James D. Watson Quotes

Today, the theory of evolution is an accepted fact for everyone but a fundamentalist minority, whose objections are based not on reasoning but on doctrinaire adherence to religious principles.

Science moves with the spirit of an adventure characterized both by youthful arrogance and by the belief that the truth, once found, would be simple as well as pretty.

Knowing "why" (an idea) is more important than learning "what" (the fact).

No one may have the guts to say this, but if we could make better human beings by knowing how to add genes, why shouldn't we?

It's necessary to be slightly underemployed if you are to do something significant.

We're not all equal, it's simply not true. That isn't science.

Whenever you interview fat people, you feel bad, because you know you're not going to hire them.

The way to do great science is to stay away from subjects that are overpopulated, and go to the frontiers.

Our goal should be to understand our differences.

Never be the brightest person in the room.

At lunch Francis [Crick] winged into the Eagle to tell everyone within hearing distance that we had found the secret of life.

A clone of Einstein wouldn't be stupid, but he wouldn't necessarily be any genius, either.

I never dreamed that in my lifetime my own genome would be sequenced.

Do things as soon as you can. If a decision needs to be made, make it. It gives you more time to change your mind.

A goodly number of scientists are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid.

Science that leads over the horizon depends on gathering the best minds and enabling them to do what the best minds naturally seek to do: pursue the most thrilling questions of the time.

Science has always been my preoccupation and when you think a breakthrough is possible, it is terribly exciting.

There is only one science, physics: everything else is social work.

For all my life, America was the place to be. And we somehow continue to be the place where there are real opportunities to change the world for the better.

I don't think we are here for anything. We're just products of evolution. You can say, "Gee, your life must be pretty bleak if you don't think there's a purpose." But I'm anticipating a good lunch.

If scientists don't play God, who will?

DNA was my only gold rush. I regarded DNA as worth a gold rush.

Biology has at least 50 more interesting years.

Nothing new that is really interesting comes without collaboration

Already for thirty-five years he had not stopped talking and almost nothing of fundamental value had emerged.

I think the reason people are dealing with science less well now than 50 years ago is that it has become so complicated.

Take young researchers, put them together in virtual seclusion, give them an unprecedented degree of freedom and turn up the pressure by fostering competitiveness.

The biggest advantage to believing in God is you don't have to understand anything, no physics, no biology. I wanted to understand.

My heroes were never scientists. They were Graham Greene and Christopher Isherwood, you know, good writers.

If we don't play God, who will?

The brain, is the most complex thing we have yet discovered in our universe.

I wanted to see if I could write a good book.

People say it would be terrible if we made all girls pretty. I think it would be great.

One of the greatest gifts science has brought to the world is continuing elimination of the supernatural.

[As a young man ] I came to the conclusion that the church was just a bunch of fascists that supported Franco. I stopped going on Sunday mornings and watched the birds with my father instead.

Racists have often used pseudoscience to justify their socially damaging views; watch these films to see how science, by replacing ignorance with knowledge, can undo that damage.

If I had been married earlier in life, I wouldn't have seen the double helix. I would have been taking care of the kids on Saturday. On the other hand, I was lonely a lot of the time.

The luckiest thing that ever happened to me was that my father didn't believe in God, and so he had no hang-ups about souls.

I wish there would be more movies about scientists.

The pace of discovery is going unbelievably fast.

Some think there is something wrong about enhancing people.

There are many people of color who are very talented.

I have been much blessed.

As an educator, I have always striven to see that the fruits of the American Dream are available to all.

No good model ever accounted for all the facts, since some data was bound to be misleading if not plain wrong.

Ultimately, we'll help the people we discriminate against if we try to understand more about them; genetics will lead to a world where there is a sympathy for the underdog.

(The National Cancer Program is) a bunch of (obscenity).

I am thrilled to see my genome.

The American public is being sold a very nasty bill of goods about cancer.

You've never heard of an English lover. Only an English patient.