My speech to the graduates at the Olin College of Engineering

Special place for the kind of engineers we need

I had a blast speaking to the awesome graduates of the Olin College of Engineering. It is a special place for project-based engineering and to produce engineers who know how to work in teams and actually do things rather than just learning a bunch of redundant requirements that weigh down engineering curricula at other places. As artificial intelligence and the raging technocracy take over, the kinds of engineers that they produce at Olin are the ones we need. They were REALLY fun to talk to.

Gilda Barabino has done a great job as the president there for 5 years and is leaving the place better than she found it. It was an honor to be her last graduation speaker and to get an an honorary degree that makes me a Phoenix for life.

Here is the video of my speech (starting at 50 min in), and the text is below.

Hello, everybody!

I’m so excited to be the commencement speaker at the Olin College of Arts and Crafts!

Sorry, the Olin College of Engineering.

Congratulations, graduates! Class of 2025!

You made it through a lot. Pandemic, divisive politics, international conflict.

And you thought you were going to college in Boston. Hanging in Harvard Square, listening to music at the Hatch Shell, eating risotto in the North End.

Turns out you were out here.

Way out here.

With the Same. People. Every. Day.

And don’t worry, I know about the six-week rule. So far, I’ve made it one day without starting any romantic relationships.

41 days to go.

After I make through that, I just need to learn the lyrics to the Battle Hymn of the Republic so I’m ready for Bill Warner day.

Pretty soon, I’ll be a true Phoenix. The way things are going right now, being imaginary sounds pretty good.

Despite the isolation and the quirky traditions, when you came to Olin, you joined an amazing community where you were taught how to learn and how to work in teams by professors like Rob Martello who were so excited about their subjects. And with staff members like Patrick Clarkson who were always happy to help solve your problem.

And with students with similar interests to you.

When I went to college at a big public university full of frat boys and sports fanatics, people made fun of the fact that I was the first person to solve the Rubik’s cube on national television.

If I’d come here, people would have made fun of how slow my time was.

Well, graduation speeches have three ideas in 12 minutes. So, I’d better get going.

Nobody’s Normal

I don’t think I can stand in front of this many students and not mention the fact that we are in a mental health crisis among young people. As many as 50% of college age students have sought mental health services. That’s a lot of people here today who are hurting. I can understand why anyone would be struggling given all that’s going on in the world – and especially with the stress of college and the political environment. Lots of pundits want to tell you why this is happening. For sure, part of it is an outdated and biased idea of what it means to be ‘normal’ that most of us can’t conform to.

You may notice that my hand movements and the lack of modulation in my vocal tone are a little unusual. That’s because I’m autistic. Lots of famous and successful people have had this diagnosis. But far more autistic people -- and those who had autism but were never diagnosed, and therefore never given the supports they needed -- were much less fortunate, sometimes requiring constant care and exhibiting much higher rates of anxiety and depression than the general population. And that’s partly because, particularly in some sectors of society, our awkward traits come with significant stigma.

As an autistic person, I have the greatest admiration for all of you who had to do so many, non-stop excruciating group projects.

For me, that even would be worse than chasing mercury around the Miller Academic Center.

Now one reason I’m telling you this is so you know that if you have mental health struggles of your own, you can still be the speaker at Olin College commencement one day. In fact, all of us up here in our robes with our fancy degrees may look completely together, but every one of us has had challenges just like you may be having. So as my GW colleague Richard Grinker says, remember that if you look closely enough, nobody’s normal.

Institutions aren’t perfect

There’s an elephant in this big room. Actually, a donkey and an elephant, because we just had a very divisive election and a dizzying start to the administration. And the number of votes for the two candidates were so close that for every person who is disappointed and scared about the future, there’s someone else who is happy and excited. You’re being handed quite a big challenge with all of this. And my advice is not to listen to any pundit who tries to tell you why someone voted: there’s no way any one analysis applies to everyone who voted one way or the other. And remember that the American people are not always the same as the American politicians.

But we do know that part of the story is a big loss of trust in institutions. And many of you will leave here to work for these institutions. Medicine, science, law, journalism, big corporations, government, higher education. All lost a significant amount of public trust during the pandemic. And that’s something the institutions need to be humble about. It’s not going to work to cynically dismiss every criticism.

