Academic Freedom, Public Reactions, and Anonymity

作者：Hayry Matti^*

来源：Bioethics, 2014, 28(4): 170-173.

DOI：10.1111/bioe.12094

• John Stuart Mill
• ethical individualism
• controversial ideas
• Ronald Dworkin
• Francesca Minerva
• public reactions
• academic freedom
• Fritz Machlup
• Alberto Giubiliani
• individual responsibility
• 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.

• 出版日期2014-5