A Chinese university is dumping intellectual freedom from their charters yet China hopes to be the world’s top AI power. Is there a contradiction here?
Intellectual freedom
At Nature: Doubt and diversity are okay in science
This retired historian of science thinks it might even be okay to question the “biological ‘species’ concept”.
Roger Scruton, a non-Darwinian intellectual, was honored recently in Czech Republic
Where he did much to keep intellectual freedom alive during the communist years
What? David Berlinski and Gunter Bechly reply to Jerry Coyne … at Quillette?
It would be fun to discuss the history of life for once without the dead hand of Darwin overruling all. From the looks of things, it may also be possible now.
David Gelernter warns against Darwin mob
And he’s a Unabomber survivor.
Bret Weinstein: Free speech is only part of the problem on campus
Roger Kimball discusses Weinstein’s idea of “a breakdown in the basic logic of civilization.”
Jerry Coyne blocked on WordPress in Pakistan
It’s somewhat like blaspheming against Darwin by airing doubts about his theories in the American school system. But in Pakistan, the death penalty is involved.
What are the implications of Julian Assange’s arrest in London?
Yesterday, a prematurely aged-looking Assange (he is 47) — a founder of Wikileaks and Australian — was arrested by UK Police after the Ecuadorean Embassy he has sought asylum in since 2012 withdrew its protection. The arrest raises questions on dissidents, privacy, protection of legitimate secrets, the public’s right to know more than officials, power Read More…
Darwinian PZ Myers blows off attack on Bret Weinstein
The progressive war is, increasingly, with facts, with nature itself. They can’t win but we can certainly lose.
New US free speech policy for universities miffs boffins at Nature
The universities are “spooked by” Trump, are they? Well, they brought him on themselves. They could have listened before, when someone nicer than he is was telling them.
Total surveillance should worry us more than an AI news writing machine
The most dangerous tyrannies are the ones intended to bring about some public good. It’s the difference between someone who just wants to rob you and someone who wants to fix you and run your life.
US prez Trump vows to tie federal funding to campus free speech
Details are unclear but U.S. President Trump has threatened to cut off federal research funds to colleges and universities that deny free speech: In an interview after Trump’s speech, Terry Hartle, senior vice president for the American Council on Education, called the executive order “a solution in search of a problem,” because “free speech and Read More…
Bill Dembski on censorship of books at Amazon
You think you’re free to read what you want? Think again: Three days ago on this forum, I raised the question how long would it be before Amazon, which has now started banning videos skeptical of vaccines, starts banning books. I thought books would be safer. But no. Tommy Robinson’s book Mohammed’s Koran has now been banned Read More…
French author muses on why Darwinism never dies
In an essay on Paul Gosselin ’s Flight from the Absolute: Cynical Observations on the Postmodern West, Volume II, we are told, Over two and a half decades have passed since Phillip E. Johnson kick-started the intelligent design (ID) movement in America with the publication of his path-breaking book, Darwin on Trial (1991). In this Read More…
Maybe dissent from Darwin can’t kill a career any more?
Too soon to tell but in an age when “trust in science” is demanded in the teeth of evidence, not on account of it, maybe Darwinism can’t kill opponents the way it used to. Or does it?