Nobel Winner Apologizes For Race Remarks

DNA Pioneer James Watson "Mortified" He's Quoted As Saying Africans Are Less Intelligent

(CBS/AP)  Nobel Prize winner James Watson, the 79-year-old scientific icon made famous by his work in DNA, has apologized for comments to a London newspaper about intelligence levels among blacks, saying he's "mortified."

The renowned Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where Watson served as chancellor, also suspended his administrative responsibilities Thursday following the outcry, the laboratory said in a news release.

And London's Science Museum canceled a sold-out lecture he was to give there Friday.

Watson has a history of provocative statements about social implications of science. But several friends said Thursday he's no racist.

A profile of Watson in the Sunday Times Magazine of London quoted him as saying that he's "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."

While he hopes everyone is equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true," Watson, who won a Nobel Prize in 1962 for co-discovering the structure of DNA, is quoted as saying. He also said people should not be discriminated against on the basis of color, because "there are many people of color who are very talented."

The comments, reprinted Wednesday in a front-page article in another British newspaper, The Independent, provoked a sharp reaction.

The mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said his comments "represent racist propaganda masquerading as scientific fact.... That a man of such academic distinction could make such ignorant comments, which are utterly offensive and incorrect and give succor to the most backward in our society, demonstrates why racism still has to be fought."

"I think these remarks are extremely dangerous and extremely offensive to make," Steven Rose, a neuroscientist and a co-founder of the British Society for Social Responsibility in Science, told CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips. "They distress black people; I think quite rightly, too. And they do no good either scientifically or to the fight against racism, in Britain or the United States."

In the United States, the Federation of American Scientists said it was outraged that Watson "chose to use his unique stature to promote personal prejudices that are racist, vicious and unsupported by science."

And Watson's employer said he wasn't speaking for the Cold Spring Harbor research facility on Long Island, where the board and administration "vehemently disagree with these statements and are bewildered and saddened if he indeed made such comments."

"I am mortified about what has happened," Watson said. "More importantly, I cannot understand how I could have said what I am quoted as having said.

London's Sunday Times says it has the recording, reports CBS News correspondent Larry Miller.

Watson is in Britain to promote his new book, "Avoid Boring People," and a publicist for his British publisher provided this statement Thursday to The Associated Press:

"I can certainly understand why people, reading those words, have reacted in the ways they have. To all those who have drawn the inference from my words that Africa, as a continent, is somehow genetically inferior, I can only apologize unreservedly. That is not what I meant. More importantly, from my point of view, there is no scientific basis for such a belief."

Watson's publicist, Kate Farquhar-Thomson, would not address whether Watson was suggesting he was misquoted. "You have the statement. That's it, I'm afraid," she said.

Watson's new book also touches on possible racial differences in IQ, though it doesn't go as far as the newspaper interview.

In the book, Watson raises the prospect of discovering genes that significantly affect a person's intelligence.

"...There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically," Watson wrote. "Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so."

Watson is no stranger to making waves with his scientific views. In 2000, in a speech at the University of California, Berkeley, he suggested that sex drive is related to skin color. "That's why you have Latin lovers," he said, according to people who attended. "You've never heard of an English lover. Only an English patient."

Some years earlier he was quoted in a newspaper as saying, "If you could find the gene which determines sexuality and a woman decides she doesn't want a homosexual child, well, let her."

"Jim has a penchant for making outrageous comments that are basically poking society in the eye," Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, said Thursday.

Collins, who has known Watson for a long time, said his latest comments "really ... carried it this time to a much more hurtful level."

In a brief telephone interview, Collins told The AP that Watson's statements are "the wildest form of speculation in a field where such speculation ought not to be engaged in." Genetic factors for intelligence show no difference from one part of the world to another, he said.

Several longtime friends of Watson insisted he's not a racist.

"It's hard for me to buy the label 'racist' for him," said Victor McElheny, the author of a 2003 biography of Watson, whom he's known for 45 years. "This is someone who has encouraged so many people from so many backgrounds."

So why does he say things that can sound racist? "I really don't know the answer to that," McElheny said.

