Last updated: July 2026
This Code of Ethics is not a decorative declaration.
It establishes the principles under which AffonsoHenriquesEssays.com intends to publish, research, analyse, and conduct professional work.
I. INTELLECTUAL HONESTY
I will not knowingly present a false statement as fact.
I will not knowingly suppress material evidence merely because it damages a conclusion I prefer.
I will distinguish, as clearly as the subject permits, between what I know, what I infer, what I hypothesise, and what I believe.
II. NO MANUFACTURED CERTAINTY
I will not manufacture certainty to appear authoritative.
Where evidence is incomplete, I will say so.
Where several scenarios remain plausible, I will not convert my preferred scenario into an inevitable future.
III. THE RIGHT TO CHALLENGE CONSENSUS
Consensus is evidence of agreement. It is not, by itself, proof of truth.
Academic, political, institutional, corporate, and cultural consensus may be examined critically.
No institution, ideology, intellectual tradition, or exercise of power is exempt from analysis merely because criticism is socially costly.
IV. THE DUTY TO CHALLENGE MYSELF
The standards applied to other people’s arguments must also be applied to my own.
If evidence contradicts my thesis, the contradiction must be examined.
If my reasoning fails, rhetorical strength must not be used to hide the failure.
V. AUTHORSHIP AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
The intellectual positions published under my name remain my responsibility.
Artificial intelligence may assist me in research, organisation, language, editing, counterargument, and analytical development.
I will not knowingly attribute to myself another human author’s original work.
I will not use AI as a mechanism for fabricating evidence, quotations, academic credentials, sources, or experiences.
Responsibility cannot be outsourced to an algorithm.
VI. ACADEMIC INTEGRITY
I will represent my academic education, publications, affiliations, and professional experience accurately.
I will respect legitimate publication rights and licensing restrictions.
I will not knowingly republish complete academic works where I lack the right to do so.
I will cite the intellectual work of others when their ideas or findings materially support my argument.
VII. INDEPENDENCE
I will not sell an intellectual conclusion.
A consultancy client may purchase my time, analysis, and professional work. A client does not purchase my beliefs.
A political actor, company, institution, or ideological group does not acquire editorial control through access, pressure, payment, prestige, or intimidation.
VIII. PRIVACY AND DATA RESTRAINT
I reject unnecessary surveillance of readers.
AffonsoHenriquesEssays.com will not intentionally build behavioural profiles merely because technology makes profiling possible.
It will not intentionally sell or rent reader data.
It will not intentionally deploy advertising or marketing cookies to follow readers across the internet.
Data collection should be limited by necessity, not expanded by curiosity.
IX. CORRECTION
When I make a material factual error, I should correct it.
I am not ethically required to abandon a controversial interpretation merely because it is controversial.
Correction concerns error.
Censorship concerns permitted thought.
The two should not be confused.
X. HUMAN DIGNITY AND INTELLECTUAL SEVERITY
I reserve the right to write severe criticism.
I reserve the right to question institutions, systems of power, historical narratives, cultural patterns, and widely admired ideas.
I do not accept that intellectual seriousness requires polite agreement.
But criticism should remain directed toward arguments, actions, structures, institutions, and demonstrable patterns.
The deliberate dehumanisation of people is incompatible with this project.
XI. NO LOYALTY TO COMFORT
The purpose of this website is not to protect the reader from uncomfortable questions.
Nor is it to manufacture provocation for attention.
The ethical obligation is more demanding: to follow an argument where evidence and reasoning lead, including when the conclusion is inconvenient to the author himself.
XII. RESPONSIBILITY
Everything finally published under my name is my responsibility.
Not WordPress.
Not an academic association.
Not a client.
Not an artificial intelligence system.