Remuneration
Spinning his wheels—that’s what he decided—he was spinning his wheels. He had sat in his office for days on end, finding it difficult to prepare lecture notes, difficult to attend committee meetings, difficult to concentrate, difficult to pull himself together, which he did, eventually, but not until he realized he was spinning his wheels. Danielson was right. It was time for him to look elsewhere for gainful employment.
This was the state of affairs when Professor Dimitri decided to start a job search by sending out his Curriculum Vitae. He even went so far as to conduct a self-inventory, contemplating other types of employment—a museum tour guide, perhaps, or a spokesman for some important cause. He took stock, discussing the matter with his wife. They were glad that their kids were older and living out on their own. It reduced the burden should they need to move.
The anguish one feels under such circumstances is difficult to hide. It was impossible for Professor Dimitri who exuded his anguish. Class began as usual, making Jenn wonder if he knew about the misunderstanding. Why the anguish? Didn’t he know? Why was he carrying on as if nothing had changed, saying nothing, explaining nothing, hinting at nothing?
“This doesn’t make sense,” she said to herself, remembering how reassuring Professor Danielson was about setting this right.
Professor Dimitri continued his lecture, “Proof arguments for the existence of God attempt to justify belief in God, and there are plenty of them. As students of philosophy, your job is to evaluate an argument’s case. Is there sufficient warrant to support its premise? How tight is the connection between its premise and conclusion? You must examine its premise, investigating each warrant independently, ascertaining whether the conclusion follows naturally. The strength of a claim is never to be taken for granted. Warrant must be predicated on evidence. It makes no difference what the subject matter is, be it politics, religion, or philosophy. We assay arguments for soundness.”
Aha. Jenn noticed that he was pacing back and forth across the room, hands clasped behind his back, deep in thought, which was not unusual for him, but, more to the point, he was up and out of his desk. This was a good sign. He had a good command of his lecture too, no longer drifting in and out as if he wasn’t sure of where he was going. It was class as usual and Jenn didn’t think he could’ve recovered so remarkably if he didn’t know. Then she began to wonder why he wasn’t telling the class.
“You must probe. Probe, I say, by asking investigatory questions. Your questions must pry into your subject like a giant lever, lifting, shifting, and maneuvering until you get answers, answers which you then evaluate. It’s a two-step process—investigation and evaluation. You must position yourself properly, stabilizing your leverage, prying open the case in order to liberate its information. Lay it bare. Nothing must be hidden. Then, you evaluate it, unleashing your analytical powers. Your aim is to detect anomalies, loopholes, incongruities, gaps, inconsistencies, ambiguities and the like. Finding them is important, so important. You must track them down like a hound on the scent of a fox.”
Jenn loved it. It was his best lecture of the term. “This is what lawyers live for,” she thought to herself, imagining what it must be like to solve a big court case. Hadn’t she just played a role in resolving his termination? Even if it didn’t call heavily upon her analytical powers, still, it bore some likeness to an investigation. Well, at least a small part.
Her preoccupation with this lecture soon caused her to lose sight of his dismissal. It was Heidi who took it from here, noticing something very different about the way he was lecturing. He wasn’t using his notes. In fact, he never so much as glanced at them. Something else must be superintending his lecture. It was a brilliant stroke on her part when she deduced it must be personal experience.
She had noticed before that while teaching on one topic, he’d be thinking on another. People do it all the time, multitasking, and it’s easy for a professor who gives the same lecture year after year to let his mind wander off into more fertile matters. But, today he wasn’t distracted. Whatever was driving him was foundational to his lecture. His words were laser-focused, alert to getting his thoughts across well, alert to his students who, every once in a while, needed a dose of something more than routine course materials.
Philosophy comes to life when it comes from the heart, it becomes reality when it comes from experience. This is what tip her off. His passions were back in full swing, operating from a beating heart, but there was an aura of reality which suggested to her that he was speaking from experience. What she couldn’t deduce was that it was coming from an imminently recent experience.
“There is methodology. Some methods are better than others. You must find what works best for you and apply it with rigor. The scientific method advances the knowledge of science. The philosophic method advances the knowledge of philosophy. It’s that simple. Both rely on evidence, both aim to render compelling arguments, rational statements, reasonable beliefs,” he said, completely unaware that he was mixing science and philosophy in the same crucible, concocting some volatile formulation, absentmindedly, forgetful of his condition.
He was unusually high spirited.
“Today you sit in a chair and listen to your professor give his lecture. You study your course homework out of a textbook and turn in your assignments. Don’t lose heart. The day will come when you will undergo a transition. A day when you’ll rise from your seat of learning and put on a laboratory coat, grasping nature by the throat with your own two hands, forcing it to yield new technologies. A day will come when you will stand strong, holding your own against arguments from the opposing podium, a day when your own cunning will earn you a place in society, a place of achievement, a place of honor,” he said, unaware that he wasn’t even standing in his evocative spot.
“The only thing that should keep your trigger finger from jettisoning an argument is its justification. As philosophers, we assay for rationality, despising assumptions, loathing opinions, scorning preferences, deriding sentiments—we demand validity! Proof? Did anyone hear me say proof? Never. We work with evidence. Proof sets the bar too high. Who knows what constitutes proof? Mathematics is able to embrace it, but it’s an elusive concept to both philosophy and religion.”
