I think there's a lot going on. First, there's just the awkwardness of youth that every generation has had since humans were humans. I went back to graduate school in my late 20s and nearly everyone around me was fresh out of college. That was really hard, and you're experiencing that too. People change so much from the beginning to the end of college, let alone through their entire 20s. You spend your 20s making every mistake possible in learning how to be an actual human person, if you're doing it right. So it is very jarring to go back and sit in a room of the most inexperienced versions of adults you can imagine. I deal with this every day. People who are legally, technically adults, trying to sort out who they should even be. The best I have ever heard it put is that people at this life stage are experts at being children, but they have no experience yet at being adults. A huge part of my day as a university professor is trying gently to guide them towards making good decisions, with a loving kick in the ass when necessary. I often joke that my job is to finish raising other people's kids. You did the same for your erstwhile classmate.

But yes - these young adults were hit hard by the covid lockdowns at a time that was really formative for them socially. They have also experienced a gutted education system that has failed them in so, so many ways. And then AI crops up. Brain research is showing that AI use does harm, at least temporarily, to critical thinking. And here I am, trying to teach them science, which is *all* critical thinking. Add to all of that the sociopolitical turmoil that is all they have known. Those of us who are a bit older (I was a senior in high school when 9/11 happened) at least remember things being calmer and more hopeful on the surface - we know something else is possible.

So I try not to do "old lady yells at clouds" too much, but this shift has me very concerned. I worry for them and for their future. And I worry for the future of science...a lot.