and Southeast Asia. If for

some historical reason, Quemoy became part of the Mainland, then today, there would be no deep

emotional ties between Taiwan and Southeast Asia, and the situation between the two shores of the

Taiwan Straits could be significantly different from what it is today. Quemoy could be the heart of a Jin-

Xia-Nanyang super-life-circle (金廈南洋大生活圈) and the opportunities offered to higher education institutions of the region are boundless.

Recently, the four presidents from both shores of Taiwan Straits, Chin-Cheng Lee (李金振) of National Quemoy Institute of Technology, Haydn Chen (程海東) of Tunghai University, Chong-Shi Zhu (朱崇實) of Xiamen (Amoy) University and Michael M. C. Lai (賴明詔) of NCKU (the four persons from left to right in the following photo) met and developed the following manifesto for collaboration:

"In the current landscape, Quemoy is faced with political, economical, sociological, educational,

cultural and environmental transformation. Viewing the situation macroscopically and regionally, we

have invited experts and leaders to this Summit to 'consider the future of Quemoy,' to measure its

pulse, and to contemplate its sustainable development. Leveraging the Quemoy issue, we will reflect on

the directions of humanity development of Taiwan, Mainland China, Asia, and last but not least, the

Globe!"

Understand Position of Taiwan in Asia Pacific

As a "newcomer" to Taiwan in particular, Asia Pacific in general, I have been intrigued with Taiwan's

position in Asia Pacific. As a physicist, my modus operandi is always to look for a model. I think I found

an intriguing one and would like to share with you briefly. The model for Taiwan to emulate could be

Switzerland.

The following two maps show the geographical positions of Switzerland and Taiwan.

For Switzerland, it is surrounded by the "big four," namely United Kingdom, France, Italy and Germany.

For Taiwan, it is also surrounded by the "big four," namely Japan, South Korea, Mainland China and the

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new economic power, Vietnam.

What are the Switzerland lessons to be learned here?

Well, the big four in Europe are known to distrust one another. Switzerland is known to be a political

and cultural neutral ground. It is also historically politically stable. In fact, even during WWII,

Switzerland remained as a neutral country and an oasis of stability, surrounded by brutal chaos! Such

neutrality has served Switzerland well. For example, it is probably a reason why the world's only super

advanced multi-nationally funded research center, CERN, is located in Geneva, and not in London,

Paris, Rome, or Berlin. For many decades since WWII, CERN may be the only research center in the

world that could go toe-to-toe with the best research centers in the United States. Today, it has even

surpassed them.

The above three photos depict CERN, ETH and IBM Zurich, the three icons of Switzerland.

With such an outstanding research center in CERN, with some of the best universities in the world

located in Switzerland, such as ETH in Zurich, and some of the trans-national industrial research

centers, such as IBM Zurich, the CERNs, the ETHs and the IBMs have powered Switzerland to be one of

the economically and intellectually most advanced nations of the Europe, if not the world. That is surely

a lesson to be learned by Taiwan.

Another truly remarkable aspect of Switzerland is that one should not be surprised to find a Swiss who

could speak English, French, Italian and German. Indeed, it is a nation of truly multi-culture and multi-

lingual! Since coming to Taiwan, I have often wondered what would Taiwan's position be like in Asia

Pacific in particular and the world in general today if in the genesis period of economic awakening in the

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early 70's, there was a vigorous and robust policy in Taiwan to turn the population into bilingual? Should

the multi-lingual success of Switzerland be a clarion call for Taiwan's population?

Mainland and Taiwan

At this moment, Mainland and Taiwan are entering a new era of détente, with increasing and intertwining interactions,

economically and intellectually. The best manifestation of

this interaction occurred on NCKU's campus a few weeks ago

in which a Kun-Qu (崑曲) Opera Troupe from Suzhou, China, made three performances. Kun-Qu has its genesis

around five centuries ago, during the Ming Dynasty. The

performances were held in the largest auditorium with a

capacity of about 1000 on campus, and were attended by

extremely enthusiastic and wall-to-wall audiences from all

walks of life from the community.

A question I was asked by my friends in the West often was

"what Mainland and Taiwan will be like in the foreseeable

future?" While the question is intriguing, it is well above my

pay grade to provide an answer. In the Presidents' Forum on

"Globalization of Universities in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macao and Mainland China," organized by Hong

Kong City University down the street, I made an attempt to answer this question as best I know how. Of

course, based on what I have discussed in this speech, it is not a surprise that my answer would be as

follows:

"Lastly, if higher education institutions from above mentioned regions can base their collaboration on

history, and render our 5,000-year culture as the underpinning, then, I believe this will bring about

tremendous implication and progress for "Promoting Chinese culture's impact on the world and

enhancing collaboration among Chinese universities in a global era."

In a sense, what is eternal is the inherent culture that is buried in the soul of every one who inherited it!

It is the only aspect of human existence that can withstand the test of time! I gave the above answer in

Chinese, so please allow me to give the Chinese version below.

Epilogue

Asia Pacific in the 21st century is unquestionably

one of the most exciting regions of the world. Asia,

in general, is also making incredible strides. It is

no wonder that more and more universities in this

region are becoming some of the best in the world.

I am especially excited to notice that one of the

best presidents of universities in Asia Pacific, Shih

Choon Fong, former president of National

University of Singapore, had recently taken on a

new challenge to become the founding president

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of King Abdullah University of Science and

Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia.

This "possibly" epoch altering move by President Shih signals the extension of the higher education

excitement of Asia Pacific to the western end of the continent. If the KAUST experiment is successful,

and judging by the determination and support it received from the Saudi ruler, it will in all likelihood be

so, it could be a very important prototype of a higher education institution that is deeply rooted in

Arabic, Asian Pacific and Western culture. It could signal what higher education institutions could be

like worldwide by the end of the 21st century: a cauldron of multi-cultural human organization,

producing a workforce with what Elie Wiesel, the Nobel peace laureate refer to as having "great courage

and moral aspirations!"

What will Asia Pacific in particular and Asia in general be like, say in the beginning of the 22nd century?

I do not have a crystal ball to tell you. I should mention that just after WWII, my father was a foreign

correspondent of China's Central News Agency stationed in New Delhi. On January 19, 1946, he

interviewed the soon to be Prime Minister of the India that was at the threshold of independence, the

Honorable Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru. During the interview, Nehru uttered 12 memorable, farsighted and

profound words to the world via my father's interview, which were

"If China and India hold together, the future of Asia is assured."

Motivated by this tremendous vision, in my speech to the National Academy of Sciences in Washington

DC on September 27, 2007, I said that

"Imagine that perhaps one day in the future a person can actually hop on a bullet-train in Seoul, Korea

for Mumbai without having to show once his/her passport to anyone! Imagine the economic explosions

and expansions, for the region and the globe that can come from such a scenario. Imagine the

improvement of the "quality-of-life" for all people in the world if Asia Pacific and South Asia, with

more than half of the world's population, propelled by India and China, and assisted by United States,

become Asia Union in the 21 century! "

Imagine if this were the goal, outstanding universities such as Hong Kong Polytechnic University must

shoulder significant responsibilities in reaching it!

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Charles Dickens (狄根斯)(1812 – 1870) wrote in the opening paragraph of his epic novel A Tale of Two Cities that

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of

foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was

the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything

before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the

other way--in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities

insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only."

Thank you Mr. Dickens for writing about our era in such vivid terms!

And thank you so much ladies and gentlemen for your attention!

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