Inside Higher Ed | Biological theorist Richard Dawkins writes in The Selfish Gene that if we wish “to build a society in which people cooperate generously and unselfishly towards a common good, [we] can expect little help from biological nature … because we are born selfish.” Observers of academic scandal and fraudulent scholarship often attest to that. Conversely, economist Jeremy Rifkin believes “human beings are not inherently evil or intrinsically self-centered and materialistic, but are of a very different nature — an empathic one — and that all of the other drives that we have considered to be primary — aggression, violence, selfish behavior, acquisitiveness — are in fact secondary drives that flow from repression or denial of our most basic instinct.”
Who is right, at least when it comes to professors?
Certainly, violence and aggression are facts of life on the typical campus, ranging from assaults, hate speech and shootings to gridiron wars ignited by tribal bonfires, beer kegs and primal weekend rituals.
As director of a journalism school at a science-oriented institution, I can attest that the empathic professor not only exists but daily displays the grace, forgiveness and tolerance usually associated with higher callings. Ours is such a calling. Who but the empathic professor, from overworked adjunct to distinguished don, can profess the same tenets of basic chemistry, composition and calculus semester upon semester until seasons blend into one career-long academic calendar, were it not for love of learning and the instilling thereof in others. …
To view the entire article by Michael Bugeja, visit: http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2010/06/18/bugeja