Mike Botchan, co-chair of the molecular and cell biology department at the University of California, Berkeley, who's known Watson since 1970, said the Nobelist's personal beliefs are less important than the impact of what he says.

"Is he someone who's going to prejudge a person in front of him on the basis of his skin color? I would have to say, no. Is he someone, though, that has these beliefs? I don't know any more. And the important thing is I don't really care," Botchan said.

"I think Jim Watson is now essentially a disgrace to his own legacy. And it's very sad for me to say this, because he's one of the great figures of 20th century biology."

[klingon69]

RE: Post by Klingon69 at 02:01 PM : Oct 20, 2007

This is what happens when you Google naively and indiscriminantly, without regard to Google"s own Terms of Service statement, in which they point out that they cannot be held accountable for the inaccuracy of the information you obtain from some off-the-wall White Supremacist website.

Well, I must admit that I did simply type in sub-species into the google search engine, and got my results. But, those results are the same as found in Webster''s Dictionary. A sub-species while part of the overall species has distinguishing characteristics different from other sub-species(ie: the almond shaped eyes of asiatics). These distinguishing characteristics are products of the environment as they have evolved in them. In most (maybe not all cases) cross-breeding between sub-species is perfectly fine. Now, that being said, find shere I said a d.a.m.n.e.d thing that could be construed at white supremacy? C''mon, you can find something to call me a racist about. I merely pointed out that while we are all the same species, Home-sapiens, and maybe by your understanding the same sub-species, we are different due to the environment we evolved into. The darker skin of the African, Aborigines and other Equitorial peoples is designed as protection against the sun, the lighter skin was for the more northern peoples who had less sun to worry about.

[klingon69]

If you have lived then, you would have concluded that the people of the British Isles were an "inferior race."
You"d be wrong then, and you"re wrong now.
Human Beings rise to the level of expectation.
Posted by Iceman_1960 at 06:33 PM : Oct 20, 2007

However, at that time, weren''t they an inferior race? Weren''t they still living in caves, wearing skins???

[iceman_1960]

Every Nobel Prize winner in history, in every Nobel Prize category, has been of African descent.

[iceman_1960]

"Between 1901 - 1998 there are NO Black Nobel Prize winners in Physics, NONE. I doubt if there are any from 1998 til present. Granted there are some talented black physics[sic] I"m sure.

The asian and jews are over represented because IQ results support this :)

I"m not racist, just aware there is a difference!
- Posted by Kitefrog at 12:29 PM : Oct 21, 2007

Are there many Blacks on the Committee that selects the winners ?

(Just kidding)

The fact that you leap (without proof) to a genetic explanation of such differences, when there is none -- a genetic explanation right out of the pages of racist pseudoscience -- does not look good for your claim to be free of racist prejudice.

Without looking it up (it will be obvious if you"ve done an Internet search) name all the great Japanese mathematicians in history.

[iceman_1960]

"Africans are superior athletes. That is hard to debate."
- Posted by fibonacci_ at 01:04 PM : Oct 21, 2007

Depends on the sport.

Whites OWN the bench press and other power lifting events.

All the top bench press record holders are White. And it"s not because Blacks don"t have access to weightlifting gear.

[fibonacci_]

Africans are superior athletes. That is hard to debate.

[kitefrog]

http://th.physik.uni-frankfurt.de/~jr/physpicnobel.html

Between 1901 - 1998 there are NO Black Nobel Prize winners in Physics, NONE. I doubt if there are any from 1998 til present. Granted there are some talented black physics I''m sure.

The asian and jews are over represented because IQ results support this :)

I''m not racist, just aware there is a difference!

[brianbwb-2009]

The picture indicates a person of advanced age who may very well be a "ginger", (once red hair, pale skin, freckles) and as anyone who watches "South Park" knows, "people afflicted with gingervitis have no souls".

Or perhaps just a "daywalker".

[mcvett]

Me and da homeboi''s be hangin in da hood readin dis bullsh*t.

