New Civilization School

Chapter 20: New Civilization School

Facing the spirited and renowned old professor before him, Zhang Yuan felt a bit nervous.

Setting aside his various miscellaneous titles, the single title of "Academician of Mathematics" was enough to scare an ordinary person half to death.

An academician!

Professor Wang's primary research focus was his specialty, Motive theory, one of the most difficult disciplines. Motive is a product of the generalization of Galois Group Theory into higher dimensions, which was later unexpectedly discovered to have a mysterious connection with Quantum Field Theory.

Research into the Langlands Program and Motive theory are the two major mainstream fields in mathematics today. The Langlands Program attempts to unify number theory, algebraic geometry, and groups, while Motive theory attempts to unify the discrete and the continuous.

They are known as the two sides of the same coin.

A mathematician once predicted: "When humanity truly completes these two frameworks, the mathematical world will usher in a true grand unification. Every mathematical problem will be solvable using these two grand theories."

It sounds intimidating, but humanity may never complete this step. Progress on the Langlands Program is passable; after hundreds of years of research, humanity has developed Geometric Langlands, p-adic Langlands, and so on. However, regarding Motive theory, because of its extreme level of abstraction, it has become a form of soliloquy for certain mathematicians, making even peer review extremely difficult, so its development has been incredibly slow.

Undoubtedly, Wang Zhong is one of the top mathematicians; the construction of Mixed Motive was proposed by Professor Wang, which caused a huge sensation at the time.

He had often heard his father mention his mentor with a tone full of respect, so Zhang Yuan was just visiting an elder while he was in the area; he had no other intentions.

He even brought a small gift, a local specialty from Donghua City—Donghua Ham. Although it seemed a bit strange now.

"Which university did you graduate from?"

"Z University," Zhang Yuan answered honestly.

"Z University, huh..." Wang Zhong frowned, feeling slightly dissatisfied. Although Z University is the third-ranked university in the Xia Kingdom, it is still slightly inferior compared to the top two. In the eyes of an old man like him, good students should attend the top two schools...

"Are you also an aerospace volunteer?"

"Yes."

"Very good, you've inherited your father's ambitions." Wang Zhong nodded, satisfied with this point.

If he weren't so old himself, with only a few years left to live, he would certainly have been one of the 500,000 people to experience the life of interstellar travel.

"What are your plans for the future?" Professor Wang picked up his teacup and took a slow sip.

"I have 19 days of vacation left, and I plan to spend some time reading in the library. After boarding the ship, I hope to find a mentor to complete my master's and doctoral studies..."

"Learning more knowledge is always good. Which direction do you intend to pursue?"

At this, Zhang Yuan smiled sheepishly: "I quite like mathematics, but restarting a civilization requires a large number of practical talents, so I still plan to engage in engineering research, such as informatics... well, mainly mathematics and space engineering."

Wang Zhong is a science professor. Science looks down on engineering, and engineering looks down on the humanities; this is the consistent academic hierarchy of contempt.

This is determined by the ease of churning out papers. It is relatively difficult for science professors to churn out papers—they have to have some innovation, right? As for the humanities, churning out papers is incredibly easy; majors like film studies or acting departments are specialized in producing "watered-down" PhDs...

When his father switched from mathematics to space mechanics back then, Wang Zhong had thrown a fit, believing that switching to engineering was "too utilitarian."

Sure enough, Wang Zhong's brow furrowed again, and he fell silent for a while. But because this was their first conversation and they weren't very close, he didn't express too many opinions.

"Have you found a mentor yet?"

"Not yet. I still have to take exams after boarding the ship. I hope to get a high score..." Zhang Yuan said very modestly.

"..."

In Wang Zhong's eyes, he naturally jumped to the wrong conclusion.

The Earth Era is just a large spaceship, and even with sufficient preparations, the resources and output within the ship remain limited. The vast majority of the crew's time will be spent in hibernation.

To restart a civilization on an unfamiliar planet, knowledge reserves and technical standards are the most important things. Therefore, the various experts and scholars on the ship naturally control more resources and possess greater authority.

These well-known experts and scholars have a limited quota for recruiting students. Being their student is, of course, more beneficial than being an ordinary technical worker; it is equivalent to having "backing."

Now, it was as if Zhang Yuan knew he couldn't get a high score and was begging him to open a back door, attempting to use him, Wang Zhong, to find a decent mentor.

