From 1968, Watson served as the director of theCold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) inLaurel Hollow, New York, greatly expanding its level of funding and research. At CSHL, he shifted his research emphasis to the study of cancer, along with making it a world-leading research center in molecular biology. In 1994, Watson started as president and served for 10 years. He was then appointed chancellor, serving until his resignation in 2007 after making comments claiming that there is a genetic link betweenrace and intelligence. In 2019, after the broadcast of a documentary where Watson reiterated these views onrace and genetics, CSHL revoked his honorary titles and severed all ties with him.
Watson wrote many science books, including the textbookMolecular Biology of the Gene (1965) and his bestselling bookThe Double Helix (1968). He made derogatory comments about Rosalind Franklin, who had been responsible for gathering data that led to the discovery of the structure of DNA, and was criticized formisogyny. Between 1988 and 1992, Watson was associated with theNational Institutes of Health, helping to establish theHuman Genome Project, which completed the task of mapping thehuman genome in 2003.
Early life and education
James Dewey Watson was born in Chicago on April 6, 1928,[1] the only son of Jean (née Mitchell) and James D. Watson, a businessman descended mostly from colonial English immigrants to America.[2] His maternal grandfather, Lauchlin Mitchell, a tailor, was fromGlasgow, Scotland, and his maternal grandmother, Lizzie Gleason, was the child of parents fromCounty Tipperary, Ireland.[3] Watson's mother was a modestly religiousCatholic and his father anEpiscopalian who had lost his belief in God.[4] Watson grew up Catholic, but he later described himself as "an escapee from the Catholic religion".[5] Watson said, "The luckiest thing that ever happened to me was that my father didn't believe in God."[6] By age 11, Watson stopped attending mass and embraced the "pursuit of scientific and humanistic knowledge."[4]
After readingErwin Schrödinger's bookWhat Is Life? in 1946, Watson changed his professional ambitions from the study of ornithology togenetics.[13] Watson earned hisBachelor of Science degree inzoology from the University of Chicago the following year.[9] In his autobiography,Avoid Boring People, Watson described the University of Chicago as an "idyllic academic institution where [he] was instilled with the capacity for critical thought and an ethical compulsion not to suffer fools who impeded his search for truth", in contrast to his description of later experiences. In 1947, Watson left the University of Chicago to become a graduate student at Indiana University, attracted by the presence at Bloomington of the 1946 Nobel Prize winnerHermann Joseph Muller, who in crucial papers published in 1922, 1929, and in the 1930s had laid out all the basic properties of the heredity molecule that Schrödinger presented in his 1944 book.[14] Watson received hisDoctor of Philosophy degree from Indiana University Bloomington in 1950;Salvador Luria was his doctoral advisor.[9][15]
Career and research
Luria, Delbrück, and the Phage Group
Originally, Watson was drawn into molecular biology by the work of Salvador Luria. Luria eventually shared the 1969 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work on theLuria–Delbrück experiment, which concerned the nature of geneticmutations. He was part of a distributed group of researchers who were making use of theviruses that infectbacteria, calledbacteriophages. He andMax Delbrück were among the leaders of this new "Phage Group", an important movement of geneticists from experimental systems such asDrosophila towards microbial genetics. Early in 1948, Watson began his PhD research in Luria's laboratory at Indiana University.[15] That spring, he met Delbrück first in Luria's apartment and again that summer during Watson's first trip to the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.[16][17]
The Phage Group was the intellectual medium where Watson became a working scientist. Importantly, the members of the Phage Group sensed that they were on the path to discovering the physical nature of thegene. In 1949, Watson took a course with Felix Haurowitz that included the conventional view of that time: that genes wereproteins and able to replicate themselves.[18] The other major molecular component ofchromosomes, DNA, was widely considered to be a "stupid tetranucleotide", serving only a structural role to support the proteins.[19] Even at this early time, Watson, under the influence of the Phage Group, was aware of theAvery–MacLeod–McCarty experiment, which suggested that DNA was the genetic molecule. Watson's research project involved usingX-rays to inactivate bacterial viruses.[20]
Watson then went toCopenhagen University in September 1950 for a year of postdoctoral research, first heading to the laboratory of biochemistHerman Kalckar.[2] Kalckar was interested in the enzymatic synthesis of nucleic acids, and he wanted to use phages as an experimental system. Watson wanted to explore the structure of DNA, and his interests did not coincide with Kalckar's.[21] After working part of the year with Kalckar, Watson spent the remainder of his time in Copenhagen conducting experiments with microbial physiologist Ole Maaløe, then a member of the Phage Group.[22]
