In the midst of massive budget cuts to higher education, the university has placed most of the burden on students by hiking tuition, freezing new faculty hires and cutting valuable programs. This means students pay an extraordinary amount of money for a meager education. Students should be outraged.

But this semester outrage has been astonishingly muted.

The Education Access Coalition organized a forum in the CUB Ballroom Wednesday. Students and faculty gave speeches, told stories and read protest poetry about the commodification of higher education. Attendance was dismal.

On March 4, there were student protests across the country, but not at WSU. The previous month there was a sit-in on Glenn Terrell Mall with an underwhelming attendance of 100 students.

Traditionally, students have been the most effective and passionate protesters, but somewhere along the line this rebellious spirit died. Limpid student protests are ignored in the national media in favor of the Tea Party movement.

I don't think students are deliberately apathetic. They have merely forgotten that higher education isn't supposed to be the rigid bureaucracy that WSU and other universities have become. The spirit of a true university is not the pursuit of a quantifiable degree or the pursuit of empty prestige, but rather the constant pursuit of knowledge.

To understand the importance of the pursuit of knowledge and rekindle the revolutionary spirit, I recommend that students read "Logicomix: An Epic Search For Truth," a comic book written by Apostolos Doxiadis and Christos H. Papadimitriou with artwork by Alecos Papadatos and Annie Di Donna. It deals with the history of logic and logicians, particularly Bertrand Russell.

In 1920, Russell and Alfred North Whitehead co-authored "Principia Mathematica," which famously devoted 362 pages to prove that one plus one equals two. This is exactly the kind of quixotic work that scholars are criticized for pursuing because it isn't pertinent to the "real" world.

The pursuit of purely logical foundations for mathematics was quixotic – not just in the sense that it was an impossible goal, but also because it was a worthwhile journey. Russell's work in logic led to later advancements in the field, including the ideas of Alan Turing, whose work in algorithms led to the invention of the computer.

The comic book format particularly highlights how the pursuit of knowledge and rationality in a chaotic world is a heroic act. At WSU, I have been lucky to have many excellent professors, who tirelessly research in addition to giving students the tools and inspiration to discover new knowledge. I have benefited from the classes I have been required to take in diverse fields, even if some of that knowledge won't have an immediate practical value.

Students need to step up and protect the pursuit of knowledge, as it is currently in danger at this university. If they do not, the forum held Wednesday will likely be the last of its kind this semester. WSU President Elson S. Floyd is not planning to hold the kinds of public forums held last spring concerning the budget cuts. The Daily Evergreen quoted him last month on the subject: "My goal is to make this round of budget cuts invisible to students."

While he at least doesn't plan on cutting academic programs, I doubt this next round of budget cuts will be without crippling effects for students – and I doubt it will be the last.

"Logicomix" reminded me that the pursuit of knowledge is vital, and students need to take a more active role in defending it. Inaction, apathy and ignorance are not the answer. What we don't know will hurt us.