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James Watson: Scientist loses titles after claims over race
Nobel Prize-winning American scientist James Watson has been stripped of his honorary titles after repeating comments about race and intelligence.
In a TV programme, the pioneer in DNA studies made a reference to a view that genes cause a difference on average between blacks and whites on IQ tests. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory said the 90-year-old scientist's remarks were "unsubstantiated and reckless". Dr Watson had made similar claims in 2007 and subsequently apologised.
He shared the Nobel in 1962 with Maurice Wilkins and Francis Crick for their 1953 discovery of the DNA's double helix structure.
Dr Watson sold his gold medal in 2014, saying he had been ostracised by the scientific community after his remarks about race. He is currently in a nursing home recovering from a car accident and is said to have "very minimal" awareness of his surroundings.
Previously: Disgraced Scientist is Selling his Nobel Prize
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday January 14 2019, @04:46PM (2 children)
It might well be that disagreements emerged afterwards.
If an old scientist started claiming 2+2=7 people would laugh and conclude he is dodo.
Because the claim is evidently wrong. So, is it any different in this case? Are the feelings if random people enough to strip a guy from a prize? Because in the past other people did bad things to other people? If so, shouldn't EU people be offended by the mere presence of the religion of the Moors? Should the north Africans mourn the loss of Carthage? Why not concentrate on crimes happening now?
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(Score: 2) by qzm on Monday January 14 2019, @07:38PM (1 child)
Does this mean we will also be punishing 'academics' who, with no evidence teach that male rape culture is real?
What about white privilege?
These are equally 'theories' to be kind.. And just as poisonous for exactly the same reasons..
(Score: 2) by Bot on Friday January 18 2019, @09:29AM
Rape culture and white privilege are based on facts. The theories that wanted jews in ovens, and those who wanted the bourgeois stripped of property though, were based on facts too. All it matters is the weight you give to those facts and how you distribute the blame.
Anybody who teach that should be held shared responsibility for the acts of people who carry out exactly what they preach.
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