Caught in the crossfire: Fears of Chinese-American scientists.

The US global leadership in science and technology has greatly benefitted from immigrants from other countries, most notably from China in the recent decades. However, feeling the pressure of potential federal investigations since the 2018 launch of the China Initiative, scientists of Chinese descent in the United States now face higher incentives to leave the United States and lower incentives to apply for federal grants. Analyzing data pertaining to institutional affiliations of more than 200 million scientific papers, we find a steady increase in the return migration of scientists of Chinese descent from the United States to China. We also conducted a survey of scientists of Chinese descent employed by US universities in tenured or tenure-track positions (n = 1,304), with results revealing general feelings of fear and anxiety that lead them to consider leaving the United States and/or stop applying for federal grants. If the situation is not corrected, American science will likely suffer the loss of scientific talent to China and other countries.

Prosocial motives underlie scientific censorship by scientists: A perspective and research agenda.

Science is among humanity's greatest achievements, yet scientific censorship is rarely studied empirically. We explore the social, psychological, and institutional causes and consequences of scientific censorship (defined as actions aimed at obstructing particular scientific ideas from reaching an audience for reasons other than low scientific quality). Popular narratives suggest that scientific censorship is driven by authoritarian officials with dark motives, such as dogmatism and intolerance. Our analysis suggests that scientific censorship is often driven by scientists, who are primarily motivated by self-protection, benevolence toward peer scholars, and prosocial concerns for the well-being of human social groups. This perspective helps explain both recent findings on scientific censorship and recent changes to scientific institutions, such as the use of harm-based criteria to evaluate research. We discuss unknowns surrounding the consequences of censorship and provide recommendations for improving transparency and accountability in scientific decision-making to enable the exploration of these unknowns. The benefits of censorship may sometimes outweigh costs. However, until costs and benefits are examined empirically, scholars on opposing sides of ongoing debates are left to quarrel based on competing values, assumptions, and intuitions.

Realizing the price of academic freedom.

Since 2010, the number of life science doctoral graduates opting into academic postdoctoral employment has steadily declined. In recent years, this decline has made routine headlines in academic news cycles, and faculty members, universities, and funding bodies alike have begun to take notice. In November 2022, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) convened a special interest group to address the problems in postdoctoral recruitment and retention. In response, the American Physiological Society Science Policy Committee highlighted several key issues in postdoctoral training and working conditions and offered the NIH solutions to consider. There are known issues that affect postdoctoral recruitment and retention efforts: low wages relative to other employment sectors, a heavy workload, and poor job prospects to name a few. Unfortunately, these concerns are frequently dismissed as "the price of doing business in academia," and postdoctoral scholars are promised that if they overcome the trials and tribulations of this training period, the reward at the end, a career with academic freedom to pursue your own interests, justifies the means. However, academic freedom cannot and should not be used as the band-aid in a system where most of us will never actually experience academic freedom. Instead, we should systematically embrace solutions that improve the personal and professional health of early career researchers in all levels of training and independence if the goal is to truly shore up the academic workforce.

The Cancer of Cancel Culture: Spreading "Correct" Scientific Ideologies Across North American Academia.

The spread of "cancel culture" related to sex and gender controversies in North America is examined as part of a larger movement to politicize sex research findings and certain sex and gender narratives as "correct" and "incorrect" from a so-called social justice standpoint. This binary is then used by academic administrators and empowered individuals or self-interest groups to reward or punish scholars for their viewpoints. The cases described by Meyer-Bahlburg, Lowrey, and Hooven are concrete examples of a growing "sexual McCarthyism" where empirical results are challenged by offended social justice "warriors" and embellished on social media into ad hominem attacks, to the point that it can damage-or even cancel-the careers of productive sexual scientists. This occurs largely out of fear on the part of academic administrators and lawyers charged with protecting the university from "brand damage" that might occur if the offending scholar is not dealt with. Sexual scientists are being vilified for research on sex differences, sex/gender assignment and subsequent causes for transitioning and/or de-transitioning, research that shows few or no untoward social or psychological effects of viewing pornography, research that debunks the notion of porn or sex "addiction," research showing the efficacy of medications to treat sexual desire disorders in women, research on "minor attracted persons" and even animal research that dares to show homologies to human sexual behavior. The silencing of empirical evidence and alternative viewpoints is contrary to the intellectual mission of universities and destructive to academic and political freedoms.

Academic Freedom Is Social Justice: Sex, Gender, and Cancel Culture on Campus.