So, if you leave here to work for one of these institutions, remember that none of them is perfect. Be part of helping them reform and engage their critics. Many of these institutions, including higher education, made immeasurable contributions to success for all, but they also owe everyone an explanation when they fall short, an acknowledgment of their shortcomings, and a plan to do better.

Take the Olin College of Engineering. Sure, they did a lot of great stuff for you, but who would have an email list where you could send a message to an entire college?

I mean, those messages only live forever.

And sometimes when you pressed for change, instead of fixing something, they told you, “We have to have another meeting because we’re a community.”

Well, bad news. This is how most institutions respond. Powerful people and organizations usually only do hard things when they have to. So at your new institution, insist that they be straight with folks when they mess up and give direct answers to questions from stakeholders and reporters – instead of hiding behind canned statements. When they don’t do those things, it’s completely in bounds to press them to do better. It’s also essential.

So go love these institutions so much you that you help them improve. And hold everyone there to a higher standard, including yourself.

Do the work

Now as we are sitting here, science in the United States is in a state of turmoil. Rapid cuts to science and engineering funding and employment are roiling the workforce, stranding many young people who had plans to participate in admirable federal programs that no longer exist. No one would blame anyone here for being anxious about this.

Other countries around the world are seizing on this opportunity by recruiting US scientists abroad. It was already the case that science is growing in Asia at faster rates than here. The technological leadership that the United States has achieved over the last 80 years has enabled all of the commercial and political success that the country has had and, ironically, has produced many of the very people who are now trying undo it all.

I apologize to the members of Formula who apparently are in a cult that worships one of these individuals.

But these technocrats think this it is now OK to weaken American science partly because intelligent machines are going to do science and engineering for us, apparently even curing all diseases. There’s a simple reason why that won’t work. Because even if the machines can do a lot, they can’t benefit people without interacting with, well, people. And because you went here, you know a lot about how people interact with machines and with each other.

So if anyone can make machines that safely and equitably benefit people, it’s you.

Nobody my age can stand up here and tell you with certainty that this will all be OK. Too much is changing for us to know that. But what we can say is that over the course of tumultuous times in the world, the people who did the most to get us to the next place were the ones who did the work even when forces were trying to stop them.

So if you want to engage in resistance, do the work you came to Olin to learn to do. Make engineering generative and humane. Make machines that actually help people, especially those who haven’t benefited from the analog world as much as some of us. Energize people around you, including people who think differently and have different opinions.

And you have role models here to help you know how to do all this. Just be as helpful as Patrick Clarkson and as excited about what you’re doing as Rob Martello.

When in doubt, stop the doomscrolling and do the work.

You’re right on schedule

This may sound daunting, but we’re going a long way toward all these goals today because all of you are graduating!

Now some of the talk about changing the world that always shows up at graduations might make you uneasy. Some of you might not have your grand plan worked out. If that’s the case, you’re right on schedule. Most of you who do have a plan are going to change it multiple times.

So don’t worry if you don’t have it all figured out yet. And remember that whatever you do next, it’s the right thing if it’s what you want. Try to tune out what your parents and your advisers think you want. They don’t know everything that you know about what’s right.

They also didn’t get handed this divided world where everyone is obsessed with who belongs and who doesn’t. A world filled with uncertainty about politics, artificial intelligence, and the climate.

Tune it out and do what you think is right. You have the tools to decide and execute. You have the knowledge. You have the conscience. You just need to remember when you leave here that not all parties end with Take Me Home, Country Roads.

It could be awkward in the real world if you just launched into it.

But you will figure it out, and when things get really tough, you can still come back to Olin and take another spin around Parcel B.

Or go over to the Wellesley dump and see what kind of awesome stuff is in there.

So that’s my talk.

Nobody is normal.

Institutions aren’t perfect.

Do the work.

With these ideas, you’re ready for anything.

And remember, no matter what life throws at you, there’s one thing you can always cling to: you will never have to go to class with your ex again.

Congratulations to the Olin class of 2025!