The experiments, of which Watson became aware at the previous summer's Cold Spring Harbor phage conference, employed radioactive phosphate as a tracer to identify which molecular components of bacteriophage particles are responsible for infecting the host bacteria during viral entry.[21] The intention was to determine whether protein or DNA was the genetic material, but upon consultation with Max Delbrück,[21] they determined that their results were inconclusive and could not specifically identify the newly labeled molecules as DNA.[23] Watson never developed a constructive interaction with Kalckar, but he did accompany Kalckar to a meeting in Italy, where Watson sawMaurice Wilkins talk about X-ray diffraction data for DNA.[2] Watson had become firmly convinced that DNA possessed a distinct molecular structure amenable to precise elucidation.[24]
Sydney Brenner,Jack Dunitz,Dorothy Hodgkin,Leslie Orgel, and Beryl M. Oughton were some of the first people in April 1953 to see the model of the structure ofDNA, constructed by Crick and Watson; at the time, they were working atOxford University's chemistry department. All were impressed by the new DNA model, especially Brenner, who subsequently worked with Crick atCambridge in the Cavendish Laboratory and the newLaboratory of Molecular Biology. According to the late Beryl Oughton, later Rimmer, they all travelled together in two cars once Hodgkin announced to them that they were off to Cambridge to see the model of the structure of DNA.[32]
Watson's name on New York City'sNobel Monument; it lists American laureates only, not Crick and Wilkins who shared the 1962 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
The Cambridge University student newspaperVarsity ran its own short article on the discovery on May 30, 1953. Watson subsequently presented a paper on the double-helical structure of DNA at the 18th Cold Spring Harbor Symposium on Viruses in early June 1953, six weeks after the publication of the Watson and Crick paper inNature. Many at the meeting had not yet heard of the discovery. The 1953 Cold Spring Harbor Symposium was the first opportunity for many to see the model of the DNA double helix. Watson, Crick, and Wilkins were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1962 for their research on the structure of nucleic acids.[2][33][34] Rosalind Franklin had died in 1958 and was therefore ineligible for nomination.[28] The publication of the double helix structure of DNA has been described as a turning point in science; understanding of life was fundamentally changed and the modern era of biology began.[35]
Interactions with Rosalind Franklin and Raymond Gosling
Watson and Crick's use ofDNA X-ray diffraction data collected byRosalind Franklin and her studentRaymond Gosling attracted scrutiny. It has been argued that Watson and his colleagues did not properly acknowledge Franklin for her contributions to the discovery of the double helix structure.[29][36]Robert P. Crease notes that "Such stingy behaviour may not be unknown, or even uncommon, among scientists".[37] Franklin's high-quality X-ray diffraction patterns of DNA were unpublished results, which Watson and Crick used without her knowledge or consent in their construction of the double helix model of DNA.[36][28][38] Franklin's results provided estimates of the water content of DNA crystals and these results were consistent with the two sugar-phosphate backbones being on the outside of the molecule. Franklin told Crick and Watson that the backbones had to be on the outside; before then, Linus Pauling and Watson and Crick had erroneous models with the chains inside and the bases pointing outwards.[14] Her identification of thespace group for DNA crystals revealed to Crick that the two DNA strands wereantiparallel.[14]
The X-ray diffraction images collected by Gosling and Franklin provided the best evidence for the helical nature of DNA. Watson and Crick had three sources for Franklin's unpublished data:
Discussions with Wilkins,[40] who worked in the same laboratory with Franklin;
A research progress report that was intended to promote coordination ofMedical Research Council-supported laboratories.[41] Watson, Crick, Wilkins and Franklin all worked in MRC laboratories.
In a 1954 article, Watson and Crick acknowledged that, without Franklin's data, "the formulation of our structure would have been most unlikely, if not impossible".[42] InThe Double Helix, Watson later admitted that "Rosy, of course, did not directly give us her data. For that matter, no one at King's realized they were in our hands". In recent years, Watson garnered controversy in the popular and scientific press for his "misogynist treatment" of Franklin and his failure to properly attribute her work on DNA.[29] According to one critic, Watson's portrayal of Franklin inThe Double Helix was negative, giving the impression that she was Wilkins' assistant and was unable to interpret her own DNA data.[43] Watson's accusation was indefensible since Franklin told Crick and Watson that the helix backbones had to be on the outside.[14] From a 2003 piece byBrenda Maddox inNature:[29]
Other comments dismissive of "Rosy" in Watson's book caught the attention of the emerging women's movement in the late 1960s. "Clearly Rosy had to go or be put in her place ... Unfortunately Maurice could not see any decent way to give Rosy the boot". And, "Certainly a bad way to go out into the foulness of a ... November night was to be told by a woman to refrain from venturing an opinion about a subject for which you were not trained."
