# Is Nobel Prize winner James Watson co-discoveror of the DNA helix a "disgraced" scientist? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 3, 2014, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194 "2014-12-03T03:21:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/1 "2014-12-03T03:21:41Z")
I was puzzled by this headline, [Disgraced scientist James Watson puts DNA Nobel Prize up for auction, will donate part of the proceeds](http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/disgraced-scientist-james-watson-auctions-dna-nobel-prize-article-1.2029838) but in reading he article saw that they were referencing his comments ([wiki link)](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Watson) in 2007 about the intelligence of black people being innately lower than that of other groups. Is he considered “disgraced” in the scientific community at this point for having expressed these opinions? In looking at the wiki he does apparently not have a working “know when to shut up” button. > [@](#): > > Provocative comments[edit] > James Watson (February 2003) > > Watson has often expressed provocative concepts and disparaging opinions of others within the realm of genetic research. > He has been quoted in The Sunday Telegraph, 1997, as stating: “If you could find the gene which determines sexuality and a woman decides she doesn’t want a homosexual child, well, let her.”[79] The biologist Richard Dawkins wrote a letter to The Independent claiming that Watson’s position was misrepresented by The Sunday Telegraph article, and that Watson would equally consider the possibility of having a heterosexual child to be just as valid as any other reason for abortion, to emphasise that Watson is in favor of allowing choice.[80] > > On the issue of obesity, Watson has also been quoted as saying, 2000: “Whenever you interview fat people, you feel bad, because you know you’re not going to hire them.”[81] > > While speaking at a conference in 2000, Watson had suggested a link between skin color and sex drive, hypothesizing that dark-skinned people have stronger libidos.[81][82] His lecture argued that extracts of melanin – which gives skin its color – had been found to boost subjects’ sex drive. “That’s why you have Latin lovers,” he said, according to people who attended the lecture. “You’ve never heard of an English lover. Only an English Patient.”[83] > > Watson has repeatedly supported genetic screening and genetic engineering in public lectures and interviews, arguing that stupidity is a disease and the “really stupid” bottom 10% of people should be cured.[84] He has also suggested that beauty could be genetically engineered, saying in 2003, “People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would be great.”[84][85] > > Watson has had quite a few disagreements with Craig Venter regarding his use of EST fragments while Venter worked at NIH. Venter went on to found Celera genomics and continued his feud with Watson. Watson was even quoted as calling Venter “Hitler”.[86] > > On October 25, 2007, Watson was compelled to retire as chancellor of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory on New York’s Long Island and from its board of directors, after he had been quoted in The Times the previous week as saying “[I am] inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa [because] all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours—whereas all the testing says not really.” He went on to say that despite the desire that all human beings should be equal, “people who have to deal with black employees find this not true.”[50] > > In March 2013 Watson, who is partly Irish himself, made offhanded remarks about Irish people, stating that “[the] historic curse of the Irish, which is not alcohol, it’s not stupidity. But it’s ignorance.” [87] ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/2 "2014-12-03T05:57:27Z")
Yes, he is effectively now considered just the drunken old uncle who pisses himself and mutters racist remarks at the Science family Christmas party. May have done great work in a particular niche of the field (even if the _primary_ research was actually done by a [Nobel-less woman](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosalind_Franklin)), but not relevant anymore and with some truly repellant ideas. ---
**Author:** ![Busy\_Scissors](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/d78d45/32.png) [@Busy\_Scissors](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Busy_Scissors)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/3 "2014-12-03T13:01:35Z")
At a fundamental level I doubt he is - Making the most important scientific breakthrough in the twentieth century + talking shite as an auld man does not equal disgrace in the scientific community. It’s prob fair to say he is a disgraced scientist in public life, which for Watson would be quite meaningful as a public scientist. He was probably always too much of a gobshite to be a serious political operator, but he did operate on that level of getting research institutes built, controlling major research initiatives etc. He’d also be the type to speak at events that are bigger than just the scientific community in attendance. Those avenues are prob closed to him now (although you could argue they would be anyway because he’s very old). Also highly doubt that he is not relevant - he may not be contributing relevant ideas but many of the best and most influential life scientists alive will have passed through his labs over the years. That gives him tremendous standing and influence - scientific networks are deeply embedded and often not visible to outsiders. Are these people now giving him the cold shoulder? They might be - I think you would need to be a biologist yourself who is seeing things at first hand to really answer this question, but I doubt it. ---
**Author:** ![BOOM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c4cdca/32.png) [@BOOM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BOOM)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/4 "2014-12-03T13:37:13Z")
Certainly a whole slew of unpopular remarks. RE Africans, what “testing” is he relying on? ---
