Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish (16 years ago today)

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This is the text of the Commencement address by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, delivered on this date 16 years ago (June 12, 2005). A video of the speech is here:

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories. 

The first story is about connecting the dots. 

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out? 

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college. 

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting. 

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example: 

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating. 

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later. 

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life. 

My second story is about love and loss. 

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating. 

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over. 

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life. 

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I retuned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together. 

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle. 

My third story is about death. 

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something. 

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart. 

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes. 

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now. 

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept: 

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true. 

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. 

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.  

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you. 

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. 

Thank you all very much. 

Stop Limping

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To utilize the ability you have you must start by getting rid of any loser’s limp you might have. A typical Loser’s Limp is, “I’m not a born salesman, or a born doctor, lawyer, artist, architect, engineer, etc.” In my travels, I have picked up newspapers from the rural villages of Australia, to the bulging metropolises of North American and Europe. I’ve read where women have given birth to boys and girls, but thus far I have never read where a woman has given birth to a salesman, or a doctor, lawyer, artist, engineer, etc. However, I do read where doctors, lawyers, salesman, etc., die. Since they are not “born.” But they do “die,” obviously, somewhere between birth and death, by choice and by training, they become what they wish to become. I’ve never seen where a woman has given birth to a success or to a failure. It’s always either a boy or a girl.

Zig Ziglar, See You at the Top

Working the Creative Muscle

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Creativity can give people a competitive edge in any profession, from firefighting to oil trading. The challenge is knowing when we need to be creative and how to do it, says Balder Onarheim, co-founder of the Copenhagen Institute of NeuroCreativity. Creativity requires a lot of energy, and the brain is designed to conserve energy, especially in stressful situations, so “if it can reuse an old pattern, it will,” he says. “For most people, it’s actually about knowing when to help push your brain out of the normal way of dealing with things.” 

When seeking inspiration, many people look for ideas around issues similar to the one they’re stuck on. The genius of Oblique Strategies, says Onarheim, is that it introduces an element of randomness that breaks that mold. It’s the same reason people often have their best ideas in the shower or on a walk through the woods rather than sitting at a desk.

Jess Shankleman writing for Bloomberg Business

Risk Management

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When we say that someone has fallen on bad luck, we relieve that person of any responsibility for what has happened. When we say that someone has had good luck, we deny that person credit for the effort that might have led to the happy outcome. But how sure can we be? Was it fate or choice that decided the outcome?

Until we can distinguish between an event that is truly random and an event that is the result of cause and effect, we will never know whether what we see is what we’ll get, nor how we got what we got.

When we take a risk, we are betting on an outcome that will result from a decision we have made, though we do not know for certain what the outcome will be. The essence of risk management lies in maximizing the areas where we have some control over the outcome while minimizing the areas where we have absolutely no control over the outcome and the linkage between effect and cause is hidden from us.

Peter Bernstein, Against the Gods

Curiosity primes the pump

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The research tells us that curiosity matters for three primary reasons. First, inspiration is strongly correlated with an intrinsic desire to learn. Curiosity sparks inspiration. You learn more and more frequently because you are curious. Second, curiosity marks the beginning of a virtuous cycle that feeds your ability as a self-directed learner. Finally, research suggests that curiosity doesn’t diminish with age, so it can serve you at any point in your career. Although your learning methods will change over time, curiosity will keep the spark of motivation alive.   

Lisa Christensen, Jake Gittleson, and Matt Smith 

When we Grow

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Some periods of our growth are so confusing that we don’t even recognize that growth is happening. We may feel hostile or angry or weepy and hysterical, or we may feel depressed. It would never occur to us, unless we stumbled on a book or a person who explained to us, that we were in fact in the process of change, of actually becoming larger than we were before. 

Whenever we grow, we tend to feel it, as a young seed must feel the weight and inertia of the earth as it seeks to break out of its shell on its way to becoming a plant. Often the feeling is anything but pleasant. 

