Letters | Academic theories deserve rigorous scrutiny, not public shaming
Readers discuss the controversy over a Malaysian academic’s hypothesis about Roman shipbuilding, the Thailand-Cambodia border dispute, and cutting back Hong Kong children’s screen time
Dr Solehah’s theory – that Romans may have learned shipbuilding techniques from Malay seafarers – deserved rigorous academic scrutiny. Historical claims require evidence, methodology demands critique. This is how knowledge advances. Instead, what emerged was character assassination masquerading as intellectual discourse.
The pattern is devastatingly predictable. As Khazanah Research Institute explored in the article, “Are Moral Convictions Creating a Polarised Society?”, those unable to engage intellectually transform this powerlessness into claimed moral superiority – what Nietzsche called “ressentiment”. The academic becomes not merely wrong but dangerous. This transformation from intellectual opponent to moral threat absolves critics from the burden of actual engagement.
In his book Anti-Intellectualism in American Life, historian Richard Hofstadter identified this as democratic society’s persistent suspicion of those who examine rather than affirm popular sentiment. He distinguished between intelligence (which seizes the practical) and intellect (which questions and complicates). Societies celebrate the former while regarding the latter with deep discomfort.
The institutional response has been telling. Dr Solehah’s university (International Islamic University Malaysia) has established an internal inquiry panel to investigate her claims, framing this as a matter of “academic integrity”. When universities retreat from defending inquiry, when institutions prioritise reputation over intellectual freedom, when government officials suggest professors stick to their areas of expertise – we witness the suffocation of scholarship.