I teach in and co-direct the undergraduate program in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology at Harvard University. During the promotion of my recent book on testosterone and sex differences, I appeared on "Fox and Friends," a Fox News program, and explained that sex is binary and biological. In response, the director of my department's Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging task force (a graduate student) accused me on Twitter of transphobia and harming undergraduates, and I responded. The tweets went viral, receiving international news coverage. The public attack by the task force director runs contrary to Harvard's stated academic freedom principles, yet no disciplinary action was taken, nor did any university administrators publicly support my right to express my views in an environment free of harassment. Unfortunately, what happened to me is not unusual, and an increasing number of scholars face restrictions imposed by formal sanctions or the creation of hostile work environments. In this article, I describe what happened to me, discuss why clear talk about the science of sex and gender is increasingly met with hostility on college campuses, why administrators are largely failing in their responsibilities to protect scholars and their rights to express their views, and what we can do to remedy the situation.

Threats to Academic Freedom in Higher Education.

Much debate centers on the conditions of free speech and academic freedom within higher education. Underlying these debates are what appears to be increasing occurrences of ideologically based censorship battles within academia. This paper examines one aspect of those battles-e.g., how cancel culture has intruded into the academic environment of higher education. In particular, this paper explores how an ideologically based retraction practice may be infringing on academic freedom. The paper also discusses how an overly politicized academia may itself undermine the necessary conditions for academic freedom.

The Cyclical Return of the IQ Controversy: Revisiting the Lessons of the Resolution on Genetics, Race and Intelligence.

In 1976, the Genetics Society of America (GSA) published a document entitled "Resolution of Genetics, Race, and Intelligence." This document laid out the Society's position in the IQ controversy, particularly that on scientific and ethical questions involving the genetics of intellectual differences between human populations. Since the GSA was the largest scientific society of geneticists in the world, many expected the document to be of central importance in settling the controversy. Unfortunately, the Resolution had surprisingly little influence on the discussion. In 1979, William Provine analyzed the possible factors that decreased the impact of the Resolution, among them scientists' limited understanding of the relationship between science and ethics. Through the analysis of unpublished versions of the Resolution and exchanges between GSA members, I will suggest that the limited impact of the statement likely depended on a shift in the aims of the GSA due to the controversies that surrounded the preparation of the document. Indeed, the demands of the membership made it progressively more impartial in both scientific and political terms, decreasing its potential significance for a wider audience. Notably, the troubled history of the Resolution raises the question of what can make effective or ineffective the communication between scientists and the public-a question with resonance in past and present discussions on topics of social importance.

The Right to Teach in a Hyper-Digital Age: Legal Protections for (Post-)Pandemic Concerns.

The development of the internet has presented special challenges for teaching and learning, especially from the viewpoint of the rights and expectations of the instructor to maintain an environment appropriate to fulfill educational objectives. Restrictions imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic have amplified these concerns as virtual teaching methods almost literally overnight had to be adopted very widely among instructors. Among the ironies have been several instances where recorded (fragments of) lectures delivered virtually were publicized on social networking sites for reasons of exposing some perceived form of objectionable content. In this paper, I focus on the policy implications of lectures being transmitted on the internet subject to their recording and distribution in ways not authorized by the instructor, especially from the viewpoint of rights formally granted in the US legal system. Various legal avenues are available to protect lectures, specifically in relation to copyright law, academic freedom, and contractual breach of trust. Although pedagogical goals and means must always remain primary in our teaching, these legal measures can be relied upon when other safeguards fail in order to maintain and promote educational integrity.

Governing Campus Speech: a Bottom-Up Approach.

I review arguments favoring bans on problematic speech (e.g., hate speech) on campus. Contrasting such calls for top-down regulation, I explore the potential for a "bottom-up approach" to campus speech governance to address vexing concerns pertaining to campus speech without violating free speech and academic freedom principles. I examine the political economy and epistemological dynamics inherent within the two forms of governance. I argue that, relative to a centralized top-down approach, a decentralized bottom-up approach to speech governance avoids political dynamics that bend toward the inappropriate use of power. Further, I argue that a bottom-up approach leaves the discursive space contestable, and therefore more open to new discovery and correction. Recognizing that a bottom up approach is no panacea, I also consider open questions and concerns that warrant further inquiry.

Reputational Risk, Academic Freedom and Research Ethics Review.

Drawing on scholarship around academic freedom and new public management, this article explores the way in which research ethics committees in UK universities (URECs) can come to exhibit behaviour - common in their US equivalents - that prioritises the reputational protection of their host institution over and above academic freedom and the protection of research subjects. Drawing on two case studies the article shows both how URECs can serve to restrict research that may be 'embarrassing' for a university and how, in high profile cases, university management come to use such committees as mechanisms for internal discipline.

New threats to academic freedom.

Using a specific case as an example, the article argues that the Internet allows dissemination of academic ideas to the general public in ways that can sometimes pose a threat to academic freedom. Since academic freedom is a fundamental element of academia and since it benefits society at large, it is important to safeguard it. Among measures that can be taken in order to achieve this goal, the publication of anonymous research seems to be a good option.

Academic freedom and the professional responsibilities of applied ethicists: a comment on Minerva.

