Rector David Dreyer Lassen's inaugural address

Dear all,

How wonderful it is that today is full of University of Copenhagen mythology, symbolism – and a touch of puffed up pomposity.

Let’s just call it pride.

There was also a nice atmosphere – although slightly different – at [departing rector, ed.] Henrik’s final steering group meeting on the UCPH strategic ambition to be the best place for the best ideas.

Henrik was wrapping up a lengthy PowerPoint presentation.

I was to take over, both actually and symbolically, the leadership of the meeting and the chairmanship of the steering group.

Whereupon Henrik, with perhaps a bit too much pathos, a slight nod, a brief speech, and the characteristic wide grin of his, handed over …

… the power point slide pointer to me.

But no: A PowerPoint clicker on UCPH strategy can’t compete with the rector’s chain, the cape, and the historical weight of the University of Copenhagen.

So fasten your seatbelts folks.

Here is 545 years of rectorial transition history – in ten minutes – where I have made some ‘savings’ in terms of content.

A rector at the University of Copenhagen is just the last link in the rector’s chain.

A link in an unbroken intergenerational fellowship stretching all the way back to the first rector, Henrichsen, and past characters like Holberg, Oehlenschläger, and Panum.

So first, a tribute to rector number 259, Henrik Wegener.

Henrik’s name reminded me of his namesake, Alfred Wegener.

The originator of the theory of continental drift.

The idea that the world was once a single supercontinent, Pangaea, with South America glued under Africa’s armpit. And that the continents have drifted apart over the past 200 million years.

Wegener’s theory was controversial for many years but was supported by, among others, Marie Hammer, an alumna and PhD from UCPH in 1944.

Marie Hammer travelled the world – from Alaska to Pakistan – to collect moss mites – a tiny creature with limited range.

When many of the same moss mite species are found on multiple continents, it can’t be a coincidence.

Hammer, for instance, found a moss mite in a remote meadow in the highlands of Argentina that was identical to a species from Rold Forest in Denmark. This fitted Wegener’s theory of continental drift.

Our own Henrik Wegener’s great achievement is perceiving UCPH as an almost continental whole.

And putting together the big UCPH puzzle.

When all the pieces are in place – strategy, budget, administration, buildings – UCPH can function better as a unified entity, with direction.

Towards even better research, driven by the curiosity that fuels all researchers.

Towards more innovation and entrepreneurship.

Towards timely degrees and lifelong learning opportunities.

*

The founding of this university in 1479 is – on a geological timescale – less than a second ago.

So it is still relevant to study the old papal bull from 1475 – which this year turns 550 years old.

This is the letter in which the Pope in Rome granted permission to establish a university up here.

It is the founding university document.

Bull – what a strange word.

But it simply means a ‘seal of lead’, which the Pope’s letters were affixed with.

So what does this bull, which made a small impact on the universe from here in Copenhagen, actually say?

Well, it is like reading my own view on the university’s societal mission.

Listen to this excerpt:

»From such a university’s students and their gradually acquired knowledge and skills, the greatest values would arise, for the benefit of the cities’ and countries’ civil governance …«

And further:

»We are aware that scholarly knowledge serves the salvation of souls, the resolution of disputes, the attainment of peace among people, the distinction between the permissible and the forbidden, the distribution of rewards to the good and punishment to the wicked, and many other private and public, spiritual and temporal good purposes.« End of quote.

This task has been clear since 1475, and UCPH must get even better at getting our valuable knowledge out the door, to benefit society.

We need to solve science’s own problems.

But we must also help solve the world’s other problems, typically in collaboration with others.

And the to-do list of problems is not exactly getting shorter.

It is currently as if the American continent is moving away from Europe at high speed, faster than what the old theories would suggest.

And as the bull says: The world needs our knowledge to establish peace among people.

*

In the past, the new rector had to place two fingers on the university’s silver sceptre and swear to uphold the university’s statutes from 1479.

These statutes state that the rector:

»… shall be dressed in appropriate and decent attire with a hood and a fur collar in winter or silk attire in summer … He shall have an appropriate entourage and at least one officer shall precede him with a staff. In other matters unrelated to the rectorship, he shall not walk the streets as frequently as he used to, and he shall be dressed more nobly and have a larger entourage and, in general, conduct himself in a more distinguished manner than he did before he became rector.«

I am relieved that the rector no longer has to swear on the statutes. So I don’t have to attend spinning classes every Saturday wearing a silk cape, if my spandex cycling gear isn’t deemed dignified enough.

The silver sceptres are also gone, they have been replaced by PowerPoint clickers.

However, I am not only inheriting UCPH’s impressive trophy cabinet filled with science’s finest awards.

From ERC Starting Grants to the Nobel Prize.

I am also inheriting UCPH’s silver goblet.

The goblet was presented as a gift to UCPH by the Scottish-English King James in 1589.

Somewhat ironically, this silver goblet was damaged by a later English king during the bombardment in 1807. But it was salvaged and is today in the custody of the National Museum.

The university got a new silver goblet in 1817.

Both goblets are – on this occasion – exhibited in a display case over there in the Tapestry Hall.

The silver goblet has been used in rectorial transitions for centuries.

The tradition was that the new rector would drink Rhine wine from the goblet at the first meeting of the Consistory.

This was last done at Linda Nielsen’s inauguration in 2002.

We are reviving this tradition today.

With the difference that no one drinks from the goblet.

But that everyone, not just the rector, gets Rhine wine in their glass at the reception afterward.

In the picture up there, you can see the aforementioned King James visiting Tycho Brahe on the island of Hven.

Fittingly, the scene depicts a day in March, where the spring sun shines through the budding treetops.

Brahe got what you might call Denmark’s first basic research centre.

Not only did he receive between 1 and 2 per cent of the King’s revenue and funding for his very own observatory, Uranienborg.

But on top of that, he was granted the entire island of Hven, where he ruled over the peasants with full authority to collect taxes.

The research went well, but then came what all research centres fear – the midterm evaluation – and the situation was not helped by the fact that Brahe had a dispute with the man we could call the director of funding, namely King Christian IV.

It ended with Brahe leaving Danish research and moving to Prague, where he became imperial astronomer.

Brahe was a genius, admitted to UCPH at the age of 12.

He initially studied law but later dedicated himself to astronomy, where he discovered Stella Nova and, above all, became the first scientist to fully adhere to the scientific method – the same method this rector follows as number 260.

That is, empirical experiments and observations – and the willingness to revise one’s worldview when data points in new directions.

In addition, Brahe was an avid alchemist, much like Newton.

Back then, many attempted to artificially create precious metals. Today, we know that gold cannot be produced in this way.

But that education and research are in themselves the true paths to gold, or – as it is inscribed above the entrance just outside – the path to the heavenly light.

Now, without further applause, the music students’ choir will sing the anthem of UCPH.

Not the one with lyrics by the former rector Oehlenschläger.

But instead Hellige flamme, written for a rectorial transition in 1837 by Weise & Heiberg.