Passing of Mr.Tsung-Dao Lee: The Fate of Chinese Elites and the Fading of Public Responsibility

 On August 4, Mr. Tsung-DaoLee(李政道), a famous Chinese scientist and Nobel Laureate in Physics, passed away in the United States. As soon as the news came out, Chinese around the world mourned, and universities and research institutions in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and Singapore that benefited from Mr. Tsung-Dao Lee generally held commemorative ceremonies to honor his memory.

   The death of Mr. Tsung-Dao Lee has been mourned by all parties, not only because of his achievements in physics, but also because of his help, as a Chinese, to the scientific research of mainland of China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, and his promotion and cultivation of talents for Chinese students in China and all over the world. Although Mr. Lee became a U.S. citizen after 1962, he never forgot his hometown and his Chinese identity, and he contributed greatly to scientific research and education throughout Greater China.

   Mr. Tsung-Dao Lee's personal fate was also quite legendary and tumultuous. Tsung-Dao Lee grew up in the brutal years of the war, his studies were interrupted many times, he moved from school to school, and his life was threatened during the war. However, Tsung-Dao Lee remained tenacious in his studies, and was honored to go to the U.S. to further his education, where he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1957, together with Yang Chen-Ning.

   In the early 1950s, many Chinese intellectuals and scientists in the U.S. rushed back to mainland China from the U.S. out of the passion to serve the country and the call of "New China", wanting to utilize their talents and benefit the people. However, more than two decades of political campaigns made these people suffer a lot (including Lee's close friend, translation scholar Wu Ningkun), and some even died in persecution. Tsung-Dao Lee, however, was keenly aware of the danger of returning to his home country and stayed in the United States.

  This not only allowed him to escape death, but also gave him the opportunity to discover the "non-conservation of the U-symmetry", receive the Nobel Prize, and achieve many other scientific research and educational achievements. This was his good fortune. If he had returned to China, he would not have been able to make such achievements, even if he had not been severely persecuted. Even if they sang the praises of power and flanked like Qian Xuesen, and received protection and preferential treatment, they could only "eat old money" without any new achievements.

   In the early 1970s, when Sino-American relations were warming up, Lee visited the mainland and was received by Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai and had a very pleasant conversation with them. During the meeting, Lee managed to persuade Mao to agree to the establishment of a university class to train forward-looking talents, to set up a series of scientific research institutes and facilities, and to open up scientific and technological exchanges between China and the United States, which had been frozen after 1949.

   After the reform and opening up of China, Tsung-Dao Lee has been actively involved in academic exchanges between China and the United States, and has traveled across oceans. This in turn reflects his adaptability and wisdom, as well as his concern and dedication to China's scientific research endeavors and talent cultivation.

   It can be said that Tsung-Dao Lee has been the mainstay of academic and research exchanges between China and the United States for decades. If there was no Tsung-Dao Lee at that time, no Lee's efforts, although China and the United States will still break the ice and progress in scientific and educational exchanges, but must be greatly reduced.

   Lee’'s commitment is rooted in his deep love for his country and his sense of responsibility to his fellow countrymen. Although Lee is not a national of the People's Republic of China, this is due to the fact that China does not recognize dual citizenship, as well as to the unique international situation and delicate U.S.-China relations. Lee loved both the United States and China, both of which were his homelands.

   Lee’'s friends and colleagues in the United States, such as YangChen-Ning,Chien-Shiung Wu, and Samuel C.C.Ting, who have also made extraordinary achievements, have also visited mainland China one after another after the warming of Sino-American relations, and have made great contributions to the development of scientific research and education in China. They also made a monumental contribution to the development and progress of the United States and all mankind.

   But other Chinese intellectuals who returned from the U.S. in the 1950s, as well as many Chinese scholars of literature and science who had stayed in the U.S. and had been on the mainland since 1949, experienced a catastrophe that they did not anticipate, and suffered both physically and mentally. such as Xiao Guangyan, Zhao Jiuchang, and Yao Tongbin, even committed suicide or were killed alive. Those who survived by chance were scarred, missed out on life, missed out on the rapid development of the world, and no longer had the possibility of making breakthrough achievements. Their talents and potentials were not much different from those of Tsung-Dao Lee and others, but they were destroyed in the storm of the times because they chose the wrong time to return to China and because of the brutal political campaigns.

