James D. Watson, the Nobel laureate who made the news recently for comments that many considered racist, stepped down from his post at Cold Spring Harbor this morning. Watson released a statement via email, the full text of which appears below. It's a clear-headed, morally sober statement that focuses on the benefits of science. Let's assume that it's real, although there's the possibility that it's a hoax, given the fact that the email address seems to be a hastily created Gmail account rather than that of the lab's publicity department (that's probably unwarranted suspicion, though we are in the Internet era):
"This morning I have conveyed to the Trustees of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory my desire to retire immediately from my position as its Chancellor, as well as from my position on its Board, on which I have served for the past 43 years. Closer now to 80 than 79, the passing on of my remaining vestiges of leadership is more than overdue. The circumstances in which this transfer is occurring, however, are not those which I could ever have anticipated or desired.
"That the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory is now one of the world's premier sites for biological research and education has long warmed my heart. So I am grateful that its Board now will allow me to remain along my beloved Bungtown Road. Forty-nine years ago, as a newly appointed young Assistant Professor at Harvard, I gave my first course on this pernicious collection of diseases of uncontrolled cell growth and division. Cancer, then an intellectual black box, now, in part because of research at the Laboratory, is almost full lit. Though important facts remain undiscovered, there is no reason why they should not soon be found. Final victory is within our grasp. Strong in spirit and intensely focused, I wish to be among those at the victory line.
"The ever quickening advances of science made possible by the success of the Human Genome Project will also soon let us see the essences of mental disease. Only after we understand them at the genetic level can we rationally seek out appropriate therapies for such illnesses as schizophrenia and bipolar disease. For the children of my sister and me, this moment can not come a moment too soon. Hell does not come close to describing the impact of psychotic disorders on human life.
"This week's events focus me ever more intensely on the moral values passed on to me by my father, whose Watson surname marks his long ago Scots-Irish Appalachian heritage; and by my mother, whose father, Lauchlin Mitchell, came from Glasgow and whose mother, Lizzie Gleason, had parents from Tipperary. To my great advantage, their lives were guided by a faith in reason; an honest application of its messages; and for social justice, especially the need for those on top to help care for the less fortunate. As an educator, I have always striven to see that the fruits of the American Dream are available to all.
"I have been much blessed."
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James Watson's Resignation Letter
Posted Oct 25th 2007 10:35AM by Ben Greenman
Filed under: Science, Controversy
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Reader Comments ( Page 1 of 2)
1. I have little faith that the human genome project will clarify what cancer is. The human genome project is taking science down a blind alley that will not explain cancer or reveal what it is. The human genome project will lead to things even more barbaric than preventive mastectomies. To understand what cancer is, science needs to think long and hard about genetic engineering and the possibility that nature has been doing genetic engineering for eons. Genetic engineering should have eliminated the term spontaneous mutations from the scientific vocabulary. There are no spontaneous mutations. All mutations are genetic engineering occurring in nature. We are johnny-come-latelys to genetic engineering. Everything living undergoes genetic engineering. The Dutch who have genetically engineered the varieties of tulips we enjoy should be a step ahead of other scientists in understanding genetic engineering. Forget the human genome. Cancer is a lifeform very adept at genetically engineering itself or it would not survive in such a variety of hosts and be so resistant to cures.
Ronald B. Zeh at 11:06AM on Oct 25th 2007
2. Hey Zeh, that's a pretty impressive comment. No foul language or blunt/rude statements....rare for people commenting on AOL.
Ya done good on this one Ben.
willet at 12:03PM on Oct 25th 2007
3. Willet, how kind. You are, without doubt or hesitation, one of the most antagonistic, rude, hate mongerer's on the AOL sites.
Indeed, I see now, you are, as well, a hypocite.
rhodalee at 12:40PM on Oct 25th 2007
4. Well Zeh, for you the human genome project is like a monkey with a typewriter. For scientisits and biostatisticians it's like the rosetta stone.
Dennis at 4:15PM on Oct 25th 2007
5. Goodbye to "gentleman Jim."
signed Rosalyn Franklin
William at 12:41AM on Oct 26th 2007
6. upon reading this a second time, i have decided it sounds like a spam mail. all he needs to do is tack on a paragraph about wanting to transfer money into my account from nigeria. what bs.
shady v at 11:27AM on Oct 26th 2007
7. Cancer is an opportunistic infection in many species of plants and animals. For a cancer cell invading me, it has to absorb some of my genes to make it look like me so that my immune system doesn't wipe it out. Unless a cancer cell digests some of my cells, it won't look like me and my immune system will be hard after it. Cancer is like the fox that raids the henhouse and eats a chicken. The farmer goes out after the fox, but the farmer doesn't cut open the fox, find chicken parts, bones, and feathers and say that the fox is a transformed chicken. That is what scientists who look at cancer conclude and have been writing for decades. Do people buy degrees in college, or do they go to college and really learn to think? Because there are human genes in a cancer cell proves one thing. Cancer has dined on host cells and host cell components are in the cancer cell's craw. Oncologists are off the beam when it comes to understanding cancer.'
