DIY History | Transcribe | Campus Culture | Students for a Democratic Society, Herrnstein lecture, February-June, 1972 | 1972-03-05 Des Moines Register Letter to the Editor: 'Objects to Silencing Speaker at U of I'

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Students for a Democratic Society, Herrnstein lecture, February-June, 1972

1972-03-05 Des Moines Register Letter to the Editor: 'Objects to Silencing Speaker at U of I'

Objects to silencing Speaker at U of I
To the Editor:
I have followed the commentary about Prof. Richard Hernstein's disrupted lecture at the University of Iowa.
That incident has a close parallel in the history of science: Galileo's attempt to get the Copernican theory about the orbits of the planets adopted. In that case, Galileo was much closer to the truth than the Ptolemic theory the Catholic Church followed in supressinf Galileo.
Hernstein is probably wrong. However, the issue will not be decided by SDSers with various fine arts and liberal arts major, nor by the opinions of various biologists or educators, but by professors and their graduate students, performing carefully-controlled experiments. Hernstein should have been allowed to speak, and if the SDSers wanted to speak, they should have questioned him about any bias his opinios may have introduced into his research, the controls he imposed on his experiments, the validity of his statistical methods, etc.
I realize that the U of I is not the scientifically-oriented institution that Iowa State University is, but I would expect students there to realize that issues of fact are not decided by the majority opinion, but by scientific study. It must be the ability of a theory to explain and predict facts, in the simplest manner possible, and not its compatibility with our "common sense" or ethics that forms the basis of acceptance of a theory; that was the basis of quantum mechanics, relativity and evolution. The same tests must be given to the theories of the propagation of intelligence. - Michael Clover (chemistry, physics and mathematics), Iowa State University, 1472 Helser, Ames, Ia. 50010.

[PHOTO]
GALILEO GALILEI

'Ashamed'
To the Editor: 
There are no scars which I wear more proudly than those earned in battles for free speach. But I must express my profound shame at the events at the University of Iowa which prevented Prof. Richard Herrnstein speaking.
I am ashamed that any of my brethren of the academic family, students, faculty or administrators, should have committed so foul a crime against that principle fundamental to our society in general and to the academic enterprise in particular: freedom of expression of all ideas. - Edward J. Thorne, head, Department os Speech, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Ia. 50613.

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Objects to silencing Speaker at U of I To the Editor: I have followed the commentary about Prof. Richard Hernstein's disrupted lecture at the University of Iowa. That incident has a close parallel in the history of science: Galileo's attempt to get the Copernican theory about the orbits of the planets adopted. In that case, Galileo was much closer to the truth than the Ptolemic theory the Catholic Church followed in supressinf Galileo. Hernstein is probably wrong. However, the issue will not be decided by SDSers with various fine arts and liberal arts major, nor by the opinions of various biologists or educators, but by professors and their graduate students, performing carefully-controlled experiments. Hernstein should have been allowed to speak, and if the SDSers wanted to speak, they should have questioned him about any bias his opinios may have introduced into his research, the controls he imposed on his experiments, the validity of his statistical methods, etc. I realize that the U of I is not the scientifically-oriented institution that Iowa State University is, but I would expect students there to realize that issues of fact are not decided by the majority opinion, but by scientific study. It must be the ability of a theory to explain and predict facts, in the simplest manner possible, and not its compatibility with our "common sense" or ethics that forms the basis of acceptance of a theory; that was the basis of quantum mechanics, relativity and evolution. The same tests must be given to the theories of the propagation of intelligence. - Michael Clover (chemistry, physics and mathematics), Iowa State University, 1472 Helser, Ames, Ia. 50010. [PHOTO] GALILEO GALILEI 'Ashamed' To the Editor: There are no scars which I wear more proudly than those earned in battles for free speach. But I must express my profound shame at the events at the University of Iowa which prevented Prof. Richard Herrnstein speaking. I am ashamed that any of my brethren of the academic family, students, faculty or administrators, should have committed so foul a crime against that principle fundamental to our society in general and to the academic enterprise in particular: freedom of expression of all ideas. - Edward J. Thorne, head, Department os Speech, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Ia. 50613.