Now it was Heidi who started loving the lecture, tying it into Christian apologetics. The problem with proof is that it blunts the senses, forcing belief. Proof overpowers whereas evidence empowers, inviting belief, lighting a path forward. The onus to pursue God rests upon seekers. For this reason, the Gospel is soft on the soul’s sensibilities, respecting its faculties of investigation and deduction. Heidi was preoccupied. Jenn, in the meantime, had reverted to observing Professor Dimitri.
“There is definitely something unique about this lecture,” thought Jenn, who couldn’t believe her ears when he mixed chemistry and philosophy.
“Is he cured?” she wondered.
“Philosophy deals with metaphysical entities. The problems we tackle are much greater than the materialistic problems that entangle science. If science deals with the material world, then we deal with the immaterial world. If science deals with the finite, we deal with the infinite, if conditioned, then unconditioned, if caused, then uncaused, and so forth and so on. We look to uphold the great transcendentals of existence: the good, the truthful, and the beautiful.”
Professor Dimitri was in his glory, touching on topics as far ranging as Greek deities and the Reformation.
“The gods may zap earthlings with lightning bolts, proof enough if you’re the one getting zapped, but if it’s not you, then it’s nothing but hearsay. By the way, if you didn’t know, it was almost getting struck by lightning that convinced Martin Luther to join the priesthood. If it hit him then who knows? The Reformation may never have happened.”
What the girls were observing was a transformed man, a man whose transformation was wrought through victory. There are many emotions a person experiences upon notice of termination, and for the hypersensitive type like Professor Dimitri, it was a heck of a roller coaster ride, starting with that jarring note that said ‘see me’.
It released the breaks, lurching him forward like chain-linked-cars rolling along a track to that unfortunate discussion in Danielson’s office, jaggedly, jittering him about in his seat, slowly at first, until deep hooks locked in, clutching with a rough jolt, forecasting a sense of doom as it hauled him to the highest apex on the track, cresting at altitudes that weaken the stomach, slowly, giving him every opportunity to anticipate the downward thrust that accelerated him at gravity speed, tossing him with alternating g-forces, first centripetal, then centrifugal, motions that overcome a soul’s gyroscope, rotating the mind through axes that spin vertically and horizontally in opposite directions over and over again until at last a hard breaking pitched him against a bar pining him to his seat, finally returning him to a rickety wooden platform.
The safety bar for him was his search for new employment, allowing him to step out of the coaster and regain his sea legs. This was the precise moment when Professor Danielson stopped into his office, fully intending to correct a most unforeseen misunderstanding. He stood right in front of the only plaque on Professor Dimitri’s wall. It was a quote by Alex Vilenkin.
It is said that an argument is what convinces reasonable men and a proof is what it takes to convince even an unreasonable man.
Professor Danielson tried to explain that there was never any thought of termination, but to his surprise, to his dismay, and finally, to his consternation, Professor Dimitri wouldn’t believe him. How could this be? How could that wicked roller coaster have been nothing but a phantom? Professor Danielson was taken back at first, surmising this must be on account of his condition.
He then attempted to reassure him with the warmest of regards. When that didn’t work, he became more assertive, insisting, but Professor Dimitri became defensive, insulted by the accusation he’d make a mistake. At that, Professor Danielson, not a man to back down easily, responded by mounting an argument, defining his premises, clarifying his claims, making his case. Professor Dimitri raised defeaters to show his claims were invalid, contradicting his assertions, zoning in on false warrant, establishing that his conclusion was false because it stemmed from false premises. Perhaps it was only natural for this to happen between two professors skilled in the art.
Yet, even if conflict resolution operates on a higher plane of engagement for philosophy professors, a person’s foibles don’t simply go away. In the end, it was Professor Dimitri who emerged victoriously, having outwitted the department chairman. It is only appropriate in a gentlemen’s duel for the loser to openly concede, acknowledging the victor’s win. Professor Danielson humbly admitted his loss, praising the refinement and strength in Professor Dimitri’s argument. As a reward for his fine victory, he offered him his position back in the department. And, furthermore, to make amends for the anguish he’d suffered on account of the university’s clumsy actions, the chairman offered him a sabbatical leave for the spring term.
“Please regard it as nothing more than a form of remuneration,” he said.
Professor Dimitri accepted. His mood much improved, it was this experience that was driving his lecture, which is why he didn’t need his notes.
“We must bring the power of philosophical analysis into our everyday lives. It will help you through your most difficult problems in life,” he said, in conclusion, “for critical reasoning is so indispensable to our cause, so very indispensable, permitting us favor with arguments that bear strength, vitality, and rigor. We shall not compromise! We shall achieve satisfactory solutions! Such is the business of formal argumentation—to engage victoriously.”
“I have news. The department chair, Professor Danielson, paid a visit to my office earlier this week and I’m happy to report the university has rescinded my notice of termination. They even compensated me with a sabbatical leave. It will give me time to recover from a most unpleasant experience, and I plan to use the opportunity to cultivate skills that may enable me to support myself in other ways should I lose my teaching post permanently.”
Jenn walked up to him on her way out of class.
“I’m happy you’re staying with us, Professor,” she said, adding no more, except to leave him with an endearing smile.