I've read the posts herein and also read the media's coverage of Nobel Prize-winning DNA pioneer Dr. Watson. I can't answer the stated question of this thread title since I don't know the good doctor personally and almost ever media writeup of James Watson's comments quotes a Times interview response that Dr. Watson denies. He said that the way the words were presented did not reflect properly his position. Is it worthwhile to trash the doctor's extensive record of scientific accomplishment on the alter of political correct condemnation based on a single Times interview that may have taken the Nobel Prize-winning researcher out of context?
Lest any may have been duped by our resident racist, The Times to which he refers to disingenuously is not The New York Times, but rather the Rupert Murdoch owned Sunday Times of London. Watson stepped down today from his position at Cold Springs Harbor.
Does his opinion on that matter? Isn't entirely the woman's choice to decide what is and is not human?
WTF are you talking about? I see plenty of people as less intelligent as me. Not whole groups or races, just individuals. And I know plenty of people that make me feel like a bag of hammers. But I don't view them and they don't view me as less human. And who gives a f**k what women think?* *it's kitty time, Alice
Not sure, but I think he just slipped in some drivel taking a swipe at women's reproductive rights. Nothing to see there...
I'm sure you as well as I are in full support of a woman's right to declare stupid pre-born babies not human.
This is not strictly true. There appears to be a third variable besides DNA and environment called epigenetics (go ahead, wiki it). This process essentially controls the phenotypic expression of genes by turning them on or off--in response to environment. Science has, essentially proved nurturists "right" (whatever that means)--environment not only shapes the phenotypic expression of genetic potential, it actually can have a direct effect on the genes themselves. Identical twins reared apart then do begin to diverge in significant ways. Ironic then that Watson neglects to follow the direction of his own field.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2000/11/13/MN111208.DTL He's been an idiot for a while.
That's not evidence. That's not even relevant. You are implicitly assuming taht every single person in the world has equal opportunity, resources, and (most importantly) motivation to compete at sprinting. In the 1950s, the best sprinters were white. Did blacks suddenly evolve? As a comparison, look at the heavyweight boxing champions over the last 100 years. Jewish, Irish, Italian, Black, Latino--did each group "evolve" over the course of a generation?
I think that's naive. 100+ years ago, Cesare Lombroso knew that Sicilians were predisposed to be criminals because all the criminals he studied were Sicilian. While we don't make the same mistakes today, you have made a big one by assuming that the category of race either 1) exists at all or 2) if it does exist, looks anything like what we've conceptualized it as. Laws that continue to be on the books in places in the South classify anyone with a drop of "black" blood to be black. My wife had to basically lie when we got married because she is triracial--Virginia had no classificatory ability to cope with that. The decision of scientists to reify the concept has no grounding in "scientific fact" as you call it, but simply society's demands for racist knowledge. Race is essentially a social construction. The less stock you put in it the better and more accurate your conclusions will be.
not something i know anything about, but clearly if it relates to environmental factors turning genes on and off then it is an environmental effect, rather than being a third distinct driver. albeit it's a different sort of environmental effect from what TV shows you have, or how tall you grow if you have a bad diet, it's still the effect of environment. i presume you're talking about, say as an example, the growth of a winter coat of an animal in response to cold weather / fewer hours of sun? in any case i don't see what it has to do with what i was talking about. i wasn't talking about identical twins reared apart as i already said. i was talking about the difference between identical twins raised in the same family and fraternal twins raised in the same family. ok, they're not going to have an identical environment just because they are bought up in the same family, but it's the closest you can get to a useful experiment without putting humans in strictly controlled isolated environments for years, which is not going to happen. unless the chinese are doing it.
The PC gestapo has its way. Watson retires... http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071025/ap_on_sc/controversial_scientist_2
So, your contention is that a rich and famous scientist should be free to abandon the very principles that lead to such wealth and celebrity? In which case, shouldn't your statement read "the SC (Scientifically Correct) gestapo"?
Yes, the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory should have just let him continue parading his tinfoil hat around for the world to see, discrediting their own reputation as much as their (now former) chancellor's.
It it my position that science, and by extension, scientists, should be as free as possible to think, postulate, and discover. Inevitably, if this happens, bumbling and pure stupidity will occur. The punishment for this bumbling should be the "brick wall" of reality. Science MUST be as free as possible. Will errors occur? Of Course! Will offense be taken by the conjecture of the scientist. Surely! But the scientist must be able to continue in their work regardless of hurt feelings or their own idiocy. (As long, of course, as noone is physically hurt) Tuskegee? Horrible. Nazi experiments? Horrible. Watson's idiotic statements? Shameful. There's a lot of difference...
no. but the sport was opened up to them and now they dominate it. it's not just partial domination either - it's complete domination in the 100m. are you suggesting that white sprinters don't have the same opportunity, resources and motivation to compete? in the same way that years ago NFL players were mostly white and now they're mostly black. the white players are generally fatties in offensive line or quarterbacks. i don't know a huge amount about NFL but i'm assuming that there isn't some kind of odd motivational thing which drives white people to only want to play QB or eat pies and play offensive line... i don't think the fact that heavyweight boxing hasn't been dominated by one 'racial group' over the last 100 years does anything to demonstrate that black people do not have more natural talent at sprinting than white people. i think it's pretty much a no brainer myself.