MIT cancels UChicago professor’s science lecture after his comments on DEI, Princeton invites him instead

MIT administrators canceled a lecture by a University of Chicago professor scheduled for Oct. 21, 2021, succumbing to an eight-day Twitter campaign calling for the scholar’s disinvitation. The campaign was initiated by students and professors who expressed discontent with the professor for challenging the role of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) in higher education in an op-ed he wrote in August 2021.  

Key Players

Dorian Abbot is an associate professor in the department of geophysical sciences at the University of Chicago. He is also an active proponent of academic freedom and merit-based evaluations. 

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is consistently ranked as one of the world’s top academic institutions. The university came under fire from Free Speech advocates and online pundits for its decision to cancel Abbot’s science lecture. 

Further Details

Abbot was originally invited in 2020 to give MIT’s annual John Carlson Lecture, a prestigious yearly event featuring discourse on news in climate science. The discussion would ultimately be scheduled for Oct. 21, 2021, due to the Covid-19 pandemic. 

By Nov. 15, 2020, Abbot had posted a series of videos to his public Youtube channel that criticized the DEI dialogue taking place in academic circles in the United States. In response, some 150 students and postdoctoral scholars signed and published a letter calling for Abbot’s resignation from the University of Chicago, but their demands were refused by President Robert Zimmer. 

On Aug. 12, 2021, Newsweek published an op-ed written by Abbot that criticized the DEI movement in universities across the nation. The article, titled “The Diversity Problem on Campus,” argues that “DEI violates the ethical and legal principle of equal treatment,” and it “entails treating people as members of a group rather than as individuals, repeating the mistake that made possible the atrocities of the 20th century.” 

In the Newsweek piece, Abbot proposed the implementation of alternative standards for university admissions: merit, fairness, and equality (MFE). Under this method, he said, applicants would be evaluated solely on the grounds of their merit and qualifications, an unbiased process that assesses them as individuals. An eight-day Twitter campaign ensued, criticizing Abbot and his article. Many proponents of the DEI movement questioned his values, bringing them to the attention of the university. 

On Sept. 30, 2021, MIT notified Abbot his lecture had been canceled. MIT justified its decision to cancel the lecture in a letter sent to faculty, stating, “While all of us can agree that Professor Abbot has the freedom to speak as he chooses on any subject, the department leadership concluded that the debate over both his views on diversity, equity, and inclusion and manner of presenting them were overshadowing the purpose and spirit of the Carlson Lecture,” according to The Boston Globe. 

Outcome 

Princeton University denounces MIT’s decision and invites Abbot to present his lecture there instead

On Oct. 3, 2021, Princeton University professor Robert George, a Free Speech and academic freedom advocate, announced via Twitter that Abbot’s cancellation amounted to a “shameful capitulation to political pressure.” On Oct. 5, George announced that Abbot had been invited by the James Madison Program in the department of politics at Princeton to deliver his lecture on Oct. 21, the same day as the originally scheduled Carlson Lecture.  George said Abbot would present via Zoom, and by Oct. 12 thousands of people had signed up to listen.  

On Oct. 18, 2021, Leo Rafael Reif, president of MIT, wrote in a mass email that Abbot’s disinvitation had caused “great distress” to many, and that student, faculty, and staff of MIT had “suffered a tide of online targeting and hate mail from outside MIT.” 

Reif also acknowledged that the event had led many to question MIT’s commitment to free expression. “Some report feeling that certain topics are now off limits at MIT,” said Reif. “Let me say clearly what I have observed through more than 40 years at MIT: Freedom of expression is a fundamental value of the institute…” adding that the next step was to “engage in serious, open discussion together.”

UC Berkeley science director quits job after colleagues refuse to invite Abbot 

Meanwhile, David Romps, director of the Berkeley Atmospheric Sciences Center (BASC), resigned in protest from University of California, Berkeley, after his colleagues rejected his request to invite Abbot to speak on campus, according to KTVU Fox New 2. 

“I hold BASC and its faculty — my friends and colleagues — in the highest regard,” tweeted Romps, “and so it has been a great honor to serve as BASC’s director…But it was never my intention to lead an organization that is political or even ambiguously so.”

The lecture goes on

On Oct. 21, 2021, several thousand people logged in to attend Abbot’s virtual speech at Princeton. According to The New York Post, George said in his introductory remarks that “We are not a scientific institute. However we believe that one of the enduring principles in our tradition of civic life, civic liberty, is free speech and academic freedom.  And that is why we are hosting Dr. Abbot’s lecture.”

Abbot went on to discuss the earth’s climate and measuring the habitable nature of planets in different solar systems.