**Author:** ![mozchron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c2a13f/32.png) [@mozchron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mozchron)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/5 "2014-12-03T16:25:40Z")
Watson isn’t a disgraced scientist; he’s a disgraced human being. I’ve met him, he’s a jerk. > [@MrDibble](#): > > …(even if the _primary_ research was actually done by a [Nobel-less woman](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosalind_Franklin) This is a myth, and one that I really wish would stop being repeated, particularly here on the dope. Yes, the key insight to Watson and Crick came about Wilkins improperly showing them Franklin’s “photo 51”. But it was already known that DNA was likely helical and a ton of work had already been done by lots of people - the image gave them critical insights into the details but didn’t change fundamentals. A month or so after this incident, Franklin was leaving Kings College and all her work was given to Wilkins anyway, so at best the impropriety sped things up by a couple of months. Franklin was never eligible for the Nobel because she died years before it was awarded (of cancer in her late 30’s). Yes, Franklin’s role in the discovery was tragically minimized, in part to sexist attitudes of the day. History has in part restored her place. But to deify her and state that she was cheated out of the Nobel is just nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/6 "2014-12-03T16:32:43Z")
[Sounds familiar](http://hinterlandgazette.com/2009/05/inventor-william-shockleys-wishes-to.html). ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/7 "2014-12-03T17:31:56Z")
Watson is just one of a disturbingly long line of scientists honored for distinguished work who later succumbed to [the Nobel disease](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Nobel_disease). I know it’s only a fraction of Nobel winners overall, but jeez. It’s a good reminder to us that a high level of accomplishment in one field does **not** signify expertise outside of that field (or even a continued level of sanity). ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/8 "2014-12-03T17:42:11Z")
Asshole never gave Rosalind Franklin the kudos and credit that she deserved. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/9 "2014-12-03T18:14:01Z")
> [@mozchron](#): > > This is a myth So much a myth even Crick fell for it? To quote him “However, the data which really helped us to obtain the structure was mainly obtained by Rosalind Franklin” An opinion confirmed by Watson later. ---
**Author:** ![dracoi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/90db22/32.png) [@dracoi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dracoi)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/10 "2014-12-03T18:40:31Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Watson is just one of a disturbingly long line of scientists honored for distinguished work who later succumbed to [the Nobel disease](http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Nobel_disease). > > I know it’s only a fraction of Nobel winners overall, but jeez. > > It’s a good reminder to us that a high level of accomplishment in one field does **not** signify expertise outside of that field (or even a continued level of sanity). I see it as a reminder that the same kind of creative thinking and tenacity that leads people to great discoveries can also lead them down the worst rabbit trails. Of course, Watson’s issue seems to be foot-in-mouth disease as much as the underlying racism. Half of what he’s saying isn’t even all that bad if it was phrased better. For example, every parent wants their kids to have genes that will make them smart, attractive, happy, etc. But when you say it in a way that’s both pro-abortion and homophobic… well, who haven’t you alienated with that comment? If melanin does boost sex drive, then his conclusion follows, but arguing the science by falling back on stupid racial cliches is not helping. (And I’m not saying he isn’t clearly a card-carrying racist. I’m just saying that some of these ideas could have been phrased in a way that we’d agree with.) ---
**Author:** ![Parenchyma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Parenchyma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Parenchyma)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/11 "2014-12-03T19:01:44Z")
[Here’s](http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/01/dna-james-watson-scientist-selling-nobel-prize-medal) a biologist who gives Watson and Galton their props as scientists, but says there’s no reason to pretend they aren’t horrible racists and to call them on it. ---
**Author:** ![BOOM](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c4cdca/32.png) [@BOOM](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BOOM)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/12 "2014-12-03T20:25:49Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > May have done great work in a particular niche of the field (even if the _primary_ research was actually done by a [Nobel-less woman](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosalind_Franklin)), but not relevant anymore and with some truly repellant ideas. Sorry, but this is just plain wrong; she was never - ever - eligible for the Nobel: > [@](#): > > Rosalind Franklin had died in 1958 and was therefore ineligible for nomination ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2014, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/13 "2014-12-03T21:00:28Z")
> [@BOOM](#): > > Sorry, but this is just plain wrong; she was never - ever - eligible for the Nobel: No, she was ineligible _for the 1962 Nobel_ that Watson, Crick and Wilkins got. She was not “never - ever - eligible” for a Nobel at all. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/14 "2014-12-04T22:02:49Z")
Besides, most of those I see talking about Franklin in this way are more concerned about the lack of _credit_, both by Watson and Crick and the public at large. ---