Robert P. Crease remarks that "[Franklin] was close to figuring out the structure of DNA, but did not do it. The title of 'discoverer' goes to those who first fit the pieces together".[37]Jeremy Bernstein rejects that Franklin was a "victim" and states that "[Watson and Crick] made the double-helix scheme work. It is as simple as that".[37]Matthew Cobb andNathaniel C. Comfort write that "Franklin was no victim in how the DNA double helix was solved" but that she was "an equal contributor to the solution of the structure".[42]
A review of the correspondence from Franklin to Watson, in the archives at CSHL, revealed that the two scientists later exchanged constructive scientific correspondence. Franklin consulted with Watson on her tobacco mosaic virus RNA research. Franklin's letters were framed with the normal and unremarkable forms of address, beginning with "Dear Jim", and concluding with "Best Wishes, Yours, Rosalind". Each of the scientists published their own unique contributions to the discovery of the structure of DNA in separate articles, and all of the contributors published their findings in the same volume ofNature. These classic molecular biology papers are identified as: Watson J. D. and Crick F. H. C. "A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid".Nature 171, 737–738 (1953);[31] Wilkins M. H. F., Stokes A. R. & Wilson H. R. "Molecular Structure of Deoxypentose Nucleic Acids".Nature 171, 738–740 (1953);[44] Franklin R. and Gosling R. G. "Molecular Configuration in Sodium Thymonucleate".Nature 171, 740–741 (1953).[45]
Harvard University
In 1956, Watson accepted a position in the biology department atHarvard University inCambridge, Massachusetts. His work at Harvard focused on RNA and its role in the transfer of genetic information.[46] He continued to be a member of the Harvard faculty until 1976, even though he took over the directorship of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory eight years prior.[46]
During his tenure at Harvard, Watson participated in a protest against theVietnam War, leading a group of 12 biologists and biochemists calling for "the immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces from Vietnam."[47] In 1975, on the thirtieth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, Watson was one of over 2,000 scientists and engineers who spoke out against nuclear proliferation to PresidentGerald Ford, arguing that there was no proven method for the safe disposal of radioactive waste, and that nuclear plants were a security threat due to the possibility of terrorist theft of plutonium.[48]
Watson's first textbook,The Molecular Biology of the Gene, used the concept of heads—brief declarative subheadings.[49] His next textbook wasMolecular Biology of the Cell, in which he coordinated the work of a group of scientist-writers. His third wasRecombinant DNA, which described the ways in whichgenetic engineering had brought new information about how organisms function.[50]
PublishingThe Double Helix
In 1968, Watson wroteThe Double Helix,[51] listed by the board of theModern Library as number seven in their list of100 Best Nonfiction books.[52] The book details the story of the discovery of the structure of DNA, as well as the personalities, conflicts and controversy surrounding their work, and includes many of his private emotional impressions at the time. Watson's original title was to have been "Honest Jim".[53] Controversy surrounded the publication of the book. Watson's book was originally to be published by theHarvard University Press, but Francis Crick and Maurice Wilkins, among others, objected. Watson's home university dropped the project and the book was commercially published.[54][55] In an interview with Anne Sayre for her book,Rosalind Franklin and DNA (published in 1975 and reissued in 2000), Francis Crick said that he regarded Watson's book as a "contemptible pack of damned nonsense".[56]
In 1968, Watson was appointed director of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. He and his wife, Elizabeth, had two sons between 1970 and 1972, and by 1974 the family had established a permanent residence in Cold Spring Harbor. Watson led the laboratory as director and president for approximately 35 years, subsequently serving as its chancellor and, later, chancellor emeritus.[57]
In his roles as director, president, and chancellor, Watson led CSHL to articulate its present-day mission, "dedication to exploring molecular biology and genetics in order to advance the understanding and ability to diagnose and treat cancers, neurological diseases, and other causes of human suffering."[58] Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory substantially expanded both its research and its science educational programs under Watson's direction. He is credited with "transforming a small facility into one of the world's great education and research institutions. Initiating a program to study the cause of human cancer, scientists under his direction have made major contributions to understanding the genetic basis of cancer."[59] In a retrospective summary of Watson's accomplishments there,Bruce Stillman, the laboratory's president, said, "Jim Watson created a research environment that is unparalleled in the world of science."[59]
In 2007, Watson said, "I turned against theleft wing because they don't like genetics, because genetics implies that sometimes in life we fail because we have bad genes. They want all failure in life to be due to the evil system."[60]
Human Genome Project
Watson in 1992
In 1990, Watson was appointed as the head of theHuman Genome Project at theNational Institutes of Health, a position he held until April 10, 1992.[61] Watson left the Genome Project after conflicts with the newNIH Director,Bernadine Healy. He was opposed to Healy's attempts to acquire patents on gene sequences, and any ownership of the "laws of nature". Two years before stepping down from the Genome Project, Watson had stated his own opinion on this long and ongoing controversy which he saw as an illogical barrier to research; Watson said, "The nations of the world must see that the human genome belongs to the world's people, as opposed to its nations." He left within weeks of the 1992 announcement that the NIH would be applying for patents on brain-specific cDNAs.[62] (The issue of the patentability of genes has since been resolved in the US by theUS Supreme Court; seeAssociation for Molecular Pathology v. U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.)
