Academic Freedom and the Professional Responsibilities of Applied Ethicists: A comment on Minerva

Academic freedom is an important good, but it comes with several responsibilities. In this commentary we seek to do two things. First, we argue against F rancesca M inerva's view of academic freedom as presented in her article ‘New threats to academic freedom’ on a number of grounds. We reject the nature of the absolutist moral claim to free speech for academics implicit in the article; we reject the elitist role for academics as truth‐seekers explicit in her view; and we reject a possible more moderate re‐construction of her view based on the harm/offence distinction. Second, we identify some of the responsibilities of applied ethicists, and illustrate how they recommend against allowing for anonymous publication of research. Such a proposal points to the wider perils of a public discourse which eschews the calm and careful discussion of ideas.