The Role of Science in Society: The Researcher as Public Intellectual

Abstract What is the role of researchers in society? Can research be political? A heated debate in Denmark about activist research and pseudoscience raised many philosophical issues about the role of the scientist in society. In this article, we distinguish between different strands of this debate about activist research and the limits of academic freedom from the perspective of ethics and the philosophy of science. We begin by presenting some topics from the debate. Then we discuss perspectives from the ethics of science in relation to science and society, cancel culture, pseudoscience, demarcation, and academic freedom. Moreover, we analyze the ethical obligation of researchers to be public intellectuals as essential for ensuring the ethics and responsibility of science in democratic societies. Accordingly, we present the idea of the public intellectual proposed by Hannah Arendt as a justification for the protection of academic freedom and for the ethical responsibility of science in society.