James Watson's Nobel Medal Sells For $4.1 Million

An anonymous reader writes Scientist James Watson, who has issues with women, Africans, and the scientific community, has became the only living Nobel laureate to sell his medal after it fetched over $4 million at auction. "Watson told Nature that his motivation for selling the medal is a chance for redemption. He plans to donate some of the proceeds to Cold Spring, where he still draws a $375,000 base salary as chancellor emeritus, and also to University College Cork in Ireland to help establish an institute dedicated to the mathematician George Boole. 'I'm 52% Irish,' Watson said by way of explanation."

Comments

Yeah, well ...

[CaptainDork]

... he's Irish, what do you expect?

Re:Yeah, well ...

[wiredlogic]

Just needs some spare change to keep getting drunk if we were to extrapolate from his ethnicity.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Anti-Irish bigotry! How humorous!

The best anti-Irish joke was during the Great Famine where Irish food production actually rose, but the English shipped all of their food overseas, and extorted land rights from the starving. Remember kiddies, if you have to pick a side, pick genocide.

I realize that you're just upholding centuries of tradition here, but the next time you feel like making a racist joke, even about some other racist, do us all a favor and kill yourself. You're a worthless stain on humanity; may your bowels gush out.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Richy_T]

"Irish" is a race now?

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Anonymous Coward]

*any* accepted? Okay. Look at their skin color. That's a rather widely accepted definition that makes them the same race as English, French, Spaniards, Greeks, and even Persians and Arabs.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Irish" is a race now?

Its a joke. Watson kind of lost the plot later in his career and started propounding theories starkly at odds with the rest of genetic science that race was some sort of huge influence in peoples behavior because genetics and generally aspoused some pretty revolting racist views that almost bordered on neo-nazi like thinking. Actual science more or less has looked into the issue and found race is pretty much skin deep, just a few minor adaptions in skin tone and face structure, and pretty much nothing else. There ARE some regional variations, but thats not the same as race which is a concept far more rooted in sociology and beliefs than in anything scientific.

Watson thus has been a laughing stock of the sciences as a result, considered a crank who did make one major discovery, albeit a rather important one.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[alexborges]

Oh for fucks sake.

The greatest ireland gave to the world is the best artists and scientists that shat on the face of the idea of race.

I have not a hair of irish, and i can see this. Why cant you?

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Please shut the fuck up... you are either an idiot or a liar, probably both.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ-e5XjlmZA

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Anonymous Coward]

He's not Irish, he is American. He does have Irish ancestors, however.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[michelcolman]

Woosh...

It's not a joke about the Irish, it's about using Watson's own flawed (or at least ill-researched) logic in an ironic way to link negative properties to his Irish DNA using silly stereotypes.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Widely accepted only among braindead yanks, who seperate the world into black, white, brown, yellow, and the race of Islam.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[Richy_T]

Well, for a start, you immediately qualified "Irish". That should be enough to end this but let's run with "Gaelic Irish". What of those from the same gene pool who are not Irish? They could be Germans, Americans or even Japanese. Many of those genes probably came from the vikings anyway.

"Irish" is not a race. Though as others have said, the notion of race is stupid anyway. All you have are locally adapted phenotypes of the one human race.

Re: Yeah, well ...

[iluvcapra]

The term "Irish race" is pretty well-attested in 19th and early 20th century Amercian usage, along with German Race and a bunch of others.

Race is culturally constructed, and the lines Americans draw with race are historically determined by either slavery and its legacy, or immigration. Skin color is a more important pretext to race now than it was in the past, because now most immigrants to the US aren't coming from Europe.

Re:Yeah, well ...

[tehcyder]

*any* accepted? Okay. Look at their skin color. That's a rather widely accepted definition that makes them the same race as English, French, Spaniards, Greeks, and even Persians and Arabs.

Anyone who can lump all of those groups together and say they share some common identity because they have "white" skin is simply proving how stupid racism really is.