  There are also more exceptional examples. The Chinese scientists Charles K. Kao and Daniel C.Tsui, who also won the Nobel Prize in Physics, fled to Hong Kong from the mainland around 1950, studied in Hong Kong and Britain and the United States, became global leaders in the fields of electronic motors and solid-state physics respectively, and were awarded the Nobel Prize in 1998 and 2009 respectively.

   And their hometown folks, in the Republic of the "first thirty years" suffered a lot, which Tsui's hometown of Henan also famine, many of his friends and relatives died of starvation, the survivors also spent decades in extreme poverty, his cousin once begged to eat. The former residence of Tsui is now preserved, and you can still see the poverty and dilapidation of his family back then. Kao and Tsui were the most fortunate among the people in their hometown, not because they were so gifted, but because they fled to Hong Kong, which was the most decisive factor in their destiny. And they simply could not have escaped from Hong Kong if they had been prepared to do so a few years later.

    Tsung-Dao Lee's life and the situation of his friends, colleagues, and compatriots reflect the stumbling fate of the Chinese elites of the twentieth century who originated from mainland China, and the divergent paths of those who made different choices. Chinese elites in the Republican era in the first half of the twentieth century and the Chinese overseas Chinese generally had a strong sense of national sentiments and aspirations to serve the country, and they advocated democracy and science, and they also physically practiced to save the country and the nation through the pursuit of knowledge in arts and sciences and the devotion to scientific research and industry. The Chinese people and the Southeast Asian people were in the midst of the Anti-Japanese War. While the Chinese people and Southeast Asian Chinese suffered great harm during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, they also became more cohesive in the global Chinese community.

   Chinese intellectuals generally have the traditional scholar's sense of public responsibility and people-oriented consciousness, They also practiced the pragmatic value of "applying oneself to the world". The intellectuals of the Republic of China had this kind of responsibility and consciousness, which they had implicitly realized in their hearts and practiced in their deeds. The victory in the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression was about to open a new page of great rejuvenation of the Han and Chinese nations.

   However, the subsequent changes in the political situation in China and the world landscape have torn apart and caused infighting among the Chinese people of the world, including the Chinese elite. Intellectuals who stayed in (or returned to) mainland China were even more devastated by the rounds of political movements. The Chinese elites in mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the United States, Europe and Southeast Asia each experienced different sorrows and joys, and had very different destinies in life.

  By the 1980s, the red storm had finally passed, and the Chinese who had been separated from each other were reconnected and partially cohesive. The economic construction and cultural, educational, and scientific endeavors of mainland China were restarted, and other Chinese-majority regions such as Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and Singapore were developing at a rapid pace. In the new era when peace and development became the mainstream, and economic and technological power struggles became the main theme of international competition, the Chinese people's industriousness and emphasis on culture and education enabled the Greater China region's economy and science and technology to develop and progress at a rapid pace. Chinese scholars in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore, as well as in the United States and Europe, have also contributed greatly to the economic and technological development of mainland China.

   But behind the happy situation of development and recovery, there are still many sorrows and regrets. Many of the intellectuals who suffered so much during the "first thirty years" of China's history have been wronged and laid to rest, and the survivors have been devastated, and the belated vindication has made it difficult for them to fully recover physically and psychologically, while the June 4 Incident of 1989 and the political upheavals before and after it, as well as the Communist Party of China (CPC)'s continued suppression of freedom of speech and prevention of citizens' participation in politics, continue to undermine the ability and capacity of intellectuals to take part in public affairs. The ability and desire of intellectuals to participate in public affairs. Since the reopening of the People's Republic of China, the downplaying of the historical problems of the Maoist era and the "unity and forward-looking" approach, although conducive to a rapid transition to peaceful development, have not allowed people to reflect deeply on the tragedy and address the root causes of the tragedy, resulting in a large number of unresolved problems, and the tragedy continues to harm intellectuals and scientific research in a variety of ways.

