Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
The case of Dorian Abbot, a University of Chicago associate professor of Geophysical Sciences, would have been a purely local event: he was locally excoriated by his colleagues for making three anti-DEI videos, and people here called for his punishment. This being the U of C, that went nowhere. As Bret Stephens notes in his … Continue reading Bret Stephens on Dorian Abbot and reforming campus dogmatism
I’ve written a few posts about my Chicago colleague Dorian Abbot, who got in trouble here on campus for making YouTube videos criticizing Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives. College members demanded punishment, but that didn’t occur because the University of Chicago considers Abbot’s videos free speech, and we don’t punish that. Abbot continued his … Continue reading Yascha Mounk: Dorian Abbot’s cancellation is novel—and dangerous
I’ve written about Dorian Abbot—an associate professor in our Geophysical Sciences Department—twice before. The first time was in November of last year when Abbot came under fire for posting YouTube videos that weren’t in line with the Zeitgeist. As I said at the time: The (associate) professor is Dr. Dorian Abbot in our Department of Geophysical … Continue reading UC Prof Dorian Abbot canceled for a prestigious lecture at MIT after criticizing diversity initiatives
Yesterday I reported on the unconscionable deplatforming of University of Chicago professor Dorian Abbot, who was scheduled to give a prestigious invited lecture at MIT on October 21. The topic of his lecture was to be “climate and the potential for life on other planets”. Abbot was to be the Carlson Lecturer in MIT’s Department … Continue reading Academic Freedom Alliance calls out MIT for canceling Dorian Abbot lecture (and a poll)
The Massachusetts Institute of technology (MIT) was badly burned over the Dorian Abbot affair after it rescinded an invitation to University of Chicago geosciences professor Dorian Abbot to give a prestigious lecture. The invitation was withdrawn after MIT found out that Abbot posted YouTube videos in which he criticized DEI initiatives. It was not good … Continue reading MIT adopts a slightly hedged “free expression” statement
I wrote yesterday about the Academic Freedom Alliance’s concern with colleges making official statements about ideology, politics or morality. The reason they shouldn’t do this is that such declarations impede free discourse by discouraging those who disagree with the statements from speaking up. If your department has an official statement about the college or the … Continue reading MIT faculty worried about chilling of speech
Elizabeth Weiss, a professor of anthropology at San José State University in California, wrote a summary of Stanford’s Academic Freedom Conference this fall for Quillette (click headline below to to read). She was not only a reporter and a participant, but also a victim—professionally damaged by those who violated her academic freedom. That’s because she … Continue reading A participant reports on last fall’s Stanford Academic Freedom Conference
Joshua Katz was a classics professor at Princeton until May of this year, when he was summarily fired for having a consensual relationship with an undergraduate at his school. As this article the NY Times recounts, the circumstances of Katz’s being fired were murky and controversial, as apparently he had already been punished for this relationship … Continue reading In praise of my university
We’ve met Anna Krylov on these pages before (see here); she’s a quantum chemist and the Gabilan Distinguished Professor in Science and Engineering and Professor of Chemistry at the University of Southern California. And we met her because she’s an opponent of the invasion of wokeness into STEM, and because she somehow got an anti-woke paper, … Continue reading Intellectural freedom in STEM: An interview with Anna Krylov
The Stanford Business School is having an academic freedom conference on Friday, November 4, and Saturday, November 5 at the business school’s Knight Management Center at Stanford. The good news is there are a lot of people whom I want to meet, many of them of the “heterodox” stripe. Some of these people I find … Continue reading Academic freedom meeting at Stanford