Yo dog, I wants to ax whitey a queshun:

wadda, wadda, wadda, wazzuup wit dis shizzle ma nizzle??

Dis cracka needs to go to
re-educashun camp (aka. sensitivity training classes)
so he can be taught to think politically correct.

nuff said, I wants to be hangin wit my homeboi''s stead-a listnin to this cracka.

LOL

[iceman_1960]

Every ethnic group that emphasizes academic achievement, whose children are encouraged to put a lot of time and effort into their schoolwork, does well academically.

It isn"t a matter of race. It"s a matter of parental encouragement and good study habits.

All modern humans are members of the same species and the same subspecies, and that is characteristic of all modern humans: They rise to the level of expectation.

Hard work yields good results in the classroom.

[baptox]

Dr. Watson''s statements are a result of his "edit button" beginning to fail with age. He was probably unaware that he made this statement and his previous statements.
Still, because he is such an influential scientist, his statements are destructive. Science is based on objective, rigorous research, not our personal biased opinions.

It is probably part of the human condition that we have socially unacceptable thoughts. That we occaisionally blurt things out that we have no recollection of later is a litle more of a complicated behavior.

What really fascinates me is how obsessed we humans are with identifying intelligence as such a validating attribute of individual humans and entire cultures. The ability to compromise and negotiate and exhibit compassion are attributes that are much more likely to contribute to both world peace and our survival as a species. Why aren''t these traditionally female associated attributes more highly valued?

Oops.. I''m revealing my bias..

[andor3]

someone said: "What you missed is the science behind the statement."

I missed it because there is none. A scientific statement has to be verifiable. His statement is not testable because "intelligence" is not something that can be measured to compare and race isn''t a genetic difference.

It''s like saying the ''43 Edsel was the best car ever. It''s just an opinion because it can''t be verified or proven false.

And it is an ignorant opinion, especially for a man of science who represents some prestigious labs, who rightly suspended him.

[incog-nito]

The man is wrong. He did not take into account poverty and lack of education as factors in test results. Most tests including IQ tests are largely language based, and obviously if you can barely read and understand the question you will tend to do poorly. Your IQ level is not constant. Everyone knows that you can actually improve it by training and practice. Obviously Africa is a poorer continent than say, Europe. One would think poor people are less preoccupied by their IQ score than by making a living day to day.

[lawyertom1]

Mortified, my kister. Unfortunately, Mr. Jim has been making such comments for many years.

[bennyblack1]

And it would seem that McVett is stuck in repeating the same stuff over and over again.

Now that''s a display of intelligence! It doesn''t require any thinking. Just, cut and paste. And he probably stole it from someone else.

[mcvett]

Me and da homeboi''s be hangin in da hood readin dis bullsh*t.

Yo dog, I wants to ax whitey a queshun:

wadda, wadda, wadda, wazzuup wit dis shizzle ma nizzle??

Dis cracka needs to go to
re-educashun camp (aka. sensitivity training classes)
so he can be taught to think politically correct.

nuff said, I wants to be hangin wit my homeboi''s stead-a listnin to this cracka.

LOL

[bennyblack1]

And that''s not the name of a rap group! Though the group is certainly indicative of the culture.

[bennyblack1]

kemetorigin
Hey, I agree with you on those great figures of the past, however, what you need to understand is that those men and women stood up and decided that they weren''t going to put up with the peer pressure to be status quo. They were driven by a deep desire, initiative, motivation, and the need to stand on top of it all. All great men are different for this very reason. The drive, however, did not require that they break the law. They worked hard, and rose above the status quo. They decided that a D average in school wasn''t good enough. They decided that going to college and graduating with honors was an honorable thing to do, as opposed to today''s black men and women that encourage their friends and their families to rebelliously fail. Then become gangbangers. They certainly succeeded. They succeeded at becoming not only miserable failures, but also public enemy number one.

[iceman_1960]

Here"s one for modern Black Mathematicians.

Enjoy...

http://www.math.buffalo.edu/mad/madhist.html

[iceman_1960]

I"m still waiting to see a list of great English mathematicians who lived during Greek and Roman times.