But what is most unpleasant is the not knowing what is happening. Those long periods when something inside ourselves seems to be waiting, holding its breath, unsure about what the next step should be ... it is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that, in all probability, a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.  

Alice Walker, Living by the Word

Recent data science articles - May 2021

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The DOD’s looming AI winter

Deepfake maps created by image-manipulation tools (made possible by artificial intelligence) could really mess with your sense of the world 

Cases of fake research co-authorship have been mounting especially in papers about AI. How can we identify papers that have been written by relatively unsophisticated algorithms and don’t produce any sensible content? 

Location spoofing isn't just advanced photoshopping—it's making data look uncannily realistic--deepfake geography is a growing problem

Can we teach AI how to code? Probably not anytime soon. But IBM’s Project CodeNet just dropped a 14-million-sample dataset to develop machine learning models which should make developers more productive

DARPA helped make a sarcasm detector, because of course it did

Our understanding may be inseparable from our experience. If true, then "our physical embodiment may be difficult if not impossible to capture in symbolic processing systems"

"Despite all their remarkable progress, (AI) systems remain brittle  

Is the Pentagon being pulled into the AI hype machine? Some military experts think so  

Types of statistics papers (cartoon)

MIT researchers create a system that automatically cleans “dirty data”

Comparing the two big data frameworks: Hadoop vs. Spark

Conflating geospatial data at scale: A better, faster method of achieving mission objectives

Russia is testing new anti-GPS satellite technology as global political tensions run the risk of escalating into attacks on satellite infrastructure

When can a predictive model improve by anticipating behavioral reactions to its predictions? 

Running python scripts as fast as C using PyPy

Data Science articles from April 2021

Articles of interest about higher ed - May 31

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The Articles of Interest list will be paused for a summer break 

***HIGHER ED & COVID

The Future of Virus Tracking Can Be Found on This College Campus

For Colleges, Vaccine Mandates Often Depend on Which Party Is in Powe

Indiana AG says university mandating vaccines violates new state law

***LAYOFFS & CUTS

Stockton university Paid Administrators Bonuses Amid Faculty Furloughs

Redeemer University alumni say dropping French and theatre programs is 'heartbreaking'

***COLLEGE FINANCES

States Spent $2.68 Billion on Private Colleges in 2020

Columbia University to pay $13 million to settle complaint by retirement plan participants

Tuition Discount Rates Reach New High: 53.9% at private schools

***ACADEMIC LIFE  

Univ of Oklahoma professor, wife plead guilty to charges involving Department of Energy grants 

Full report details investigation that cleared computer science professor of sexual misconduct, retaliation allegations

Two Ohio State Professors Lose Emeritus Titles for resaerch misconduct, sexual harassment

Faculty group investigating two institutions for alleged violations of academic freedom

Professors Want More Guidance on How to Help Students Struggling With Mental Health ($)

How a controversy over Amy Chua hosting students at her house has turned the campus on its head—again.

Kyoto University Revokes It’s First Doctorate Ever

***SHARED GOVERNANCE

Faculty Sues Wesley College Over Delaware State Acquisition

Shared Governance Was Eroding Before Covid-19. Now It’s a Landslide, AAUP Report Says ($)

AAUP investigation finds eight institutions flouted academic governance norms during COVID-19

National professors’ union investigating Linfield University firing

***NIKOLE HANNAH-JONES

A Mega-Donor donor objected to the hiring of Nikole Hannah-Jones

‘1619 Project' creator Hannah-Jones weighs discrimination suit over tenure denial

Trustee: Nonacademic Background Halted Hannah-Jones Tenure

No clear answers as to why journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones was not offered tenure

UNC faculty upset that prizewinning 1619 Project journalist won’t have tenure when she starts teaching at Chapel Hill

