Disturbing. I want to know more about the decision process at U. Mass, especially if this type of broad ban is likely to be considered by other universities.

Aside: CS and math don't appear to be on the list of blacklisted departments. Maybe they will see a surge in Iranian enrollments?

Well, it makes sense - just look at history - if you do not control sensitive information, bad things can happen. For example, the Nuclear Bomb technology was leaked from the US to Russia, from Russia to China, from China to North Korea, and from North Korea to Iran. This demonstrates that Americans are not to be trusted with sensitive information, and should be blocked from doing phd in all these dangerous dangerous fields.

+Talia Ringer it's back up again

I think we need to distinguish between Americans of Iranian descent, who have chosen to cast their lot with the United States, and Iranians who did not leave Iran when the religious fanatics took over, and who may well be sympathetic to Iran's desires to build a nuclear weapon and to Iran's support for terrorists throughout the world.  While I'm sure there are some students living in Iran, who would like nothing better than to leave that country for as long as it is run by Islamic fundamentalists, can we afford to take that risk of educating them and then having them turn that education against us?  Especially, can we afford the risk given all the bright students from other countries that share US values who would love to be accepted to a US school?

+Jeffrey Ullman because forcing those people to be isolated, poor, oppressed, and uneducated is so much better a strategy to prevent them from becoming fanatics

+David Eppstein That a common theory, but I don't think there are any examples where your strategy has worked.  For example, we have been educating students from China for years, and they use the knowledge they've gained to copycat our tech companies (e.g., Baidu, Tencent, Alibaba) and to make the great firewall harder to penetrate.  Do you have any examples where befriending certain people from countries antagonistic to US values has actually worked?

+Talia Ringer How is admitting students from the country of Iran, a country that broke off relations with the US, has threatened Israel with a nuclear holocaust, and holds values diametrically opposed to those of modern democracies NOT a political act?

The main reason not to block Iranian students from accessing the US system is that it is way too late (as my earlier comment eluded to). Indeed, the science of building a nuclear bomb is not considered to be very difficult - it is the enrichment is the challenge (see  here: http://www.livescience.com/5752-hard-nuclear-weapons.html). At this point in time, Iran has the technology, and given sufficient time, the ability to build a nuclear bomb.  At this point in time, probably the only thing that can prevent Iran from building a nuclear bomb is to convince them that they do not want to build it. Sanctions together with the falling price of oil seems quite promising venue to achieve that.

 "Do you have any examples where befriending certain people from countries antagonistic to US values has actually worked?"

+Jeffrey Ullman Yes! The former Chinese students who currently work as engineers, professors, doctors, business owners, ... etc. in the US and who have undeniably contributed a lot to the US economy. I guess that segment of immigrant students was on your blind spot.

"...has threatened Israel ..."

+Jeffrey Ullman I thought it's an issue between the US and Iran. Why on earth you're mentioning Israel? 
If you're willing to deny Iranian student application because Iran has threatened Israel, perhaps you should at least equally boycott Israeli students for Israel's daily ethnic cleansing of Palestinians.

+Jean Perdue Because it indicates how dangerous it would be for Iran to get a bomb.  No other state, except N. Korea, actually threatens to use nuclear weapons.  Do we want another N. Korea to have to deal with?

+Jean Perdue And that's a really vile canard.   There is no ethnic cleansing being done by Israel, and there never was.  Where do you get your ideas from.  Israel was happy to make peace with the Arabs any time from 1948 onward, and has only harmed them in response to attempts by the Arabs to -- dare I say -- ethnic cleanse the area of Jews.  Read the Hamas charter if you doubt that.

"Because it indicates how dangerous it would be for Iran to get a bomb.  No other state, except N. Korea, actually threatens to use nuclear weapons.  Do we want another N. Korea to have to deal with?"

+Jeffrey Ullman should then say France deny American students because the US is the only country that used nuclear weapons - far worse than threatening to use a weapon which seems to exist only in delusional minds.

" Israel was happy to make peace with the Arabs any time from 1948 onward"

+Jeffrey Ullman Why wouldn't you be happy after stealing people land :-) The ethnic cleansing is there and the proofs are abundant - perhaps the weakest among them is the continuous confiscation of Palestinian land, destruction of their homes and farms ... etc. Anyway, I don't want to go farther on this topic as it's irrelevant to David's initial post and as nul n'est plus sourd que celui qui ne veut pas entendre 

Any discussion of Israel is an oversimplification because the logic used falls under Godel incompleteness theorem. As such, one should try and avoid such discussions...

"Way oversimplifying the whole issue, which shows a lack of understanding of the current situation in the area and the history behind it."

+Talia Ringer Let's go beyond this topic since it seems to be sensitive. The point that I want to make is that if we are willing to deny Iranian students for the claims of their government, we should also do something similar to Israeli students for the benign well-deserved occupation of the Palestinians, and we should equally deny Saudi students for the horrors caused by their government. 

"Any discussion of Israel is an oversimplification because the logic used falls under Godel incompleteness theorem. As such, one should try and avoid such discussions..."

+Sariel Har-Peled
And I guess your statement is the password to the incompleteness proof as it seems to create a paradox ...