In 1994, Watson became president of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.Francis Collins took over the role as director of the Human Genome Project.[57] In 1997, Watson was quoted inThe Sunday Telegraph, stating: "If you could find the gene which determines sexuality and a woman decides she doesn't want a homosexual child, well, let her."[63] The biologistRichard Dawkins wrote a letter toThe Independent claiming that Watson's position was misrepresented byThe Sunday Telegraph article, and that Watson would equally consider the possibility of having a heterosexual child to be just as valid as any other reason for abortion, to emphasize that Watson is in favor of allowing choice.[64]
On the issue of obesity, Watson was quoted in 2000, saying: "Whenever you interview fat people, you feel bad, because you know you're not going to hire them."[65] Watson repeatedly supportedgenetic screening andgenetic engineering in public lectures and interviews, arguing that stupidity is a disease and the "really stupid" bottom 10% of people should be cured.[66] He also suggested that beauty could be genetically engineered, saying in 2003, "People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would be great."[66][67]
In 2007, Watson became the second person[68] (afterCraig Venter) to publish his fully sequenced genome online,[69] after it was presented to him on May 31, 2007, by454 Life Sciences Corporation[70] in collaboration with scientists at the Human Genome Sequencing Center,Baylor College of Medicine. Watson was quoted as saying, "I am putting my genome sequence on line to encourage the development of an era ofpersonalized medicine, in which information contained in our genomes can be used to identify and prevent disease and to create individualized medical therapies".[71][72][73]
Later life
In 2014, Watson published a paper inThe Lancet suggesting that biologicaloxidants may have a different role than is thought in diseases including diabetes, dementia, heart disease and cancer. For example,type 2 diabetes is usually thought to be caused by oxidation in the body that causes inflammation and kills off pancreatic cells. Watson thought the root of that inflammation was different: "a lack of biological oxidants, not an excess", and discussed this in detail. One critical response was that the idea was neither new nor worthy of merit, and thatThe Lancet published Watson's paper only because of his name.[74] Other scientists expressed their support for his hypothesis and proposed that it could also be expanded to why a lack of oxidants can result in cancer and its progression.[75]
In 2014, Watson sold hisNobel Prize medal to raise money after complaining of being made an "unperson" following controversial statements he had made.[76] Part of the funds raised by the sale went to support scientific research.[77] The medal sold at auction atChristie's in December 2014 forUS$4.1 million. Watson intended to contribute the proceeds to conservation work on Long Island and to funding research at Trinity College, Dublin.[78][79] He was the first living Nobel recipient to auction a medal.[80] The medal was later returned to Watson by the purchaser,Alisher Usmanov.[81]
Watson was a member of the Board of Directors of United Biomedical, Inc., founded byChang Yi Wang. He held the position for six years and retired from the board in 1999.[88] In January 2007, Watson accepted the invitation ofLeonor Beleza, president of theChampalimaud Foundation, to become the head of the foundation's scientific council, an advisory organ.[89][90]
In March 2017, Watson was named head consultant of the Cheerland Investment Group, a Chinese investment company which sponsored his trip.[91] He was an institute adviser for theAllen Institute for Brain Science.[92][93]
Watson had disagreements withCraig Venter regarding his use ofEST fragments while Venter worked atNational Institutes of Health. Venter went on to foundCelera genomics and continued his feud with Watson. Watson was quoted as calling Venter "Hitler".[94]
In his 2007 memoir,Avoid Boring People: Lessons from a Life in Science, Watson describes his academic colleagues as "dinosaurs", "deadbeats", "fossils", "has-beens", "mediocre", and "vapid".[95]Steve Shapin inHarvard Magazine noted that Watson had written an unlikely "Book of Manners", telling about the skills needed at different times in a scientist's career; he wrote Watson was known for aggressively pursuing his own goals at the university.E. O. Wilson once described Watson as "the most unpleasant human being I had ever met", but in a later TV interview said that he considered them friends and their rivalry at Harvard "old history" (when they had competed for funding in their respective fields).[96][97]