***COLLEGE PRESIDENTS

Rice President Announces He Will Step Down In 2022

Former Penn State president has jail sentence upheld  

University Of Colorado President Exits With $1.3 Million Contract Buyout

Fresno State announces new university president

***CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS  

The humanities at Christian Colleges

Conflict over 'power and theology' ensues at Southwest Baptist University

Wesleyan College Faculty Condemns Commencement Speech 

Wheaton College plaque bearing offensive language to be replaced in the fall

Canada Christian College denied university status, name change

Grants Focus on STEM Research at Christian Colleges 

Christian college accused of censoring criticism of school

Judge rules against Christian liberal-arts college in Fair Housing Act lawsuit 

Evangelical Colleges Consider Vaccine Requirements for Fall 

Bachelorette star played sports at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego

***SEMINARIES

Seminary Built on Slavery and Jim Crow Labor Has Begun Paying Reparations ($)

Religion behind bars: Ruth Graham part of Mississippi’s new prison seminary for women

***CHRISTIAN COLLEGE PRESIDENTS 

Azusa Pacific University President to Retire

Trevecca Nazarene University board extends contract of president

Michigan's Cornerstone University announces new president

***TEACHING

ProctorU scraps fully automated remote proctoring

Can Technology Breaks Help Students?

***SEXUAL MISCONDUCT AT CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS 

Benedictine College chaplain removed after 'Inappropriate conduct' with female student

Moody Bible Institute ‘ill-equipped’ to investigate sexual misconduct, independent probe finds

College of Holy Cross will launch comprehensive investigation into faculty sexual misconduct after multiple allegations over last several years

A prosecutor says no to a rape charge, so a college student at a small Christian liberal arts school calls her own grand jury

***BAYLOR & LGBTQ+

Baylor Opens Door to Possible LGBTQ+ Student Group

LGBTQ+ Baylor students are cautious as university entertains creating new chartered student group

***RESEARCH

Do not trust your p-value, be it small or large

Activist Archivists Are Trying to Save the ‘Pirate Bay of Science’ 

A fresh crop of published findings that have come up null or replicated earlier ones

Australian and international scientists publish open letter defending Dr Elisabeth Bik and calling for science whistleblowers to be protected

Legal threats and police searches: Debate explodes over baby shaking science 

Scientific Integrity Matters

Scientific-journal publishers announce trans-inclusive name-change policies

***FAKE RESEARCH

Hundreds of fake research manuscripts from paper mills have flooded biochemical and biomedical journals in recent years

Gibberish papers still lurk in the scientific literature 

Why Do Scientists Lie?

***PEER REVIEW 

Can AI be used ethically to assist peer review? 

How to respond to difficult or negative peer-reviewer feedback

***RETRACTIONS

Unreliable social science research gets more attention than solid studies

Journals are retracting more and more papers because they’re not by the authors they claim to be

Academic journals, journalists perpetuate misinformation in their handling of research retractions, a new study finds

Paper linking frequency of Google search terms to violence against women retracted

Elsevier retracts entire book that plagiarized heavily from Wikipedia

***STUDENT LIFE 

Disturbing new University of Oregon policy claims jurisdiction to monitor students lives 24/7 off campus (opinion)

Student Fee Lawsuits over COVID-19 shutdown Can Proceed in Delaware, Judge Says

An Illinois Man Waits 80 Years To Graduate From College

College student becomes Chicago Cubs’ first Black public address announcer

Sorority kicks out member for Posting Video Mocking Trans Health Secretary

Colleges grapple with resuming study abroad

Research paints disappointing picture of online internships

How do colleges respond to student arrests?

***GRADUATES

The graduate’s guide to a new world of work

CEO gives Quincy College graduates $1,000, says to give half away

Fewer U.S. College Grads Are Stuck With $25,000 Entry-Level Jobs

***FREE SPEECH

What might a new Iowa law mean for professors’ classroom expression?

Florida State settles free speech lawsuit filed by Catholic student leader

The University of Alabama is being sued for its rule that requires students to obtain a permit to speak on campus five days in advance.

