Daniel Ellsberg, the federal employee who made the Pentagon Papers public in 1971, gave an excellent, if verbose, lecture to the packed Joyce Hergenhan Auditorium the week before Spring Break. During that lecture, the only student question stirred severe dismay in at least one audience member about the bleak outlook for intellectual engagement in our undergraduate culture.

The structure of her argument, if her remarks deserve the name, went roughly as follows: Ellsberg claimed to be pro-American in his actions and criticism of outrageous injustices perpetrated by the U.S. military-industrial sector during the Vietnam War. He seemed anti-American, however, in failing to give equal time to the atrocities exercised by the evil people who justify patriotic, righteous American action abroad. What about the beheadings of Daniel Pearl or Nick Berg (who, incidentally, attended this writer’s high school), she asked, or the totalitarian regimes that American influence exists to eradicate? Aren’t those evil governments bad, too? Shouldn’t we be balanced and fair when discussing overreaches of state power?

Ellsberg, with prodigious hearing aids, either truly didn’t catch what the student said or was as baffled as most of the audience at her outburst. As she interrupted and sputtered to press her point, he responded diplomatically: The atrocities she mentioned are indeed horrible, but the U.S. government has also done horrible things and we, as Americans, have a morally relevant involvement in those crimes.

The moral to take from Ellsberg’s lecture is that we all have some responsibility for the actions of our government abroad and ought to take action to expose dishonest, illegal, immoral actions when we have the opportunity to do so. Jail time might be a result of that action — Bradley Manning is in the middle of such legal action now. Ellsberg himself, at the age of 79, was arrested this past weekend at the Quantico marine base while protesting the conditions under which Manning is being held. Students at this university, at an age much more amenable to jail time, should be able to understand the clear reasoning behind Ellsberg’s commitment, even if they disagree.

The argument here is not that Ellsberg’s views are the outcome of intellectual honesty and engagement — there are plenty of smart people who might call Ellsberg a traitor or have conservative views. The argument here is that intellectually engaged members of this community need good reasons to object to a liberal or even radical stance; and it’s scary that students on this campus seem incapable of doing so.

Balance is a nice thing in politics or debate of actually contested issues. A public lecture, however, is not a debate, and nothing about a balanced debate allows for incoherent, ideological falsities or indecorous outbursts. Balance or open conversation is not a value in itself — it is a means to more effectively discover truth in the absence of undue bias.

Public lectures often provide reason for concern — last fall, many students chatted and checked Facebook throughout Steven Pinker’s potty-mouthed tirade against the humanities. Q-and-A sessions often become platforms for audience members (not only undergraduates) to make disrespectful, irrelevant or contrary orations rather than ask serious questions.

Public lectures provide us with a fantastic opportunity to engage truly brilliant public intellectuals and either take inspiration for or find good reasons to doubt our beliefs. Contentiousness comes along with intellectual engagement, but it requires respect, informed opinions and cogency. An intellectually curious student is well advised to attend lectures on campus, pay attention and ask real, appropriate questions. But when challenging a speaker, which is great, do it in a way that can make our university proud of the intellectual climate of this campus. Never, ever begin with, ‘Not to mean any disrespect, sir…’

Scott Collison is a senior philosophy and physics major. His column appears every Wednesday, and he can be reached at smcollis@syr.edu.