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Biological differences exist, but the minor variations among humans mean their significance is a matter of debate

'If I believe something then I'll say it," Nobel laureate geneticist James Watson recently warned the Times of London's Charlotte Hunt-Grubbe. And sure enough, the 79-year-old Watson, who co-discovered the structure of DNA in 1953, proceeded to shoot from the lip, bringing his stellar career to a crashing end in the process.

Watson, who is as famous for making controversial comments as he is for his science, said, among other things, 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."

Not content with impugning an entire continent, Watson drove the matter home, remarking that while he hopes everyone is equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true."

Jstar1 wrote:why should anybody here care what he says about race? are you suggesting something?

Watson, the latter group argued, is just the latest casualty in an environment that doesn't allow people to ask dangerous questions -- or test dangerous hypotheses, such as ones involving racial difference -- even in a university.

Reise wrote:

Watson, the latter group argued, is just the latest casualty in an environment that doesn't allow people to ask dangerous questions -- or test dangerous hypotheses, such as ones involving racial difference -- even in a university.

I liked this quote.

After all, the ideal in both medicine and morality has always been to treat people as individuals. But until recently -- until the decoding of Watson's and Venter's genomes -- that wasn't possible. Now, geneticists suggest that it will soon be possible to decode any individual's genome relativity easily and cheaply.

And this means that we will no longer have to group people together on the basis of their race or any other factor. Genetics will render race superfluous. And of all the people we'll have to thank for that, none will be more important than -- you guessed it again -- James Watson.

:love: The Motherland

dom wrote:There are genetic differences. Proof: colour of skin, colour of hair, colour of eyes, average height/size, etc. We can tell a person's race by the structure of their bones as well - saying there's no such thing as genetic differences is ignorant.

These traits are very visible, the ones that people argue about are not.

And it's absurd to group together all the populations of a continent, especially the continent of Africa, whose populations contain all the genetic variation that exists in humanity.

all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours -- whereas all the testing says not really."...Watson drove the matter home, remarking that while he hopes everyone is equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true."

Silver0 wrote:sounds like mein kampf

Pan_Raider(`_´) wrote:

Silver0 wrote:sounds like mein kampf

that guy wasn't even german Ö_ö, he was an austrian psycho

Xyzzzy wrote:

Pan_Raider(`_´) wrote:

Silver0 wrote:sounds like mein kampf

that guy wasn't even german Ö_ö, he was an austrian psycho

sorry, but Austrians speak German <3