This teacher really put them to the test.
Professor Khair ul Bashar of Comsats University in Islamabad, Pakistan, was fired and blacklisted after posing a question about incest to his electrical engineering students in an exam.
“The content of the quiz is highly objectionable and totally against the curriculum laws of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan and caused unrest amongst the families of the students,” a letter from a university official read.
The inquiry said the quiz with the offending question was given on Dec. 4 and Dec. 5 to Bachelor of Electrical Engineering students and Bashar was “terminated” on Jan. 5.
“Julie and Mark are brother and sister,” reads the question. “They are traveling together in France on summer vacation from college.”
“One night they are staying alone in a cabin near the beach. They decided that it would be interesting and fun if they tried making love,” continued the question. “At the very least, it would be a new experience for each of them.”
The prompt goes on to say that Julie was on birth control and Mark used a condom and that they both enjoyed being intimate together although they vowed never to do it again.
“What do you think about that? Was it OK for them to make love?” posed the teacher. “Give reasons for your answers and include some relevant examples from your own knowledge and personal opinion.”
According to the professor, the answer had to be 300 words and include “four paragraphs which include an introduction, body and conclusion.”
The controversial question was first posed in 2000 by University of Virginia professor Jonathan Haidt during a study on whether moral judgments were based on “reason, or on intuition and emotion.”
The question prompted uproar from both students as well as academics outside Comsats University.
“COMSATS: Whatever is the outcome of this inquiry, the individual who tried to peddle this idea of incest with in students must be apprehended & made an example for the academic fraternity,” one outraged Twitter user wrote. “Not only that particular individual but all those who processed this quiz & approved it.”