Ronald B. Zeh at 8:14AM on Oct 27th 2007
8. Genes create living entities. They not only determine the physical characteristics but also mental and predispositions and resistance to diseases. The genetic breeding specific strains of lab animals, such as mice and rats, strongly show these genetic predispositions. Thirty years ago the bacteria, E Coli, was shown to have a hundredfold variation in their ability to resist UV (Ultraviolet) damage to DNA. It was shown to be the result of the amount of a repair enzyme that either fixed or failed to fix the damage. Cancer is the result of genes gone out of control. Ponce de Leon searched Florida in the 1500's, looking for the "Fountain of Youth" and, of course, failed. That has not discourged people today for seaching to environmental cures and ignoring the underlying genetic basis of life.
It is most upsetting, that in a free society that stresses freedom of speech, that James Watson should be chastised for expressing his scientific judgement as to blacks, on the average, having lower IQ's. The strong and undemocratic actions taken against James Watson strongly suggests there is a strong basis for what he said otherwise there wouldn't be such a strong backlash. In all the reactions I have read, name calling and intimidation have been his opponent's tools. Most that would have the intellectual basis to agree fear they will suffer the same fate. Hitler, Stalin and all despots through the ages employed the same tactics against scientific ideas with which they felt threatened.
Louis HR Muller at 9:01PM on Oct 27th 2007
9. There are no absolutes in science, hence no absolute genes, except in the minds of absolutist scientists. In an organism like a cancer cell, the genetic makeup is dynamic and ever changing. The dynamism of cancer as an organism has confused "scientists" for generations and turned cancer research into a political rather than a scientific activity. The taxpayers have been bilked of enough dollars by taxpayers. Get your money for your ossified ideas about cancer from people willing to give up their money rather than victimizing taxpayers and taking them in with scientific inanities.
Ronald B. Zeh at 10:04PM on Oct 27th 2007
10. Science funded by the federal government is a drop by money grab. If science were privatized, the money would go to the people with the best ideas as it did in the days when Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, and Marconi had ideas that changed the world rather than eating up taxpayer dollars. Scientists are making claims about the human genome that are probably as extravagant as the claims they made about monoclonal antibodies and as fatuous as the claims made about that immune system booster gamma globulin. A few years ago, some scientists even said that organic evolution on earth was brought about by cosmic rays. That was an idea presented in the science fiction of Aldous Huxley--mere entertainment. How long are people going to let scientists spoof them into paying the taxes for such ilk. I see little promise for conquering or controlling cancer coming from the human genome project despite what James Watson says.
Ronald B. Zeh at 1:20AM on Oct 28th 2007
11. Genes don't create living entities. They manufacture the building blocks that compose living entities.
Ronald B. Zeh at 8:06AM on Oct 30th 2007
12. Too much of the people's money granted by the government to science disappears in the pockets of scientists with degrees who are nothing more than opportunists out to grab the bucks and enjoy the perks and the theft. The best way to get a return on the dollar is to fund science with people who are smart about money. If you're smart about money, you can recognize the good people who should have your support. Politicians and government bureaucrats aren't smart about money. They're smart about getting elected whereupon they take money from dumb people. Pity. The history of science is glorious. Science is the human endeavor to understand the world God created and enhance our control over it. Evolution can go amuck. Good people can make corrections in the disorder in the natural world. That's what human freedom and responsibility are all about. Life is a test of virtue and ultimately rewards or punishments for what we do with our God-given power to be like Him.
Ronald B. Zeh at 1:21AM on Oct 31st 2007
13. When I read "The Double Helix," the guilt surrounding Watson and Crick was obvious to anyone who reads between the lines. I didn't know what to do with my psychoanalysis of the book. About five years ago, I faxed my opinion about the book to National Public Radio, stating that Rosalind Franklin was the discoverer of the DNA helix. Apparently someone at NPR researched this topic and the truth about the discoverer of the DNA helix is now out. I'm not a reporter and I didn't know where to go with my analysis of "The Double Helix," but the truth troubled me. I thank whoever at NPR pursued this topic and uncovered the truth about the woman who revolutionized biology with her discovery of the DNA helix.
Ronald B. Zeh at 12:08AM on Nov 1st 2007
14. Since I began responding to this blog about James Watson's resignation letter, the poet Emily Dickinson came to me in a dream and said, "Who am I? I'm nobody. Are you nobody, too? Then there's a pair of us." If anyone wonder who I am, I would say Emily Dickinson knows. But nobodies with the truth have their influence.
Ronald B. Zeh at 12:42AM on Nov 1st 2007
15. Regarding Rosalind Franklin, I wish some reporter would do me a favor. Was that photomicrograph of the DNA hexix made by Ms. Franklin a micrograph of one of her own cancer cells? If it was, Ms. Franklin probably knew what cancer really was. Was the micrograph one of her own genes unraveled in the craw of a cancer cell that had dined on her?
She couldn't save herself, but many others she probably will. I will be honored if Ms. Franklin gives me a hug when I get to Heaven.
Ronald B. Zeh at 2:45AM on Nov 1st 2007