Re: [xmca] Watson redux

There is an interesting movie along the lines of this thread. In this
movie though, Anthony Hopkins knows his genetic makeup and spends 50
years trying to hide it after losing the love of his life because of it.

The Human Stain
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0308383/

I wish there were more movies like these...

Mark

On Dec 11, 2007, at 7:56 AM, David Preiss wrote:

> Interesting how ironic science can be. (That reminds me of Nazi
> scientists that had a jewish background. Uh! If these analysis can
> be applied to them, how enjoyable!) On the other hand, I can't help
> but think that these findings will be part of the anecdotic stories
> thousands of college professors and textbook writers will include
> within their narrative in the following years when talking about
> genetics and human behavior. I am so glad they will be. I just hope
> students learn the right thing beyond the irony behind the situation
> and that's the difference between racism and science.
> David
>
> On Dec 9, 2007, at 3:54 PM, Mike Cole wrote:
>
>> The following was forwarded to me by a colleague. Thought people
>> might find
>> it interesting.
>> mike
>> --------
>>> From The Sunday TimesDecember 9, 2007
>>
>> DNA pioneer James Watson is blacker than he thought
>>
>> Jonathan Leake, Science Editor
>>
>> JAMES WATSON, the DNA pioneer who claimed Africans are less
>> intelligent than whites, has been found to have 16 times more genes
>> of
>> black origin than the average white European.
>>
>> An analysis of his genome shows that 16% of his genes are likely to
>> have come from a black ancestor of African descent. By contrast, most
>> people of European descent would have no more than 1%.
>>
>> The study was made possible when he allowed his genome - the map of
>> all his genes - to be published on the internet in the interests of
>> science.
>>
>> "This level is what you would expect in someone who had a great-
>> grandparent who was African," said Kari Stefansson of deCODE
>> Genetics,
>> whose company carried out the analysis. "It was very surprising to
>> get
>> this result for Jim."
>>
>> Watson won the Nobel prize, with Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins,
>> after working out the structure of DNA in 1953. However, he provoked
>> an outcry earlier this year when he suggested black people were
>> genetically less intelligent than whites.
>>
>> This weekend his critics savoured the wry twist of fate. Sir John
>> Sulston, the Nobel laureate who helped lead the consortium that
>> decoded the human genome, said the discovery was ironic in view of
>> Watson's opinions on race. "I never did agree with Watson's remarks,"
>> he said. "We do not understand enough about intelligence to
>> generalise
>> about race."
>>
>> The backlash against Watson forced him to step down as chancellor of
>> Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, New York state, after 39 years at the
>> helm. He had said he was "inherently gloomy about the prospects for
>> 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".
>>
>> The analysis by deCODE Genetics, an Icelandic company, also shows a
>> further 9% of Watson's genes are likely to have come from an ancestor
>> of Asian descent. Watson was not available for comment.
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>
> David Preiss, Ph.D.
> Subdirector de Extensión y Comunicaciones
> Escuela de Psicología
> Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile
> Av Vicuña Mackenna 4860
> Macul, Santiago
> Chile
>
> Fono: 3544605
> Fax: 3544844
> e-mail: davidpreiss@uc.cl
> web personal: http://web.mac.com/ddpreiss/
> web institucional: http://www.epuc.cl/profesores/dpreiss
>
>
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Received on Mon Dec 10 15:59 PST 2007