A typical Finn from Persia

Professor Masud Chaichian is a man of many identities: a Jewish Finn from Persia, a cosmopolitan scientist who prefers the forest to big cities - and, more likely than not, the first non-native to hold a permanent professorship at the University of Helsinki.

The background of Masud Chaichian is not exactly that of your average Finnish university professor. Born into a Jewish family in Iran, Chaichian became an academic cosmopolitan in the early 1960's. His career as a physicist took him from Moscow to the Weizmann Institute in Israel, from Britain to Germany and to CERN in Switzerland. Yet here he is, professor of high energy physics at the University of Helsinki, some twenty-four years after coming to Finland on a one-year research grant. What made the wandering scientist settle down in ultima thule?

"When I got here I realized I liked this country enormously. Finland wasn't crowded, for one thing. I had always lived in big places with lots of people. Here it was peaceful and the nature was beautiful. I had also got to know many Finns at CERN, and that's why I initially wanted to come here for a year", explains Chaichian.

When the positions of professor and associate professor at the Department of High Energy Physics opened up, Chaichian applied. Though getting ranked as the top candidate for both jobs, Chaichian had to settle for the associate professorship _ and even this required an intervention from President Kekkonen.

"When I first got here things were rather difficult, since I didn't know the language. When I applied for a professorship I had only been here for two years and couldn't yet speak perfect Finnish. I wrote to President Kekkonen to get an exemption, but got it only for the position of associate professor. Nowadays, with more and more foreign researchers and students coming in, the language doesn't present as big a requirement for a new professor", Chaichian says.

Yet nobody could say Chaichian was a slow learner. Already fluent in Persian, Hebrew, Russian, English, German and French, he was going through the classics of Finnish literature by the time of his appointment, only two years after having set foot in Finland.

"The fact that I found the language so interesting and learned it very quickly added to my wish to stay. One would imagine that in a small and relatively closed country like Finland there would be more prejudices against outsiders, but I didn't experience any of that. On the contrary, I feel the people were specially generous to me, maybe because they saw that I really liked it here and wanted to adjust", Chaichian recalls.

Basic research appreciated

Finland has a long and venerable tradition in mathematics, with such top-names as Lindelöf, Ahlfors and Nevanlinna. In comparison, the main development of physics started rather late, only after World War II. Yet the research currently done in theoretical particle physics is rated among the top ten percent in Europe.

"I think the reason for our success is a genuine appreciation and interest towards basic science. Furthermore, we have lots of areas of research, such as low-temperature physics, that are at the same time theoretical and very applicable. Until the present day this balance between basic research and applications has been maintained with excellent results."

Though the policies of the Academy of Finland and Ministry of Education have been, and still are, beneficial to post-graduate research in physics, Chaichian sees the tendency to cut down on basic research as a valid concern.

"When the professors in Helsinki were planning to go on strike in 1984, they asked the rector of the University, Olli Lehto, for an opinion. Obviously, Lehto couldn't condone the strike, but I recall him replying that the level of the university reflects the level of the society. I absolutely agree with him. All things are interdependent. You can't raise the level of biology without raising the level of mathematics and physics and chemistry. In Russia, for example, they have lost by now two future generations of scientists because, in the recent past, applications have been all that count."

Chaichian considers the declining interest in mathematics and physics among high school students as another gradual danger. Already in Otaniemi, the University of Technology, there is a shortage of mathematically skilled students.

"The problem is not so much with the quality of education, but with a lack of interest. In twenty years or so we might not have enough good people to do the teaching and research. I think science should be advertised more. Young people don't necessarily realize that studying theoretical physics is one possible route to Nokia, for example."

Bureacracy getting out of hand

Apart from the midnight sun and a seemingly unintelligible language, it is commonplace for foreign visitors to muse upon our massive bureaucracy and the individualism of Finns. Chaichian feels, however, that the former is only a rather recent phenomenon and that the latter is surprisingly absent from the Finnish scientific community.

"In Finland things are very individualized, but when it comes to science or technology, these national features disappear. CERN is a good example of this: many nationalities, including Finns, are working together for a common aim, and communicating with one another is easy."

As for bureaucracy, things aren't quite as good.

"When I got here in 1976, the level of bureaucracy was one of the lowest in the world. I would say bureaucracy has increased by a factor of four or five during my time here, partially I think because of the EU-membership. I am the head of my division, and every morning I come to work I get a little bit depressed: there are usually two or three reports waiting on my desk with a deadline looming the next day. Filling in all those papers consumes a lot of time, and in the end nobody reads them!", Chaichian complains.

In Chaichian's opinion the EU-membership has not only produced a profusion of red tape, but has also complicated the funding of scientific projects. The EU prefers giving away money in large chunks which means the projects have to be large, too. This in turn means the applicants have to artificially pool together smaller projects that actually have little in common.

Not in it for the money

In at least one respect professor Chaichian's decision to settle down in Finland is revealing - he isn't in it for the money. Chaichian readily admits the wages aren't exactly high, but gives his support to the basic salary system in principle. In the United States, professors often bargain for their positions, changing jobs every time they get a higher bid. This, in its own way, is detrimental to the spirit of academic freedom and independence. One thing about the Finnish salary system bothers Chaichian, though.

"Even though in Finland the title of associate professor has been changed to professor, the former still get paid less than full professors. The situation is quite absurd, since the younger people appointed now as professors get a higher salary than their old teachers that may have been professors for twenty years."

Chaichian himself got a full professorship only two years ago, by invitation _ thanks to the efforts of the present head of the Physics Department. Though happy with getting rid of the shadow of Kekkonen's partial exemption, Chaichian would rather see posts filled by application than invitation.

"The recent trend to fill professorships by invitation easily leads people and universities into different camps, especially in a small country like Finland. It is counterproductive for scientific interchange. Also, there are too many short-term appointments. This causes stress, and even good scientists leave to seek out a more secure position", Chaichian says.

What does a Finnish professor do when there is free time from teaching, research and filling in EU-forms? He or she goes to a summer cottage, of course. Chaichian, who is currently doing research on non-commutative space-time, likes spending his holidays at his summer cottage in central Finland. In a very Finnish manner, the cottage also functions as a retreat where creative impulses can freely
reign; Chaichian has written most of his four books on physics at the cottage.

"I am much of a forest man. I like to be out in the nature", Chaichian reveals, and adds that he feels a close affinity to "The philosop-her of Havukka-Aho", a character in Veikko Huovinen's famous novel of the same name, and one of the best-loved characters in Finnish literature. The philosopher of Havukka-Aho is a self-taught lumberjack who likes philosophizing about atoms and other curiosities of the modern world in the peace and quiet of a Finnish forest landscape. An unlikely, yet somehow convincing, revelation from a cosmopolitan particle physicist that fell in love with Finland.

Henrikki Timgren