Letters to the Editor

'Cognitive Dissonance'

In an issue that devoted nearly 20 pages to imagining how our future will be influenced by robots ("Tomorrowland," January/February), I guess I'm thankful that we got two pages on the struggle to create a livable future (robots or not) on this planet ("Making a Financial Statement," Farm Report).

I got a chance to meet some of the students spearheading Fossil Free Stanford during the 2013 reunion weekend. The article did a great job conveying their passion and wisdom in pursuing such a lofty goal. It also defined the two main curtains investors hide behind when facing a decision that mixes morals with business. [Assistant Vice President for Business Development] Susan Weinstein herself laid it out for us: Stanford's fiduciary responsibility to maximize shareholder value, and the "opportunity to influence company management." I believe that's called having your cake and eating it, too.

This issue of the magazine really brought out the cognitive dissonance that must be growing on campus. As one group of students and institutions calls for actions to ensure humanity continues to thrive, another well publicized and powerful group grows ever more obsessed with gadgetry of questionable value to our future.
John Mulrow, '08
Wheaton, Illinois

Mike Antonucci uses a poor example for his definition of "android"—namely, the replicants from the movie Blade Runner and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, the novel on which it was based ("The Lowdown on Lingo," January/February). Novelist Philip K. Dick was fascinated by what it means to be human, and he intended his androids to be indistinguishable from humans. They are androids only because the human characters see them as machines; in the novel, it takes a posthumous bone marrow test to separate man from machine. [Director] Ridley Scott's interpretation is even clearer: The replicants are humans—built from organic organs, matured in labs, given false memories and subject to artificially short lifespans. Though it plays out differently in the film, both works see empathy as the key moral difference between humans and machines. The point is that these works are not about androids; they're about humans. I know this seems like a quibble, and yes, I'm a huge nerd, but I am surely not the only Stanford reader who noticed.
Miles Townes, '00
Arlington, Virginia

Individualism Reconsidered

"I clearly embraced individualism without pausing to consider . . ." is the seminal quote in [the excerpt] from President Casper's memoir ("A Presidency Revisited," January/February). Institutionally, Stanford might well consider that quote as it plots its future. My parents' social views lay somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun, but I became an unabashed progressive. I attribute it to my freshman Western Civ in 1959, which provided precepts reflected yet in my everyday thinking, and Lawrence Thomas's graduate course Philosophy of Education, which taught me that each one of us, individually, must work out principles and realities of our worldviews in order to benefit society.

A three-summer teaching stint with a School of Education/Graduate School of Business institute in the 2000s, dedicated to school change, caught me up short—unprepared for the extent to which Stanford has sold out to "individualists" and their donations and buildings, chasing the dream of status. The undergraduate students I met were "me-first" folks, with no shred of underpinning for their beliefs; even my beloved School of Education has sold out to macro-publishers and a profit-driven view of American schooling.

As Stanford considers expanding its undergraduate enrollment, I would implore faculty to think carefully what they intend to offer [students], once arrived. Our nation is in dire need of people who can see beyond their own status and greed. I treasure my education at Stanford and could weep over its not being available to future generations.
Stephen Phillips, '63, MA '64
St. Petersburg, Florida

No Faith in Happiness?

I was looking forward with great interest to reading your short article about the Reunion Homecoming 2013 roundtable discussion on happiness ("What Is Happiness, Anyway?" Farm Report, January/February). In one of my Bible study groups, we are studying the Gospel of John, who deals much with happiness.

Two things bothered me. First, none of the panelists really dealt directly with Katie Couric's question. Second, when I surveyed the list of panelists, I was decidedly disappointed. Though you did a nice job of presenting a diversity of humanist and social science points of view, not one of the panelists seems to have any religious perspective or connection. Not one of them even suggests that one's faith may influence one's sense of happiness.

To me as a Christian, the religious worldview is central. I would have loved to read what a Christian pastor, Buddhist monk, Jewish rabbi or an Islamic imam would have said.
James Hart, MA '70
Colorado Springs, Colorado

What finer way to start a discourse on happiness than with a dictum from Hegel? "Life is meant for accomplishment, not for happiness." It is clear that every one of the five panelists agreed with Hegel without reservation, since the word "doing" or "do" is prominent in the core of their definitions. Unfortunately, there followed assertions such as having a [wrong] diagnosis of a terminal disease; the acknowledgement that giving to others really is for one's own benefit and would contribute to one's level of happiness; and—the most malicious—the oft repeated focus on feelings. 

If happiness exists, a state yet to be proven, it can only come when one has a sense not of who one is by oneself but rather of who one is in a social setting—a recognition that is anathema to the purveyors and purchasers of this psychology du jour. Social setting does not in the least mean "support system," a centripetal concept that is another means of fostering the focus on self. This intense concentration on one's own feelings is the basis for the isolation and loneliness that pervades our society and leads to the panelists encouraging "training children's brain circuitry" and the necessity for "cognitive therapy," all of which confirms that there is a lot of disordered thinking and feeling abroad. There is much interaction within online social media, but all this is contact without commitment. 