In the epilogue to the memoirAvoid Boring People, Watson alternately attacks and defends former Harvard University presidentLawrence Summers, who stepped down in 2006 due in part to his remarks about women and science.[98] Watson also states in the epilogue, "Anyone sincerely interested in understanding the imbalance in the representation of men and women in science must reasonably be prepared at least to consider the extent to which nature may figure, even with the clear evidence that nurture is strongly implicated."[67][95]
Public remarks on genetics, intelligence, and race
Genetic determinism controversies
At a conference in 2000, Watson suggested a link between skin color and sex drive, hypothesizing that dark-skinned people have strongerlibidos.[65][99] His lecture argued that extracts ofmelanin—which gives skin its color—had been found to boost subjects' sex drive. "That's why you haveLatin lovers", he said, according to people who attended the lecture. "You've never heard of an English lover. Only anEnglish Patient."[100] Watson also said that stereotypes associated with racial and ethnic groups have a genetic basis: Jews being intelligent, Chinese being intelligent but not creative because of selection for conformity, and Indians being servile because of selection under caste endogamy.[101] Regarding intelligence differences between blacks and whites, Watson has asserted that "all our social policies are based on the fact that their (blacks) intelligence is the same as ours (whites) – whereas all the testing says not really ... people who have to deal with black employees find this not true."[102]
Watson repeatedly asserted thatdifferences in average measured IQ between blacks and whites are due to genetics.[103][104][105] In early October 2007, he was interviewed by Charlotte Hunt-Grubbe atCold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL). Watson discussed his view that Africans are less intelligent than Westerners.[106][103][107] Watson said his intention was to promote science, not racism, but some UK venues canceled his appearances,[108] and Watson canceled the rest of his tour.[109][110][111][112] An editorial inNature said that his remarks were "beyond the pale" but expressed a wish that the tour had not been canceled so that Watson would have had to face his critics in person, encouraging scientific discussion on the matter.[113] Because of the controversy, the board of trustees at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory suspended Watson's administrative responsibilities.[114] Watson issued an apology,[115] then retired at age 79 from CSHL from what the lab called "nearly 40 years of distinguished service".[59][116] Watson attributed his retirement to his age and to circumstances that he could never have anticipated or desired.[117][118][119]
In 2008, Watson was appointed chancellor emeritus of CSHL,[120][121] but continued to advise and guide project work at the laboratory.[122] In a BBC documentary that year, Watson said that he did not see himself as a racist.[123] In January 2019, following the broadcast of a television documentary made the previous year in which he repeated his views about race and genetics, CSHL revoked honorary titles that it had awarded to Watson and cut all remaining ties with him.[124][125][126] Watson did not respond to the developments.[127]
Criticism and legacy
Critics and elements of the general public have considered his scientific positions to be racist, sexist and unacceptable.[128][129] Writing forTime, Jeffery Kluger contrasts Watson's scientific legacy, giving rise to modern research and technology, with the legacy of his racist and sexist comments, and questions if the former can be lauded without endorsing the latter.[130] Writing about Watson's relationship toeugenics, legal historianPaul Lombardo said that his legacy is complex, having opposed state-sponsored programs offorced sterilization, only to be undermined by his own repeated allegations that racism was genetically justified.[131]
Watson and Elizabeth Lewis married in 1968.[1] They had two sons, Rufus Robert Watson (b. 1970) and Duncan James Watson (b. 1972). Watson sometimes talked about his son Rufus, who hasschizophrenia, seeking to encourage progress in the understanding and treatment of mental illness by determining how genetics contributes to it.[122]
Watson died inEast Northport, New York, on November 6, 2025, a week after being transferred to hospice care following treatment for an infection. He was 97.[57] After his death,The New York Times called Watson one of the most important scientists of the 20th century while also acknowledging the controversy behind his racial views.[57] TheBBC noted that Watson's works "opened the door" to help explain how DNA replicates and carries genetic information while also "setting the stage for rapid advances in molecular biology".[134]
^Putnum, Frank W. (1994).Biographical Memoirs – Felix Haurowitz (volume 64 ed.). Washington, D.C.: The National Academies Press. pp. 134–163.ISBN0-309-06978-5.Among [Haurowitz's] students was Jim Watson, then a graduate student of Luria.