**Author:** ![Stringbean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Stringbean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stringbean)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2014, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/15 "2014-12-04T22:46:19Z")
Watson and Crick were pretty weird guys. If I’m not mistaken, Crick believed DNA was alien in origin because of its “irreducible complexity,” to borrow a term familiar to evolutionists. That being said, has Watson strayed beyond his “realm of expertise?” Meaning, the quotes I have seen of him do seem to refer to genetic traits, though the conclusions are repulsive to our politically-correct tendencies. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2014, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/16 "2014-12-05T00:40:09Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > So much a myth even Crick fell for it? To quote him “However, the data which really helped us to obtain the structure was mainly obtained by Rosalind Franklin” An opinion confirmed by Watson later. I think you are almost certainly quoting that out of context. Franklin’s contribution was significant, and unfairly minimized in some of the early accounts (partly because of the casual sexism prevalent in the era, to which Watson may have been particularly prone, but probably even more because of the bad relationship, based largely on misunderstandings, she had with her nominal boss, Maurice Wilkins), but the importance of her role in the eventual understanding of DNA has subsequently been hugely exaggerated (for rather obvious ideological reasons) in some of the more recent accounts. Both Watson and (the slightly less assholish) Crick may have felt sufficiently shamed by the lack of due credit she received early on to rather exaggerate her importance in some of their later remarks, such as the one you quote. However, to say or imply that hers was the _main_ basis of the discovery, is _at least_ as misleading as the original implications that she had rather little to do with it, or was more obstructive than helpful. Personally I think she deserved a share of the Nobel rather more than Maurice Wilkins did, and she would probably have got it (perhaps instead of Wilkins) had she still been alive by the time the importance and correctness of the double-helix DNA model was sufficiently established for a Nobel to be appropriate. However, people who imply that her contribution to the discovery was equal to, or (as some seem to want to make out) greater than that of either Watson of Crick, or that she was in any sense “cheated” of the Nobel prize, are talking out of their ass. In fact, the person who almost certainly deserved the most credit, and most deserved a Nobel, for the DNA discovery, after Watson and Crick, was [Erwin Chargaff](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erwin_Chargaff). His contribution to their discovery was, in my judgement, considerably more crucial than Franklin’s, but he was an asshole too, in his own way, and he became extremely bitter that Watson and Crick received so much more fame and kudos than he did. If anyone was “cheated” of their due share of the Nobel for DNA, though, it was him rather than Franklin. (But as a man, and something of jerk, he does not have an army of revisionist feminist historians out there pleading his case.) ¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬¬ As for Watson, the science that he made his name with is still good, but, through his racism and so forth he has forfeited the respect often accorded to Nobel prize winners, and “great scientists” in general, as intellectuals with possibly wise things to say about areas of science outside their specialty, or even about politics, philosophy, or human society in general. Watson is not disgraced _as a scientist_, just old and washed up, but he _is_ disgraced as a public intellectual and pundit, which is a role that top scientists often aspire to, and sometimes even fill quite well, when they are past their prime as actual scientists. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2014, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/17 "2014-12-05T00:53:16Z")
There is nothing more disgraceful than a scientist who follows the scientific method of discovery, instead of just parroting what the PC police tell him find. He is a scientist and has his reason for believing what he holds to be scientific truths. No non-scientist is qualified to hold him in judgment for that. ---
**Author:** ![njtt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ecd19e/32.png) [@njtt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/njtt)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2014, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/18 "2014-12-05T00:56:46Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > No, she was ineligible _for the 1962 Nobel_ that Watson, Crick and Wilkins got. She was not “never - ever - eligible” for a Nobel at all. True technically, but it is a rather silly nitpick. She was ineligible, due to death, by the time it became apparent to the scientific community at large that the theoretical model of DNA to which her work had contributed was sufficiently correct and significant to be worthy of a Nobel prize. They do not give out Nobel prizes the moment someone announces a discovery, they wait until it is confirmed that the discovery is both correct and important, which _routinely_ takes many years. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2014, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/19 "2014-12-05T01:02:07Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > …non-scientist… Define this term. Is anyone without a doctorate considered a non-scientist? If I believe in the scientific method but also hold non-orthodox opinions about various stuff, can I still be a scientist? What beliefs are considered disqualifying? If I am not sure if I am a scientist or not, is there a committee I can appear before for an adjudication of my scientistness or lack thereof? ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [December 5, 2014, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194/20 "2014-12-05T01:30:55Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > There is nothing more disgraceful than a scientist who follows the scientific method of discovery, instead of just parroting what the PC police tell him find. > > He is a scientist and has his reason for believing what he holds to be scientific truths. No non-scientist is qualified to hold him in judgment for that. He is a scientist but he is not an expert in all areas of science. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-nobel-prize-winner-james-watson-co-discoveror-of-the-dna-helix-a-disgraced-scientist/706194.md?page=2)