Anna Krylov: The Politicization of Science in Academia — Manifold #25

 

Anna I. Krylov (Russian: Анна Игоревна Крылова) is Professor of Chemistry at the University of Southern California (USC), working in the field of theoretical and computational quantum chemistry. Krylov is an outspoken advocate of freedom of speech and academic freedom. She is a founding member of the Academic Freedom Alliance and a member of its academic leadership committee. 

Her paper, The Peril of Politicizing Science, launched a national conversation among scientists and the general public on the growing influence of political ideology in STEM. It has received over 80,000 views and, according to Altmetric, was the all-time highest-ranked article in the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters. 

Steve and Anna discuss: 

0:00 Anna Krylov’s background, upbringing in USSR 

7:03 Ideological control and censorship for the greater good? 

14:59 How ideology underpins DEI work in academic institutions 

30:40 Captured institutions 

37:05 How much is UC Berkeley spending on DEI, and where the money is going 

41:46 Krylov thinks it can get worse 

52:09 An idea for defeating preference falsification at universities 

Transcript

Resources: 

Professor Krylov academic page: 

https://dornsife.usc.edu/chemistry/krylov/ 

Wiki page: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Krylov 

The Peril of Politicizing Science, Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters 2021 https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.jpclett.1c01475