^Judson, Horace Freeland (1979)."2".The eighth day of creation: makers of the revolution in biology (1st Touchstone ed.). New York: Simon and Schuster.ISBN0-671-22540-5.
^Olby, Robert (2009). "10".Francis Crick: hunter of life's secrets. Cold Spring Harbor, New York: Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press. p. 181.ISBN978-0-87969-798-3.
^Judson, H. F. (1996).The Eighth Day of Creation: Makers of the Revolution in Biology. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, chapter 3.ISBN0-87969-478-5.
^Watson's 1968 autobiographical account,The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA. For an edition which contains critical responses, book reviews, and copies of the original scientific papers, see James D. Watson,The Double Helix: A Personal Account of the Discovery of the Structure of DNA, Norton Critical Edition, Gunther Stent, ed. (New York: Norton, 1980).
^Watson, James D. (2012). Witkowski, Jan; Gann, Alexander (eds.).The annotated and illustrated double helix (1st Simon & Schuster hardcover ed.). New York: Simon & Schuster.ISBN978-1-476715-49-0.
^Crow, David (November 28, 2014)."James Watson to sell Nobel Prize medal".Financial Times. Archived fromthe original on December 10, 2022. RetrievedDecember 1, 2014.'Because I was an "unperson" I was fired from the boards of companies, so I have no income, apart from my academic income,' he said.
^Jones, Bryony (November 26, 2014)."DNA pioneer James Watson to sell Nobel Prize".CNN International World News. CNN. RetrievedNovember 30, 2014.Watson says he intends to use part of the money raised by the sale to fund projects at the universities and scientific research institutions he has worked at throughout his career.
^Crawford, Hayley."Short Sharp Science: James Watson menaced by hoodies shouting 'racist!'".New Scientist. Archived fromthe original on January 10, 2018. RetrievedApril 24, 2014.... he was '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'.
^"Watson Returns to USA after race row",International Herald Tribune, October 19, 2007.
^Watson, James (September–October 2007)."'Blinded by Science'. An exclusive excerpt from Watson's new memoir,Avoid Boring People: Lessons from a Life in Science".02138 Magazine: 102. Archived fromthe original on October 24, 2007. RetrievedNovember 28, 2007.As we find the human genes whose malfunctioning gives rise to such devastating developmental failures, we may well discover that sequence differences within many of them also lead to much of the observable variation in human IQs. A priori, 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 desire to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so.
^"Notable Signers".Humanism and Its Aspirations. American Humanist Association. Archived fromthe original on October 5, 2012. RetrievedOctober 4, 2012.
^abAnon (1981)."Dr James Watson ForMemRS".royalsociety.org. London:Royal Society. Archived fromthe original on November 17, 2015. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:
^O'Dowd, Niall."He Helped Map the Structure of DNA. Up Next is a Cure For Cancer",Irish America magazine, March 10, 2011. Accessed March 22, 2011. "James Watson helped unravel the structure of DNA, a feat so stunning that it is considered the greatest scientific achievement of the 20th century. "
Inglis, J.; Sambrook, J. & Witkowski, J. A. (eds.);Inspiring Science: Jim Watson and the Age of DNA; Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press, 2003;ISBN978-0-87969-698-6.
Judson, H. F. (1996);The Eighth Day of Creation: Makers of the Revolution in Biology, Expanded edition; Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Press;ISBN0-87969-478-5.
Robert Olby (1974);The Path to The Double Helix: Discovery of DNA; London:MacMillan;ISBN0-486-68117-3; Definitive DNA textbook, with foreword by Francis Crick, revised in 1994 with a 9-page postscript
Watson, J. D.; Baker, T. A.; Bell, S. P.; Gann, A.; Levine, M.; Losick, R. (2003).Molecular Biology of the Gene (5th ed.). New York: Benjamin Cummings.ISBN0-8053-4635-X.
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