We have lost our sense of community at great peril to ourselves and our nation because of this nugatory quest for the elusive, ephemeral fabrication called happiness. It may be that the splintering and divisiveness now so pervasive is a consequence of the primacy of self. What more effective way to be isolated, alone and lonely than to feel that everything flows from and toward you? 

Katie Couric nailed it with the question, "Is there a fine line between happiness and narcissism?" The answer is that there likely is no line between the two.
Myron Gananian, '51, MD '59
Menlo Park, California

Fuel for Debate

Referring to Hugh Biggar's article "Making a Financial Statement" (Farm Report, January/February), I'm curious how useful 350.org and similar movements promoting activism—telling climate stories and launching bold campaigns—are. Fossil Free Stanford's cadre of students might make better use of their extracurricular activities by advancing research directly related to more efficient renewable energy production, rather than "storming dorms" and advising Stanford investments. This latter activity is better left to the Stanford Management Company, which has obviously concluded that the current rate of return on fossil fuel investments is greater than on renewable energy investments. Foot stomping and knocking on doors don't get us any closer to divestment of our dependency on fossil fuels, while applying "Stanford smarts" directly to research might.
Maury Bunn, MS '70
Enterprise, Oregon

I am dismayed that there is a student-led divestment campaign that targets fossil fuels. Instead of attacking the fossil fuel industry, Stanford needs to invite willing fossil fuel companies to the table and request their help protecting our environment with their ideas and funds. This approach has worked with the Student Conservation Association, on whose board I served from 2003 to 2009. A strategy of demonizing an entire industry without differentiation among companies is ineffective and certain to fail, given that some of them have been leaders in green energy and recognize the end of the fossil fuel era is inevitable. I value U.S. energy independence, international trade and transportation jobs as much as "green" jobs. I respectfully request that Stanford University students avoid broad name-calling attacks on fossil fuels without any effort to engage individual companies to solve our mutual problems of economic development and conservation. I made my fortune in the energy industry and substantially all of it is currently bequeathed to Stanford, unless the student-led fossil fuel divestment effort succeeds.
Clydia J. Cuykendall, '71
Olympia, Washington

Hugh Biggar's article was deeply discouraging. Despite the University's history of supporting "sustainable investing," despite an office that advises the Board of Trustees and President Hennessy on "investments in businesses whose practices could cause substantial social injury," it's clear that Fossil Free Stanford faces an uphill battle to get the University to divest its holdings in the fossil fuel industry. According to University officials, this issue is "murkier" than divesting from tobacco companies or from businesses that had operations in South Africa under its former regime. Susan Weinstein, assistant vice president for business development, locates for us the exact source of this murkiness: "the Board of Trustees' fiduciary obligation to maximize the financial return on Stanford's investment."

Stanford is not yet a for-profit corporation. Its Board of Trustees has higher obligations than maximizing return on investment. Educational, social, ethical and moral obligations come to mind. In considering where not to invest endowment funds, is there a "social injury" on the horizon that could be any more "substantial" than the impending catastrophe of global warming?

Here is President Hennessy addressing the topic of climate change at the Stanford Roundtable in 2007: "Why is there lingering public uncertainty? Because the scientific community hasn't done what it needs to do to help the American public understand this very complex problem. The University has to embrace it as an important part of its public mission." Well, seven years and billions of tons of greenhouse gases later, it's plain that more research papers and dire reports won't get the job done. If Stanford really wants to be part of a solution, it must take bold political and economic action. A good start would be to implement immediately the course of action proposed by Fossil Free Stanford. Furthermore, the University should announce that every dollar divested from fossil fuel businesses will be redirected into businesses focused on alternative and sustainable technologies for generating and using energy, or on technologies and programs for removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. The time for cheap talk about "public mission" is long past. It's time for Stanford to put its money where its mouth is.
Jim Airy, MS '67
La Conner, Washington

I found the article "Making a Financial Statement" both comical and depressing. What statement is being made? We flunked economics? We're spoiled, clueless rich kids? We have no regard for past or future alumni and the gifts they've made to better the University?

While the attempt may seem noble, any resulting action would almost certainly hurt Stanford through constraining or forcing action upon the endowment's management team. Technology advancement and rational economic choice remain far more effective means to effect meaningful and lasting progress than bad policy masquerading as political correctness. California and national political leaders have certainly proven this time and time again, and unfortunately, irrational energy policies frequently provide the most obscene examples.
Daniel Wildermuth, '87
Alpharetta, Georgia

I wonder where in the educational process these students lost sight of the fact that without fossil fuels there would be no Stanford University. Many of them probably would not be able to travel from their homes to Stanford, where, presumably, they will get a better education than they have already received. This, of course, assumes they traveled to Stanford by either air or gas-powered motor vehicle.

