MIT Free Speech Alliance Announces Formation of Board of Advisors

June 11, 2026

The MIT Free Speech Alliance (MFSA) is pleased to announce the formation of its Board of Advisors, a distinguished group of scholars, attorneys, and public intellectuals who share MFSA’s commitment to free expression, viewpoint diversity, and academic freedom at MIT and beyond.

MFSA has added a Board of Advisors to help it to continue its growth and influence within and beyond MIT. Our advisors’ credibility, advice, and experience will serve MFSA well as we build on our mandate to promote and protect free speech at MIT and improve free inquiry in STEM.

The Board of Advisors brings together seven nationally recognized voices who have each demonstrated, through their own careers and public advocacy, a willingness to stand up for open inquiry and robust debate even when it is unpopular to do so.

The inaugural members of the MFSA Board of Advisors are:

Dorian Abbot, Associate Professor of Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago. Abbot is himself a symbol of the free-speech cause at MIT: The cancellation of his 2021 Carlson Lecture was the founding catalyst for MFSA.
John Cochrane, Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and MIT physics alumnus (’79). A former President of the American Finance Association and longtime University of Chicago professor, Cochrane is a tireless advocate for free-market principles and open academic debate.
Jeffrey S. Flier, Endocrinologist and former Dean of Harvard Medical School. Flier is a co-founder and co-president of the Council on Academic Freedom at Harvard and a board member of Heterodox Academy.
Steven Pinker, Johnstone Family Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, cognitive psychologist, linguist, and best-selling author. A former MIT faculty member, Pinker is one of the world's most prominent defenders of rationality, free inquiry, and free expression.
Harvey Silverglate, Civil liberties and criminal defense attorney and co-founder of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE). The author of Three Felonies a Day and co-author of The Shadow University, Silverglate has spent his career fighting prosecutorial abuse and campus censorship.
Nadine Strossen, Constitutional law scholar and former President of the American Civil Liberties Union. Strossen is the author of Hate: Why We Should Resist It with Free Speech, Not Censorship and co-author, with Greg Lukianoff, of The War on Words: 10 Arguments Against Free Speech – and Why They Fail. She is currently a senior fellow at FIRE.
John Tomasi, Inaugural President of Heterodox Academy and former Romeo Elton 1843 Professor of Natural Theology at Brown University. Tomasi founded Brown's Political Theory Project to foster open ideological debate among students and faculty.

“We are enormously honored that these seven remarkable individuals have agreed to lend their names and their counsel to MFSA,” said MFSA President Wayne Stargardt ’74. “Each of them has shown, repeatedly and at personal cost, that they believe in free speech not just in principle but in practice. We could not ask for better allies in our effort to restore free expression and academic freedom at MIT.”

Contact: Peter Bonilla, Executive Director, peter@mitfreespeech.org.

The MIT Free Speech Alliance (MFSA) has over 1,200 members. Founded by MIT alumni in 2021 following the cancellation of Dorian Abbot’s Carlson Lecture, MFSA is a member of the Alumni Free Speech Alliance, together with sister organizations at Cornell, Harvard, and the University of Virginia, among other institutions. MFSA is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization and is independent of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

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