Dr. Randy Pausch has died. Dr. Pausch, if you are not familiar, was a well-loved professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University who contracted a particularly aggressive form of cancer. I’ve written about him before. Dr. Pausch was asked to deliver one of a series of lectures entitled “The Last Lecture.” As I noted before, schools such as Stanford and the University of Alabama have mounted “Last Lecture Series,” in which top professors are asked to think deeply about what matters to them and to give hypothetical final talks. For the audience, the question to be mulled is this: “What wisdom would we impart to the world if we knew it was our last chance?”
Dr. Pausch’s lecture, however, wasn’t hypothetical.
He gave his lecture on Sept. 17, 2007. If you haven’t seen it, block out 76 minutes of your time, plus ten or fifteen to recover from the experience. Trust me, it’s worth it.
Dr. Pausch left the world a gift. What we do with it is up to us.