Academic freedom is an important good, but it comes with several responsibilities. In this commentary we seek to do two things. First, we argue against Francesca Minerva's view of academic freedom as presented in her article 'New threats to academic freedom' on a number of grounds. We reject the nature of the absolutist moral claim to free speech for academics implicit in the article; we reject the elitist role for academics as truth-seekers explicit in her view; and we reject a possible more moderate re-construction of her view based on the harm/offence distinction. Second, we identify some of the responsibilities of applied ethicists, and illustrate how they recommend against allowing for anonymous publication of research. Such a proposal points to the wider perils of a public discourse which eschews the calm and careful discussion of ideas.

Academic freedom, public reactions, and anonymity.

Academic freedom can be defined as immunity against adverse reactions from the general public, designed to keep scholars unintimidated and productive even after they have published controversial ideas. Francesca Minerva claims that this notion of strict instrumental academic freedom is supported by Ronald Dworkin, and that anonymity would effectively defend the sphere of immunity implied by it. Against this, I argue that the idea defended by Minerva finds no support in the work by Dworkin referred to; that anonymity would not in most cases effectively protect the kind of immunity sought after; and that in some cases it would not even be desirable to protect scholars from public reactions to their controversial claims.

Taboos and Self-Censorship Among U.S. Psychology Professors.

We identify points of conflict and consensus regarding (a) controversial empirical claims and (b) normative preferences for how controversial scholarship-and scholars-should be treated. In 2021, we conducted qualitative interviews (n = 41) to generate a quantitative survey (N = 470) of U.S. psychology professors' beliefs and values. Professors strongly disagreed on the truth status of 10 candidate taboo conclusions: For each conclusion, some professors reported 100% certainty in its veracity and others 100% certainty in its falsehood. Professors more confident in the truth of the taboo conclusions reported more self-censorship, a pattern that could bias perceived scientific consensus regarding the inaccuracy of controversial conclusions. Almost all professors worried about social sanctions if they were to express their own empirical beliefs. Tenured professors reported as much self-censorship and as much fear of consequences as untenured professors, including fear of getting fired. Most professors opposed suppressing scholarship and punishing peers on the basis of moral concerns about research conclusions and reported contempt for peers who petition to retract papers on moral grounds. Younger, more left-leaning, and female faculty were generally more opposed to controversial scholarship. These results do not resolve empirical or normative disagreements among psychology professors, but they may provide an empirical context for their discussion.

Diogenes' tub and the double bind of science and vocation in the late Middle Ages.

Intellectuals tend to cherish heroes who embody their ideal way of life. The fact that the personas of the unworldly Greek philosophers Diogenes and Crates were so popular in the late Middle Ages proves that Max Weber's Idealtypus of the "authentic man of science" (as termed by Steven Shapin) has been problematic for centuries. This finding gives cause to modify Max Weber's and Shapin's viewpoints about the loss of the "authentic man of science" due to professionalization. The development of the university as an educational institution in the High Middle Ages chained the academic once and for all to a formal training that costs time and money: investments that were expected to have reward. Soon, university-trained experts were highly appreciated by local and national authorities. By combining Frank Rexroth's and Marcel Bubert's ideas on the coming into being of an "amor sciendi" in the twelfth century Arts faculties, with David Kaldewey's and Klaas van Berkel's appeals for academic autonomy, my article argues that academics have always struggled to protect the pursuit of truth, even while they recognized its vital importance from the beginning.

The ethics of limiting informed debate: censorship of select medical publications in the interest of organ transplantation.

Recently, several articles in the scholarly literature on medical ethics proclaim the need for "responsible scholarship" in the debate over the proper criteria for death, in which "responsible scholarship" is defined in terms of support for current neurological criteria for death. In a recent article, James M. DuBois is concerned that academic critiques of current death criteria create unnecessary doubt about the moral acceptability of organ donation, which may affect the public's willingness to donate. Thus he calls for a closing of the debate on current death criteria and for journal editors to publish only critiques that "substantially engage and advance the debate." We argue that such positions as DuBois' are a threat to responsible scholarship in medical ethics, especially scholarship that opposes popular stances, because it erodes academic freedom and the necessity of debate on an issue that is literally a matter of life and death, no matter what side a person defends.

When faculty are bullied: the unacceptable costs of doing our job and what universities can and should do.

Faculty get bullied for their work by multiple audiences. Faculty bullying is thus workplace bullying. As employers of faculty, universities must ensure faculty workspaces are safe by taking actions to secure these spaces and to support and defend faculty, specifically, and academic freedom and knowledge creation and promotion, generally. Suggestions for responding and preventing hostile work environments are provided.

Viewpoint diversity in public health.

Schools of public health are often situated within universities but not infrequently also function as public health advocacy organizations. Viewpoint diversity on many issues is often limited within schools of public health and does not reflect the diversity one finds in society more generally. It is argued that welcoming, and even seeking out, viewpoint diversity within public health would contribute to understanding and knowledge, to the training public health leaders and academics who can serve the whole of society, and to working together across ideological lines to better contribute to population health.