I suggest that the University take a serious look at divesting themselves of their fossil fuel investments when the alternative power sources render them ineffective and unprofitable. I am not expecting to see that happen in my lifetime.
Bill Lorton, '64
San Jose, California

It is hard to conceive of the amount of endowment that might make the Stanford Board of Trustees feel they could afford to relocate their current investments away from the 200 most fossil fuel-intensive industries. For instance, [Stanford's] $18.7 billion endowment is larger than the GDP of many island nations that will be required to relocate their populations in the near future. In fact, Stanford may have an endowment that is larger than the GDP of all these countries combined.

Here in the United States, Miami will soon be flooded even if all CO2 emissions are halted today, because we are now locked into 4 feet of sea level rise. If Business As Usual continues to mid-century, that number rises to 9 feet or more (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, http://assets.climatecentral.org/pdfs/Strauss-PNAS-2013-v2.pdf). Other U.S. cities on the endangered list with Business As Usual are Virginia Beach, Sacramento (and its whole delta basin), Boston, Jacksonville, Long Beach and New York City. By 2020, there is a 1 in 6 chance that combined sea level rise, tides and storm surges will flood your SFO airport and portions of Palo Alto.

From this perspective, an endowment that invests in fossil fuels is slated to lose a great deal of its value in the relatively near future. Added to that concern is the fact that the current value of fossil fuel-producing industries rests on a valuation balloon that has been inflated by estimates of current holdings, or fossil fuel materials that should never be taken out of the ground if we want to save civilization.

We are certainly on a decline and collapse path, but if you think turning this juggernaut around is impossible, then you have not been reading Lester Brown's or Richard Heinberg's work. In Plan B 4.0, Brown of the Earth Policy Institute has outlined such a mobilization process, and Heinberg has made some other important suggestions in his book The End of Growth. The U.S. military budget in 2009 was $607 billion. The whole Plan B budget (not funded by a carbon tax and subsidies) comes in at $187 billion, 31 percent of our annual military budget, so why are we not doing this yet?

I am a parent of a Class of 2016 student. During his lifetime he will not be able to live in Miami, visit some beautiful island states nor see Venice survive, due to the climate and sea level changes we are already committed to seeing this century. How many losses are we willing to accept for our children (not to mention grandchildren), when the big fear is the possible loss of civilization as states around the world continue to fail? I know that is not what any of us want, but we need to get more vocal and demonstrate an even larger commitment to their futures by talking the talk and walking the walk.

I can't say how proud I am of this "small but committed" group of Stanford students who have formed Fossil Free Stanford. I think that I am speaking for most Stanford parents by voicing my fervent support of the Stanford Fossil Fuel Divestiture Campaign. Let's help these students in this potentially powerful campaign.
Kim Kendall
Mercer Island, Washington

Football and Fitness

I have seldom seen a better illustration of the fallacy of selective vigilance than in the letter from Richard E. Winkelman, which cites the average NFL career of four years (due to injuries, he generalizes) as evidence to ban football ("Down With Football," January/February).

According to 2010-11 statistics, there were only 1,696 NFL football players. Is this really a representative study size for such a conclusion? Compare this to youth football, Pop Warner and American Youth Football, with 5.5 million players, and 1,023,142 high school football players. It is estimated that as many as 15 percent of U.S. boys participate in at least some form of football from Little League through high school, and there were 65,648 participants in NCAA college football. 

The concluding argument by Winkelman is even more ridiculous, that football should be banned because unlike other sports, which improve your health, football "destroys" your body. Yet, to play youth football, the players must have two or even three times the amount of cardiovascular exercise than in other sports. (My kids, Menlo-Atherton Vikings, have six hours of practice each week; their basketball team, Palo Alto NJB, has two and a half hours of practice a week.) Further, each August, football takes the video game joysticks out of would-be obese young people's hands for four days a week practicing in the sun. So football players' bodies are not destroyed, but enhanced in comparison to those other sports. I believe this superior cardiovascular (and muscular/internal body) exercise improves their metabolism and lifelong exercise habits.  For example, I played football for 11 years until 12th grade. My BMI many years later? 23.
Chen Kai Wen
Palo Alto, California

Admission Decisions

Despite the way Ivan Maisel tried to dissect the admissions process ("What It Takes," November/December), I think that the individual admissions officer may have a different subjective sentiment about a particular applicant [depending on] the applicant's recommendation letters, essay or socioeconomic background. It is a highly personal "like" or "dislike" of the applicant based on the information given.

