School of Science Commencement Address

Invited Commencement Address,

School of Science Class of

2024

Dr. Chris E. Stout, Distinguished Alumnus – BS, ’81

Good morning and thank you for your introduction. Had my parents been here, my father would have appreciated your remarks and my mother would have believed them.

I want to begin by thanking Dean DiTusa, the faculty of the School of Science, and this year’s graduates for the great honor of addressing this special commencement ceremony, as it is the last one, as an IUPUI School.

How exciting it is for me to be here today, and to the mothers of soon-to-be-graduates, thanks for letting me be a part of your best early Mother’s Day gift ever!

Being here brings back many fond memories - I so enjoyed my time on campus.

I started off as a math major in the School of Science, then transferred to the School of Engineering and Technology and completed a degree in Architectural Technology, and returned back to the School of Science, but this time to study my newfound passion, psychology.

And that was all in four years’ time. IUPUI was the only university where I could do all that and add a minor in medical sociology along the way.

My father and his siblings were born in a house on the family farm about 20 miles west of here. I am a first generation college attendee, and my grandparents did not have the opportunity to complete high school.

And I am well aware that I nevertheless come from a place of privilege, but it was not only privilege that brought me to IUPUI, it was an opportunity that changed my life.

When I came to this campus as a Freshman, 47 years ago, even then it offered more combined opportunities than any other university I could name. I bet for some of you that may have been the same reason you chose coming here.

And now, you’ve finished your work, and as this is graduation-season, you along with about 4 million others and their loved ones, will be forced to listen to someone my age tell you how to clean up the mess my generation is leaving you.

Some of what I’ll share with you is borrowed, some is stolen, and some may even be original, but that's doubtful as it's pretty hard to be original when you’ve been around as long as I have.

Let me start with a question.

When you were little, and when you got in to trouble for doing something wrong, was your go-to defense to say “I didn’t do it on purpose”?

Somehow that lack of intent, that circumstantial accident as it were, was the means to getting off the hook and avoiding some unwanted consequence.

For me, when I hear the word “purpose,” I think of “intention.” My challenge for you today is to consider living your life on purpose, or with purpose, with intention. It is my argument that, that is a key ingredient to living a life in full.

Here’s my evidence.

Marta Zaraska’s research reveals that people who believe their existence has meaning have lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol and more favorable gene expression related to inflammation. If a 90year-old with a clear purpose in life develops Alzheimer’s disease, that person will probably keep functioning relatively well despite real pathological changes in the brain. A meta-analysis of 10 studies involving more than 136,000 people found that having purpose in life can lower your mortality risk by nearly 17 percent.

Her cross-cultural research found that having a “purpose in life” is considered so key to longevity in Japanese culture that Japan’s Ministry of Health has included it in their official health promotion strategy. One epidemiological study conducted on over 43,000 Japanese, found that not having a purpose in life was linked to a 60 percent higher risk of dying of cardiovascular disease.

Research has shown that people who have high levels of purpose in life: spend fewer nights in hospitals, have lower odds of developing diabetes, and are at two times lower risk of dying from heart conditions, than do others.

Viktor Frankl, famed Austrian psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor, hypothesized that higher purpose gives people a will to stay alive. Research now seems to be catching up with that idea. Even when scientists control for health-related behaviors, the strong effects of meaning on longevity still persist

So, if all this is sounding persuasive, where do we start?

Aristotle talked about a lifelong pursuit of “virtuous activity of the soul,” but that’s a bit too vague for me.

I found that Amazon lists 151,928 books that refer to how you can learn your life purpose. Allow me to summarize:

Martin Seligman, one of the parents of positive psychology, asks the question this way: What activities were you already doing as a child that you still like to do now?

It may not be the thing you love to do the most, and it may not be the most fun all the time, but ask yourself: Is there something I have to work hard at to get right, something that I want to get right because I care enough about it, no matter how much time and practice it takes? Is there something that gets me up a little early, or keeps me up late, not because the project is due the next day, but because it’s important to me to make a little more progress? Not every day and night, but reliably?

Pay attention to this.

If you’re looking to find a career that will matter to you, instead of looking only in the direction of “passion,” also think about the activities that you return to despite the fact that they are harder to complete.

And while "do what you love" is an important message, it's likely not a good idea to build a career on the notion that we should all be paid for our passions. The advice captures only part of the story. It tells us how excellent work might be accomplished by loving it but it doesn't tell us why the work should be done. What is the point of all the effort? What is being worked toward?

The answer lies in working with a deeper sense of purpose or vocation.

Yet without such a higher purpose, where all this love and ambition can be directed, we don't have a very useful guidepost for meaningful success. We instead have a call to discover what it is that we love, and then to do it.

Of course, there are many people doing what they genuinely love. But how many of us love just one thing? It's romantic to imagine that each person is destined for a particular career path, one capable of being discovered with sufficient soul-searching.

But most people have multifaceted interests and abilities, and could probably be successful and happy in several fields.

I think it is better to consider love as a consequence of meaningful work instead of the motivation for it. Does the doctor love going into the hospital to see a patient in the middle of the night? Does the firefighter love entering a burning building? Does the teacher love trying to control a classroom full of disrespectful children? Not likely. But the work is performed with a sense of purpose that “love” doesn't capture.

Along these lines, I’d like to offer a plug for the idea of having a portfolio career. As mentioned, one of the lasting benefits I have enjoyed from my time at IUPUI is having such varied exposure to so many different and interesting things.

David Epstein’s book, Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World, shows that people with varied skills are becoming more valuable in the modern economy, and tend to have the most fulfilling work lives.

Now I know most of you are thinking of the proverb counterpoint: “He who follows two hares catches neither.” Perhaps that’s so, but he who chases two hares may have a great time doing so, which I think is important in having a good life.

Epstein has found that a high level of commitment to a hobby makes leisure time significantly more satisfying. In addition to being fun and making you happy, a commitment to multiple skills can make you better at each of them – work hard and play hard.

This makes me wonder if it’s the pursuit of happiness that’s key, or instead, is it the “happiness of pursuit?” Sort of like having a vision quest for your life. There are ordinary people everywhere working toward extraordinary goals, making daily down-payments on their dream.

As graduates of the School of Science, you are in a position, more than most, to know the awesome gravity of the void you are walking into. The gift, and the curse, of the scientific mind is to know that every time we presume to see the whole of something, the plane of reality will tilt to reveal new mysteries.

You all know this.

You’re the ones who have the clearest sense that there is so much we do not know. But you are also the ones with the greatest ability to see possibility in that void – to walk into it, to discover, and to create.

Class of 2024, the future belongs to you. Your education hasn’t ended, it’s just changed shape. You have already made history by starting college during some truly unprecedented times. I have no doubt that you will continue to make history throughout the rest of your lives – and doing so on purpose, and with keen intention.

Commencing is a beautiful thing, beautiful and terrifying, marked by the wonder, and the weight, of the possible.

Now is your time.

Congratulations.