On Oct. 14 the Times of London Magazine ran a quote from Dr James Watson, who shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for discovering the double-helix structure of DNA. In the article, the prominent scientist said he was "inherently gloomy" about 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 in the article that, while he hoped everyone was equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this not true."
He wrote in his book Avoid Boring People: Lessons from a Life in Science, “there is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so.”
His remarks ignited international furor.
Watson was scheduled to appear next month in Louisville. He told Kentucky Author Forum officials on Monday it would be best to cancel.
Since that time, Watson said he was "mortified by what had happened."
"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," he said. "That is not what I meant. More importantly from my point of view, there is no scientific basis for such a belief."
This from the Times of London; Herald-Leader.
No comments:
Post a Comment