Reminiscence of a teacher and a researcher

The names of previous after-dinner speakers at this conference read like a Who is Who of Quantum Optics and Photonics research. When the organizers of this conference asked me to present an after-dinner talk I felt honored by the invitation, but also humbled by joining such a distinguished company. This fact gives me a “Leitmotiv” for my present talk, because being humbled by, and feeling inferior to, all the brilliant minds one encounters in one's career is a necessary occurrence, which most of the younger listeners in this audience have either experienced or will experience. I have witnessed these feelings as advisor to students at MIT. Many of them fear that everything worth doing has already been done. There is a simple answer to this. Do not get discouraged, work harder and you will also make a respectable contribution to science or engineering. © 2004 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.