Christian group sues University of Alabama over campus speaking permits

***SEXUAL HARASSMENT & ASSAULT

Six women reported a Louisiana college student for sexual misconduct. No one connected the dots

Lawsuit: 19 women say Eastern Michigan had rape culture, covered up assaults  

New class action lawsuit aims to force University of Michigan to change policies on sexual misconduct

***TITLE IX 

Federal student privacy law does not conflict with Title IX: analysis

Is a Fair Title IX System Possible? (opinion) ($)

University of St. Thomas faces Title IX lawsuit threat over cutting tennis program    

***RACIAL ISSUES ON CAMPUS 

Oklahoma community college cancels class in reaction to 'critical race theory' law 

The fight to whitewash US history through controlling the classroom (opinion)

Boise State Finds No Evidence White Student Was Harassed

Midshipman who had faced expulsion for racist tweets graduates

 ***CRIME ON CAMPUS

She had contacted campus police more than 20 times before she died (opinion)

7 men plead not guilty in Bowling Green State University sophomore's alleged hazing death  

Former Unity College employee will spend 2 years in prison after taking more than $500K from the school

Former Louisville coach, federally charged with extortion

***RANSOMWARE & CYBER SECURITY 

Ransomware hack brings down sierra college online systems

New global partnership helps education sector defend against cyber attacks (news release)

Articles of interest about religion - May 30

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***RELIGION AND POLITICS 

In both parties, fewer now say being Christian or being born in U.S. is important to being ‘truly American’

The Growing Anti-Democratic Threat of Christian Nationalism in the U.S.

***RELIGION & CRIME

NC pastor shot, killed outside his home days after his ordination  

79-year-old woman accused of embezzling money from NC Baptist church

***RELIGION AFFILIATION 

Religious affiliation is falling in America (podcast)

***RELIGION IN COURT

Lawsuit: Only Christians Could Apply for Jail Chaplain Job 

Judge rules against woman who alleged discrimination because she was a Christian living in a predominantly Jewish community

***RELIGION & RACIAL ISSUES 

Some Korean pastors say they need to be more vocal about racial justice

Florida State U settles discrimination suit with Catholic ousted from student gov for criticizing social justice groups

***DENOMINATIONS

Southern Baptist decline continues, denomination has lost more than 2 million members since 2006 

PCUSA lost over 56K members, 116 churches in 2020: report

This year’s Southern Baptist convention could be historic

***CATHOLIC

The Catholic Church Is Reinstating Priests Accused of Sexual Abuse 

Father James Altman, who said Catholic Democrats would ‘face the fires of hell,’ asked to resign by his bishop

***MEGACHURCHES

Illinois megachurch leaves UMC amid LGBT debate, retains ownership of campuses

Tennessee megachurch Pastor claims "political elites" fake getting vaccinated, inject "sugar water" instead 

***JUDAISM

How Jewish is Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah?’ A Forward investigation in 9 verses

U.S. Jews have widely differing views on Israel

***RELIGION & SCIENCE

Research suggests the religion and science debate wasn’t always this divisive

***CULTS 

Gun Church That Worships With AR-15s Bought a 40-Acre Compound in Texas   

Duggar ’cult’ leads back to abusive teaching out of Bill Gothard organization

***THE BIBLE 

'God Bless the USA Bible' finds new printer after HarperCollins Christian passes

***RELIGION & QANON

One-Quarter of White Evangelicals Believe QAnon 'Storm' Is Coming to 'Restore Rightful Leaders'

Evangelicals are flocking to the QAnon conspiracy theory movement 

How Hollywood’s ‘Jesus’ Jim Caviezel Went Full QAnon

QAnon is now as popular in US as some major religions, poll suggests  

***SATANISM 

America's Satanic Panic Returns — This Time Through QAnon

MS-13 gang member sentenced for murdering 15-year-old girl in satanic sacrifice

***PASSING

B.J. Thomas dies at age 78

Christian Diet Guru in Plane Crash That Killed 7