One thing that still bothers me is whether admission is also based on an allotment for a geographical area or a given high school. My younger son, who was a National Merit Finalist with 4.0+ GPA, close to perfect SAT scores and eight APs, was rejected. But two classmates of his were accepted, with much inferior scores. It really was a blow to my son. To add salt to the wound, he followed the advice of his older brother (who was studying at Stanford at the time) to ask the admissions office for their reason for rejection. And the answer was, "Your eight APs are not all fives." This was so insensitive of Stanford.
Gemma Hon
Hillsborough, California

Deadly Gaps

Although Justice Richard Mosk writes convincingly about the dedication and diligence of the Warren Commission ("Truth Was Our Only Client," November/December), information that became public after the report was released raises questions about the process and conclusions of the report. I am not interested in fueling conspiracy theories or disparaging the participants, but the gaps in the information provided to the commission are egregious.

After Chief Justice Warren and several key members of the commission accepted their assignments reluctantly, President Johnson counseled against mentioning any Russian connection. More importantly, the commission never heard from Robert Kennedy, Allen Dulles or Richard Helms about the three-year campaign they had conducted to assassinate Fidel Castro, and President Johnson did not know about this assassination program until several years later. While neither the president nor the commission should be blamed for this omission, it casts doubts about the validity of the report or whether other sources or pertinent information might have been ignored or withheld.

There is also no mention of the surveillance of Oswald by the FBI and the CIA, especially during his visits to the Soviet and Cuban embassies in Mexico, which would make him a national security risk. Since the FBI and CIA did not share their files, apparently no one made the connection when Oswald took a job shortly before the assassination in the book depository on the route President Kennedy would take.

Unfortunately, this lack of cooperation between the FBI and the CIA did not end with the tragedy of 1963, but was repeated before and after 9/11, with catastrophic consequences. President Obama's initial denial of knowledge of the NSA's electronic surveillance of Americans or tapping German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cell phone raises new questions about who is in charge, and his comments about "reining in" the NSA and urging it to exercise "self-restraint" are not very reassuring.
Tony White, '58
Santa Rosa, California

Why Class Notes?

Every school alumni magazine contains a class notes section. Why? At most only a few names are mentioned, increasing slightly as the class years go up. If you don't remember the mentioned classmate, who cares? Friendships formed during college years continue as the years go by without the need of alumni publicity.

Class notes are an anachronism, take up valuable publication space and should be deleted. Instead, more articles about life in the past, present and future at Stanford would be appreciated.
Richard R. Babb, '56, MD '60
Portola Valley, California 

Better than Divestment

I commend Sophie Harrison and her group for caring about an issue and trying to take action (“Making a Financial Statement,” Farm Report, January/February). Erica Knox’s statement that “Stanford is [or can be] an incubator of what the future is going to be” is where the group should focus its efforts. Pouring money into—or this case diverting it from—commercial ventures based upon uneconomic or unproven technologies costs billions. The money would be better directed at research on marketable, economic projects.  

Countries such as Spain and Germany have recently realized that even with government subsidies, their green initiatives do not work in the commercial/consumer world. They have been subsidizing green energy on a large scale for a decade and are now pulling back support, as the technology is not cost-effective. End users are not willing to pay the related costs, even at the highly subsidized end-user prices.

You can push for divestiture, but what is an economic market alternative? That is the key question and opportunity. Rather than escrow funds to be released upon divestiture, alumni and others can pledge and invest their money in basic research.
Thomas E. Schiff, ’72, MBA ’74
Corona del Mar, California

A Truly Epic LSJUMB Moment

In your recap of memorable Band moments, you missed a great one (“An Incomparable Place,” Farm Report, January/February). Virtually every band for countless decades performed “The Star-Spangled Banner” in the style of John Philip Sousa. For the (first-ever?) nationally televised Stanford football home game against Notre Dame in October 1963, director Barnes introduced the world to his now legendary version, more reminiscent of Tchaikovsky or Debussy. Literally breathtaking, it was reported to have generated record-setting donations to the Buck Club the following week. (It wasn’t hurt by the fact that Stanford beat its rival for the first time.)

As with 9/11, people can say exactly where they were when President Kennedy was assassinated. A member of Axe Comm, I was on a ladder in a Wilbur Hall rec room hanging decorations in preparation for the Friday-night dance prior to the following day’s Big Game. The game was postponed. A week later, when the stadium’s capacity crowd rose for the national anthem, you could hear a pin drop, as in the Mormon Tabernacle. With lumps in their throats, the audience heard that trumpeter bravely, miraculously deliver those first solo verses without a warble. Slowly, softly, the rest of the band swelled in, leading to its fabulous crescendo.

I doubt there were many dry eyes; every arm was covered in goose bumps, every spine had shivers running up and down. That was an epic LSJUMB moment, one surely remembered by all 94,000 or so who were privileged to experience it first-hand.
Bob Neel, ’67, MS ’69
Seattle, Washington