He frowned and asked: "What kind of mentor are you looking for?"

Zhang Yuan was taken aback and said casually: "Of course, the more brilliant the better, someone like my father would be best!"

Wang Zhong felt even more displeased and looked at the "Donghua Ham" placed on the table.

Based on his many years of teaching experience, someone who wants to rely on their father's connections to get in through the back door is, without a doubt, a poor student!

If he isn't, I, Wang Zhong, will eat this ham raw!

He should go look in a mirror and see what kind of person he is...

If you want the most awesome mentor, you first have to consider whether you are worthy!

The way he looked at Zhang Yuan became somewhat unkind.

Wang Zhong is not someone who is completely ignorant of social conventions; taking care of the son of his favorite student is not really a big deal.

But once it involves the Earth Era, it seems to touch his sensitive spot, making him very anxious.

Because the Earth Era is an independent society; once it is launched, Earth civilization will have no way to interfere with it. Setting aside those messy external factors like Dyson Spheres or Hypernovae, this grand project actually has another internal cause.

It is a carnival for idealists on Earth!

A great social experiment!

When the "Father of Nuclear Fusion," Professor Qi Yuanshan, established the Deep Space Foundation, he also incidentally founded a new school of thought called the "New Civilization School."

The New Civilization School believes that the development of civilization is like biological evolution; it can only be patched and mended upon its existing foundation, with no way to completely tear it down and start over. Consequently, the history, culture, and ideologies that have emerged in the past will exert a profound influence on future development.

This influence can be both good and bad, and it cannot be significantly altered through simple remedial measures. Much like a person's growth, once a worldview is set, it becomes permanently fixed.

Therefore, certain historical baggage will inevitably become a burden on development.

The New Civilization School once posed a question: Why has Earth civilization not yet integrated into a unified nation?

The answer is simple.

First, human beings, as a species, are unable to relinquish vested power and interests. If several countries were to unify, the leaders of certain smaller nations would have to step down, and a vast amount of class interests would need to be redistributed; those with vested interests are unwilling to allow this.

To give a simple example: even today, the railway gauges across the world have not been standardized.

Standardizing railway gauges involves not only political factors but also various economic issues. Replacing old tracks requires money, and who is going to pay for it?

Since no one is willing to pay, it can only be dragged out.

If such a simple issue as "railway gauge" is delayed indefinitely, one can only imagine the complexity of other, more significant conflicts of interest.

Second, throughout history, the gaps between nations have been difficult to bridge; ethnic hatred and racial conflict still persist to this day. After the occurrence of the Third and Fourth World Wars, aside from the East Asian region which is slightly better off, other places remain plagued by new and old grievances, along with small-scale friction. The poorer the region, the greater the conflict.

In the foreseeable future, it is unlikely that these will disappear.

Then there is the third point: many countries are simply not worth supporting or saving.

Some countries are ruled by dictatorship and bureaucratic capitalism; some have populations entirely addicted to drugs, which they export to the rest of the world, with governments even held hostage by criminal syndicates; some have populations so lazy they would rather let fruit rot on the ground than pick it; and others are entirely consumed by religious fanaticism... The global ideological chaos is not something that a mere great man or a single powerful nation can save.

In short, the New Civilization School believes that since Earth civilization cannot be unified now, it will never be unified in the future. Even if it were forcibly unified, it would only lead to more chaotic contradictions; this is determined by a combination of historical, cultural, and other factors.

Therefore, the Earth Era is a grand experiment by the New Civilization School.

It attempts to use physical distance as a barrier to cast off all the dross of human history, aiming to build a more powerful, unified, and cohesive new civilization with a singular, universal ideology!

It is much like a father who, realizing his own future is hopeless, pins all his hopes on a newborn infant.

Once this more powerful new civilization succeeds, there is a certain probability that it could, in turn, influence the original Earth civilization.

This was the plan originally formulated by Qi Yuanshan.

A grand... ten-thousand-year plan!

(Regarding motive theory, Grothendieck's dream was to establish a "universal" cohomology theory, which he called motive theory. In any case, whenever you see words like motive or motivic in mathematics, just know that it is very powerful and very abstract.)

(There will be some mathematical science fiction content in the future; you don't need to understand much of it, just knowing that it exists is enough.)