The professor's dramatic mushroom monologue is peak academia! Fungi are truly the chaotic neutral of taxonomy - they're not plants (no photosynthesis), not animals (no mobility), but their own magnificent kingdom. The professor's existential crisis about mushrooms is completely justified! Some fungi species form the largest living organisms on Earth, can survive in space, and share more DNA with humans than plants do. No wonder the prof gets all mystical - when your research subject defies conventional understanding and occasionally glows in the dark, you'd start sounding like a wizard too!