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Heterotrophic flagellates and the revolution

by Chris Lavigne
The Republic

I recently attended my friend's convocation ceremony at Simon Fraser University. With my postmodern irony ready to mock any hint of emotional façade the event might pretend to construct, I was astounded by what an inspirational occasion it turned out to be.

It's not that there were any heart-stopping speeches that opened my mind to the myriad possibilities of life. In fact, the actual ceremony seemed to be staged only to convince visiting parents that the university was, indeed, a worthwhile and esteemed institution and not just a money-sucking cover.

Whatever inspiration there was contained in this event was not to be found in the self-serving and hyperbolic speech given by President Michael Stevenson, no doubt written by the SFU recruiting department. The only thing motivational about the ceremony were the graduands themselves.

As I sat through the clichéd prattle of Stevenson et al--"Follow your dreams!" and "Donate to the alumni fund!"--I opened the convocation program book to see how much more ceremony I would have to endure. Inside, I found each graduand's name was listed with the specifics about her or his degree.

For Master's and PhD students, the program also listed the topic of their thesis or final project. It was in perusing this engrossing list that I finally felt my heart stir.

It was in reading about Denis Karaiskaj's PhD project, "Photoluminescence Studies on Isotopically Enriched Silicon," that I felt a twinge of inspiration. It was seeing Rita Wong's PhD thesis entitled "Provisional Mobilities: Rethinking Labour Through Asian Racialization in Literature" that lifted my spirits. Even Andrew Riedel's Master of Science thesis on "Zooplankton Composition and Control of Heterotrophic Flagellates Among Lakes of the Mackenzie Delta," which seemed like it was written in another language, had me suddenly feeling optimistic about the world.

I wondered: with an infinite choice of topics, how does someone arrive at investigating something like heterotrophic flagellates? It is the ability of these women and men to focus on an incredibly concentrated area that inspired an epiphany for me. "Eureka!" I almost shouted, as perhaps Koman Joe did during his Master of Science thesis on the "Development of a Denaturant-Stable Peptide Ligase."

The combined actions and behaviour of every individual human being are what shape our world. Each of these graduate students chose a very specific and narrow subject to explore. Separately, their efforts might seem pointless or irrelevant. Is Rob Commisso's Master of Arts thesis on "Foliar Delta 15N as an Indicator of Anthropogenic Sediments" going to revolutionize the world? Of course not, but when his research is united with the studies of thousands of other people around the world, some kind of change is inevitable.

It's not generally until the end of their careers when elderly scholars become arrogant or senile enough to write books like The Complete History of the World or Nyah, Nyah, Nyah: Capitalism Wins, So There. Listed in the program, there were no all-encompassing theses titled "How to Save the Planet from Pollution" or "Building a World-Dominating Corporation." However, there were theses like Kevin Washbrook's "Assessing the Potential of Road and Parking Charges to Reduce Demand for Single Occupancy Vehicle Commuting in the Greater Vancouver Region" and Mackay Cutshall's "Strategic Analysis and Recommendations for a Growth Strategy for a Canadian Design Firm."

Everything in our society is a result of thousands, if not millions, of people acting unintentionally in unison. Every scientific breakthrough is the outcome of countless Master's and PhD theses as much as it is the product of a single genius. Any artistic movement relies on innumerable people expressing similar feelings at the same time. Revolutions erupt when individual members of a population come to the same conclusions and take action together.

Looking at our world today, we see lots of people pointing their fingers at corrupt governments or power-hungry businesses. A corporation is just a group of people acting as one. A government ostensibly represents a nation's population. Neither can exist without the contributions of multitudes of people, each doing their small part. Companies like Wal-Mart and Starbuck's don't bankrupt small businesses. Their customers and employees do. It's not oil companies that ravage the environment, it's every time we fill our cars with gas. The state of Israel doesn't attack Palestinians. Israeli soldiers do and Israeli citizens let them.

Everyone contributes to creating the world in which we live. It is not imposed on us from above. Often the very forces that we claim oppress us are actually composed of us, and could be eliminated if we simply did not participate in maintaining their existence. Corporations would fail if no one worked for them. The state of Israel would weaken if the thousands of Palestinians who are employed by it would quit.

In our world, it can be frustrating to look at the big picture. Change never seems possible, because we expect it to happen too quickly and on too large a scale. The lesson I've learned from the graduands of SFU is to think small. Change does not come from above: it's not the result of speeches from podiums--it's the outcome of the way people conduct their lives.

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