A couple of weeks ago, the Washington Post reported on the shattered career of “renowned AIDS researcher” Jeffrey Parsons, a psychologist who spent most of his career at Hunter College of the City University of New York (CUNY). The Post’s story was about the settlement in a long-running civil case over Parsons’ use and abuse […]
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“Die Hydra der Diktator” (1946) is a famous drawing by Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986) finished about a decade before he went blind in 1955. Today Borges rests firmly in the pantheon of classical liberalism. His stories convey a complex, yet also mysteriously ordered vision of the cosmos. His smooth, organic style makes him particularly compatible […]
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Diversity statements—short essays that express one’s past contributions to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and future plans to advance the cause—have become ubiquitous in academia. As I’ve written before, many universities embrace these requirements not only for faculty hiring but also for all levels of employment. And in a recent piece for the Wall Street […]
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In recent years, American higher education has popularized the idea that students do better academically when taught by professors from the same racial or ethnic group. It is hard to imagine that such a theory of “racial pairing” has risen from a testable (and refutable) hypothesis in the 1990s to an industry standard adopted by […]
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In 2003, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas wrote: The Constitution abhors classifications based on race, not only because those classifications can harm favored races or are based on illegitimate motives, but also because every time the government places citizens on racial registers and makes race relevant to the provision of burdens or benefits, it demeans […]
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A few years ago, I wrote about one of the most overlooked facets of college and university life: students and professors have far less influence on campus culture and programming than most people think. In reality, it is the ever-growing ranks of administrators who have the greatest influence. Administrators are now embedded in virtually all […]
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The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin) has become a frequent point of discussion at the National Association of Scholars (NAS). My colleague, John Sailer, recently wrote a full-length report on the rise of “Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity” (DIE) at UT Austin, and I wrote an article for the Austin Journal on the DIE […]
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The United States has been considered a truly “exceptional” place because it excels in so many ways. It has the biggest output of goods and services. It has had the most powerful military presence on the planet for many years. Its technological advances have been the greatest of any nation. And, more relevant to this […]
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Even being attacked can be educational and enlightening. In November 2020, eight official student groups published a public letter demanding that the McGill Administration rescind my Emeritus status. This was allegedly necessary in order to honor “the right of Muslims and People of Colour have to feel safe. [sic]” The groups endorsing this demand were […]
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For how many years have elite colleges been playing a double game of inclusivity/selectivity? Some years back, Yale President Peter Salovey had an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal affirming the high regard the school placed on inclusion and the opening of Yale to voices of all responsible kinds. A variant of the beloved word […]
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The National Association of Scholars (NAS) contacted scholars from different fields to gather their opinions on Governor Ron DeSantis’ recent higher education moves in Florida, including his proposals for reform and the change in leadership at the New College of Florida. Contrary to much of the discussion in academia, we found that these scholars were […]
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Historically, I’ve been a late adopter of technology. I was one of the last people I know to get a cell phone. And I continued to pay for gas inside the gas station for years after everyone else started paying at the pump with a credit card. But recognizing my own Luddite tendencies, I try […]
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One of my teaching tricks is to ask my students, “Can we have the word up without the word down?” If we have only one of these words, we find ourselves lost in that memorable koan—the sound of one hand clapping. Some words and ideas require complements. Others, such as hot and cold, also include […]
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The debate about science and its place in public policy goes way back. When President Obama pledged in 2009 to “restore science to its rightful place,” he merely begged the question: What is the rightful place of science? In their more extreme forms, postmodernists deny the possibility of truth that is validated by repeated observations, […]
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America is in a grinding civil war that pits critical theory against Enlightenment values. The Enlightenment inspired civil debate, rationality, and science. Critical theory, derivative of neo-Marxism, divides people into oppressor and oppressed groups and portrays “knowledge” as a subjective tool in the struggle for power. Rather than engage in debate, woke critical theorists engage […]
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The normal give and take of democratic deliberation between citizens, while not always achieved in practice, has been the benchmark in American political culture over the course of our nation’s history. University of Florida law professor John Stinneford says, however, that these habits of free people are increasingly at risk. “I think we have all […]
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The Ohio State University is currently seeking a professor of “Philosophy of Race,” an area of expertise that includes “the epistemological significance of race or racism” and “race in the philosophy of science.” Its Department of Physics seeks a professor whose main focus is “issues relevant to educational equity.” And its Department of Anthropology recently […]
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Benjamin Franklin once said, “nothing is certain except death and taxes.” Today, though, a third item may be equally inevitable: academia’s diversity, inclusion, and equity (DIE) bureaucracies. Scarcely a week passes without some school proudly announcing that it will now hire dozens of DIE functionaries and spend millions to promote racial justice. Oddly, many professors, […]
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Political Hydras, Part 1 (for Javier Fernández-Lasquetty Blanc) “Such is its nature that, as fast as one doubt is cut away, innumerable others spring up like Hydra’s heads, nor could we set any limit to their renewal did we not apply the mind’s living fire to suppress them.” —Boethius, The Consolation of Philosophy (4.6) Among […]
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Three years ago, I began a dangerous journey of questioning strange new policies at my institution, Bakersfield College. Since then, I’ve been subjected to smears, threats, and all manner of harassment and retaliation. The most recent episode centered on fabricated allegations of racism that several national media outlets debunked, but not before one of my […]
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