At a formal ceremony for retiring professors at my university, each retiree got an opportunity to make a short speech. In my own speech, I mentioned that my last few years coincided with the Covid panic. Far more than the disease itself, what shocked me was the worldwide mass mind that sprang into existence seemingly overnight.

All over the world, suddenly people were subjected to all-encompassing propaganda and pressures to conform to the same Covid policies. In contrast, a university should be a place to protect and encourage individual thinking, I maintained.