Is There A WAR On Science? Lawrence Krauss

Listen to this episode from Into the Impossible With Brian Keating on Spotify. Please join my mailing list here 👉 https://briankeating.com/list to win a meteorite 💥 In a sweeping conversation sparked by his new book The War on Science, Lawrence Krauss charts how well-intentioned campus DEI bureaucracies, politicized funding mandates, and “language-as-violence” taboos are eroding the core scientific virtues of open inquiry and empirical scepticism, while drawing historical parallels from Lysenkoism to today’s hiring rubrics and challenging listeners to defend freedom of thought with the same passion they reserve for social justice. He then pivots from diagnosis to remedy, outlining a five-point rescue plan—slashing ideological litmus tests, restoring merit-based evaluation, insulating grant agencies from mission creep, teaching students to steel-man opposing views, and benchmarking success against China’s unencumbered research surge—arguing that only by re-centering evidence over ideology can science remain humanity’s most reliable truth-seeking enterprise. — Key Takeaways:  00:00 Intro  01:04 The most dangerous idea threatening science today 02:35 The role of universities and academic freedom  10:26 Tenure and indirect costs in academia  14:58 Sanctions against free speech  17:39 The problem with tuition  18:42 Decolonializing STEM  23:57 What Trump is doing to address these issues  28:03 Free market education? 36:46 Judging a book by its cover 38:44 The distortion of science during COVID  44:12 Inequality in science  48:43 If Lawrence were president of the US  52:33 Audience questions  55:28 Outro — Additional resources:  📚 The War On Science by Lawrence Krauss: https://a.co/d/6ntEbll  — ➡️ Follow me on your fav platforms: ✖️ Twitter:⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://twitter.com/DrBrianKeating⁠⁠  🔔 YouTube:⁠⁠ https://www.youtube.com/DrBrianKeating?sub_confirmation=1⁠⁠  📝 Join my mailing list:⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://briankeating.com/list⁠⁠  ✍️ Check out my blog:⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://briankeating.com/cosmic-musings/⁠⁠  🎙️ Follow my podcast:⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://briankeating.com/podcast⁠⁠  — Into the Impossible with Brian Keating is a podcast dedicated to all those who want to explore the universe within and beyond the known. Make sure to follow/subscribe so you never miss an episode! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices