What were they thinking?

What were they thinking - or were they not thinking at all?

Quoted from The Times,

Professor Nutt was sacked after criticisms he had made of the Government’s drugs policy were published in a paper by the Centre for Crime and Justice at King’s College London. The comments were made in a lecture he delivered in July, in which he said that Ecstasy and LSD were less harmful than alcohol and cigarettes. He also criticised the decision to upgrade cannabis to class B.

So what we have here is a scientist giving a lecture where he gives an honest opinion to a group of people.

This is usually called teaching.

If those who listen agree with your points and find them reasonable, with good enough evidence to reference them in a work of their own this is usually considered a WIN condition by scientists.

They fired a scientist for being a scientist.

Muppets.