   China's scientific and educational endeavors have been undermined by the authoritarian system and campaigns under various names, and the academic and scientific research fields have been plagued with many ills, including a large number of research gaps, the proliferation of fraud, sycophancy to dignitaries and public power, the desire to follow the wishes of the higher-ups, the lack of general knowledge and creativity, the lack of morals despite having talents and the anti-intellectual superstitious beliefs of those who work in the scientific field, and other aftereffects that have been occurring and are still affecting the country today. The achievements since the reform and opening up are more a result of the "bottoming out" of mainland China and the support of Hong Kong, Taiwan and overseas Chinese to the motherland, China's endogenous creativity and scientific and educational heritage has been destroyed, and some of the achievements are also dependent on China's huge volume, and the per capita achievements in scientific progress can be said to be in a state of barrenness.

   China's authoritarian oppression and brutal political campaigns have created suffering and tearing, and have also made Chinese people and many overseas Chinese generally cynical and selfish, losing their moral beliefs, no longer sincerely caring about the plight of their compatriots/others, being insensitive to the ugly phenomena and injustice in society, and having no sense of public awareness and social responsibility, and becoming "refined egoists" ("精致利己主义者"). ". Moreover, compared with the old intellectuals who grew up in the Republic of China era and remained patriotic despite the ravages of the "new China", later generations, including today's young intellectuals, have become more self-interested, and some of them are obviously degenerate.

   Intellectuals are the conscience of a nation, social elites are the backbone of a country, and young people are the hope of the future. The cynicism and self-interest of the Chinese elite, and the new generation of young students who have been brainwashed to be loyalists and party loyalists, or who are drunk and dreaming of death, are the major reasons why China's economic and livelihood ills have remained unresolved for a long time, why social contradictions and injustice have intensified, and why the nation has generally become depressed. When these people, who have the most knowledge, judgment, voice, and public status, are silent, and even subscribe to the darkness and act as accomplices to the tigers, how can other people have the ability to change the reality?

  In addition, in recent years, there has been a gradual polarization and confrontation between mainland China and Hong Kong and Taiwan, and among Chinese people around the world, because of interests, ideologies, and changes in the international situation. The former "Greater China" no longer has such a strong cohesive force, and the new generation of Hong Kong people, Taiwanese, and overseas Chinese no longer have deep feelings for mainland China, and even intend to be distant, antagonistic, and hostile. However, many Chinese in mainland China and overseas have encountered more discrimination and rejection, and are in a disadvantageous or even dangerous situation in the complicated and dangerous world.

  Chien-Shiung Wu, Charles Kao, Yu Ying-shih, and Tsung-Dao Lee, all of whom grew up in the Republic of China, and who still have deep feelings for their hometowns and countries, have passed away one after another. There are very few other well-known scholars of the same generation who are still alive and their days are numbered. After the death of these people, I am afraid that the new generation of Chinese intellectuals, no matter whether they have been studying and living in mainland China, or scholars from Hong Kong and Taiwan, or Chinese elites in the United States and Europe, will hardly have the old generation's sense of nationalism, social responsibility, and sympathetic concern for their compatriots/kin.

   This is very sad, but also makes the author more pessimistic about China's future development prospects and links with the developed world. But it is difficult to change. The "refined egoists" and the various shortcomings of Chinese academic research, as well as the alienation of the identity of Chinese people outside mainland China, are also the result of various historical and practical problems, which cannot be reversed by arousing the subjective patriotism and sense of responsibility of the people concerned. For many intellectuals, "exquisite self-interest" is a necessity to protect themselves in a dangerous environment; for the new generation of intellectuals in Hong Kong and Taiwan, their local identity, which is very different from that of the traditional Greater China, has its own justifications and necessities. The author can understand all these. It is difficult for individuals to hold on to their unique views and go against the trend when they are shaped and molded by the general environment.

  However, the author still hopes that the new generation of Chinese people and Chinese elites scattered all over the world should follow the example of their predecessors such as Tsung-Dao Lee, Yang Chen-Ning,Daniel C.Tsui,Chien-ShiungWu, and Xu Chuoyun, not forgetting their own blood and cultural roots, not abandoning their compatriots in their hometowns who are still having a hard time in their lives, and having a sense of duty and mission out of family and national sentiments and humanitarianism, and showing more care and assistance to each and every member of the global Chinese community, especially to the disadvantaged groups and the underdeveloped regions. The region, more care and assistance.

   Mr. Tsung-Dao Lee has passed away, but his spirit is still alive and his contribution will last forever. I would like to pay my respects and condolences to him.