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DNA discoverer seeks to downplay race comments

US scientist James Watson poses behind a model of the DNA double helix at an exhibition in Berlin, Germany, on Oct. 11, 2004. PHOTO: AP

James Watson, the 79-year-old scientific icon made famous by his work in DNA, has set off an international furor with comments to a London newspaper about intelligence levels among blacks.

The renowned Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where Watson served as chancellor, suspended his administrative responsibilities on Thursday following the outcry, the laboratory said in a news release.

Watson has a history of provocative statements about social implications of science. But several friends said on Thursday he is no racist.

And Watson, who won a Nobel Prize in 1962 for co-discovering the structure of DNA, apologized and says he is "mortified."

A profile of Watson in the Sunday Times Magazine of London quoted him as saying that he's "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."

While he hopes everyone is equal, "people who have to deal with black employees find this is not true," Watson is quoted as saying. He also said people should not be discriminated against on the basis of color, because "there are many people of color who are very talented."

The comments, reprinted on Wednesday in a front-page article in another British newspaper, the Independent, provoked a sharp reaction.

London's Science Museum canceled a sold-out lecture he was to give there yesterday. The mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, said his comments "represent racist propaganda masquerading as scientific fact ... That a man of such academic distinction could make such ignorant comments, which are utterly offensive and incorrect and give succor to the most backward in our society, demonstrates why racism still has to be fought."

In the US, the Federation of American Scientists said it was outraged that Watson "chose to use his unique stature to promote personal prejudices that are racist, vicious and unsupported by science."

And Watson's employer said he was not speaking for the Cold Spring Harbor research facility on Long Island, where the board and administration "vehemently disagree with these statements and are bewildered and saddened if he indeed made such comments."

Watson is in Britain to promote his new book, Avoid Boring People, and a publicist for his British publisher provided this statement on Thursday to the press:

"I am mortified about what has happened," Watson said. "More importantly, I cannot understand how I could have said what I am quoted as having said."

"I can certainly understand why people, reading those words, have reacted in the ways they have. 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. That is not what I meant. More importantly from my point of view, there is no scientific basis for such a belief," the statement said.

Kate Farquhar-Thomson, Watson's publicist, would not address whether Watson was suggesting he was misquoted.

"You have the statement. That's it, I'm afraid," she said.

A spokesman for the Sunday Times said that the interview with Watson was recorded and that the newspaper stood by the story.

Watson's new book also touches on possible racial differences in IQ, though it doesn't go as far as the newspaper interview.

In the book, Watson raises the prospect of discovering genes that significantly affect intelligence.

"There is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically," Watson wrote. "Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so."
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