- Alan Lightman on academic freedom;
- Alan Lightman and Martin Rees on how scientists can be good citizens;
- Rewatching Conclave, and recalling two key quotes, about certainty, and moving forward.
The very idea of academic freedom, of freedom to think what you like without coercion by church or state, is a relatively new one.
The Atlantic, Alan Lightman, 30 Apr 2025: The Dark Ages Are Back subtitled “Americans must insist on academic freedom, or risk losing what makes our nation great.” [gift link]
(I’ve cited Lightman and reviewed three of his books on this blog.)
Today the concept of academic freedom may seem obvious to Americans. But the roots of academic freedom, which can be traced back to medieval European universities, were never certain. Back then, when scholars demanded autonomy from Church and state, they were often rebuked—or worse.
What began as a slow-burning fuse eventually led to the concept of the modern research university a few centuries later, found in the writing of the English philosopher Francis Bacon and his 1627 novel, New Atlantis. There, Bacon envisioned a college called Salomon’s House, in which scientists and others worked in an atmosphere of generosity and freethinking. This college came to be known as “the noblest foundation (as we think) that ever was upon the earth; and the lantern of this kingdom,” as the Governor of Bacon’s fictional utopia put it. “It is dedicated to the study of the works and creatures of God.”
With details. Then:
After centuries of intellectual progress, Americans must face a terrible question: Are we now descending from light into dark?
Since April 22, more than 500 leaders of America’s colleges, universities, and scholarly societies have signed a statement protesting the unprecedented interference of the Trump administration into higher education, interference that included external oversight of admissions criteria, faculty hiring, accreditation, ideological capture, and, in some cases, curriculum. As the statement says, higher education in America is open to constructive reform. However, “we must oppose undue government intrusion in the lives of those who learn, live, and work on our campuses.”
Especially targeted by the administration have been international students.
Because Trump and his dimwitted followers don’t understand the point of academic research. Here’s two paras about that.
Both tangible and intangible benefits flow from academic freedom. First, the tangible. The business world should be alarmed by the proposed jamming of the greatest engine of invention, innovation, and economic prosperity in our nation. To name just a few examples: The internet, in the form of the ARPANET, was developed by researchers at UCLA, Stanford, and MIT under the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in the late 1960s and ’70s. Key concepts and materials for lithium-ion batteries were developed at the University of Texas and the University of Oxford. The first artificial heart was developed by Robert Jarvik and colleagues at the University of Utah. Google originated as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Stanford. Natural-language processing, neural networks, and deep learning—all fundamental parts of AI—came out of research at MIT, Stanford, Carnegie Mellon, and the University of Toronto. Pivotal work in CRISPR gene editing was done by Jennifer Doudna at UC Berkeley. (She received the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for this work.) Many other technological inventions, although not directly produced in our universities, were nurtured by the training and knowledge gained in them: computers, vaccines, smartphones, social-media platforms, Global Positioning System (GPS), insulin synthesis, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), lasers.
Of course, the intellectual and creative freedom in America has enabled great productivity far beyond the precincts of science and technology. Exemplars include William James in philosophy and psychology, Toni Morrison in literature, Noam Chomsky in linguistics and cognitive science, Hannah Arendt in political theory, Martha Nussbaum in law and ethics, Margaret Mead in anthropology, W. E. B. Du Bois in sociology, John Rawls in political philosophy, Susan Sontag in cultural criticism, John Dewey in philosophy and education, and many, many more.
Much more. Great essay. Once again, this is about the ability of humans to think for themselves and draw conclusions from their observations of the world, versus the social forces that would prefer conformity, for the sake of survival of the tribe.
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A few days later.
The Atlantic, Alan Lightman and Martin Rees, 4 May 2025: How Scientists Can Be Good Citizens, subtitled “We have a responsibility to ensure that our discoveries are used in the public interest. That isn’t always easy.”
(I’ve reviewed one Rees book here but have several others yet to read.)
The essay begins by recalling how German scientists captured by the Allies reacted to the news that an atomic bomb had been dropped on Hiroshima. And the guilt they felt, since the bomb was a result of their discoveries.
The ethics of science and the responsibilities of scientists do not have simple formulations or prescriptions. Yet the questions that animated Heisenberg and von Weizsäcker 80 years ago are as urgent as ever today. The role of scientists in their society is especially relevant when science and evidence-based thinking are under attack, and scientists are sometimes portrayed as driven by financial or political interests.
It’s a long essay, adapted from a forthcoming book. I’ll quote one more bit.
Our view is that science and the technology resulting from science do not have values in themselves. It is we human beings who possess values. And we should employ those values in how we use science and technology. (In this view, we disagree with the AI entrepreneur Mustafa Suleyman, who argues in his recent book, The Coming Wave, that technology is inherently political.) The “good” referred to by Heisenberg probably meant—as it does for many people—increasing the well-being (happiness and quality of life) of the largest number of people. And the “bad” diminishes that well-being. We further suggest that scientists, as citizens of their society, have a responsibility to ensure that their discoveries and innovations are used for good and not for bad. Such a responsibility, of course, means that scientists will have to take some time away from their lab benches and equations to engage with the public and with policy makers. We also suggest that scientists, as citizens of the world, share a responsibility to help relieve the world’s economic inequalities, including the global South’s relative lack of access to energy, food, health care, and technology. As von Weizsäcker said, scientists are not policy makers, nor do they have the required skills. But their special expertise and evidence-based thinking should be resources for policy makers to improve the lives of everyone. And, because we live in a scientific and technological age, buffeted by rapid developments in biotechnology, artificial intelligence, and many other areas, scientists have a responsibility to educate the public in scientific matters. Policy makers may often be motivated by self-interest, but ultimately, in democratic societies, they must answer to the public.
I’m inclined to step back and look at the big picture. Sometimes these fine-tuned discussions miss that big picture. Which I’ve explained many times here.
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We re-watched the film Conclave the past couple evenings, given current events. I won’t try to summarize it, or the reactions to it, here. What I will note is a couple striking passages of dialogue.
The main character, played by Ralph Fiennes, gives a speech as the conclave opens. From Imbd/Quotes.
“Certainty is the great enemy of unity. Certainty is the deadly enemy of tolerance. Even Christ was not certain at the end. “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” he cried out in his agony at the ninth hour on the cross. Our faith is a living thing precisely because it walks hand-in-hand with doubt. If there was only certainty and no doubt, there would be no mystery. And therefore, no need for faith.”
I heard an interview with the author of the original book, Robert Harris, about how much he admired Ralph Fiennes’ delivery of these lines, especially on that final word.
And later this, from the Pope-to-be Benitez:
The church is not the past. It is what we do next.
At a minimum, I would observe that the Catholic Church, “the” Church to so many, is as riven as any other faith or political philosophy by shades of doubt and trends in thinking. They think they have an iron-clad basis for their beliefs, but they do not. There is an alternative, which strives to identify what is actually true, and to continually re-examine and revise their provisional truths. As I’ve discussed many times.