No More Ramen

[Anonymous Coward]

After taxes he can afford cup-a-noodle.

Re:No More Ramen

[Anonymous Coward]

It's Panera Bread all the way for JW now!

Re:No More Ramen

[blue trane]

You'd think he'd be smart enough to realize that selling it would cost him more in taxes than just keeping it. Oh wait, he still made tons of money.

Re:No More Ramen

[Anonymous Coward]

Except Panera Bread is an America fast food chain.

Re:No More Ramen

[davydagger]

somehow I don't think he's actualy selling it because he needs the money.

Re:No More Ramen

[Anonymous Coward]

> somehow I don't think he's actualy selling it because he needs the money.

In his own words, "I have no income apart from my academic income."

Re:No More Ramen

[Anonymous Coward]

Watson lives in the USA

Re:No More Ramen

[careysub]

And in the words of the article he "draws a $375,000 base salary as chancellor emeritus" which according to this calculator puts him in the top 2% of Americans. This is assuming that he had no other academic income which we do not know to be the case. Heck, The Double Helix is available right now in five different formats, and so must being in some income.

Efforts to pain Watson as beleaguered and impoverished are bizarre to say the least.

Re:No More Ramen

[K. S. Kyosuke]

No more ramen spectroscopy for him!

Re:No More Ramen

[K. S. Kyosuke]

This says he's in the world's top 0.02% percent. Unless he has a lot of debts, he's very well off.

Re:No More Ramen

[TheRaven64]

In the last article, there was a quote from him saying that he planned to use the money from the sale of the medal to buy art to donate to various organisations, apparently thinking that this was a way to buy back some respectability. I don't know if this will work...

Re: No More Ramen

[iluvcapra]

He's particularly well-off considering his paying gig amounts to a sinecure.

I'm surprise the Nobel committee allows people to sell their medals. When people win Oscars, for example, the Academy won't let them keep their statue unless they sign an agreement giving the Academy a $1 buyback option on it. The statues all have a little plaque in the back saying, in so many words "this statue is bound by contract and cannot be sold without the written permission of the Academy."

Re:No More Ramen

[tehcyder]

In the last article, there was a quote from him saying that he planned to use the money from the sale of the medal to buy art to donate to various organisations, apparently thinking that this was a way to buy back some respectability. I don't know if this will work...

His way back to respectability would be a full retraction of his idiotic comments on race. But he probably just thinks it's all some Politically Correct Conspiracy organised by black lesbians anyway.

the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

visited upon a man who had the gall to believe differently than the mob and say so.

why people fall for this leftist claptrap is beyond me.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

He's guilty of confirmation bias. He's as bad as Jefferson saying blacks can't be educated because Jefferson never met an educated black man. But since educated black men exist now, Watson's worse. Ignorant at best, intellectually dishonest at worst.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

mod up. He sold his prize because he was shunned for talking about IQ with regard to Africa. There's no way that's off-topic.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

We're a mob of right wing #GamerGate ACs!

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

#GamerGate ACs say no to censoring nobel prize winning scientists -- and no to censoring everyone else

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Brett Buck]

You are probably right about the confirmation bias. But one should be able to make that argument without hounding someone out of a profession. That is more-or-less what happened here.

      I would also note that almost no one here is actually a scientist, much less a Nobel prize winner. So no one is all that qualified to debunk his idea. There are certainly falsifiable points in his premise on race (and probably plenty of research to support it). All that need be done is produce and make the argument, and the issue should be closed. But no, that's not sufficient, he has to be punished.

      This is a classic case of claims of "Science!" being used as a cover for political correctness. More like "Science! (so shut the hell up)".

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

As opposed to what? You make it sound like there is this giant leftist conspiracy when out and out the new-right, third position,. and the right have made it damn clear they want to do even worse to the left, and the left is guilty of no more than protecting themselves. The "mob" you reffer to is the body of top scientists, and if he's not guilty of racism, he's guilty of supporting ideas proven scientificly false. At very least he's promoting bad science. Just because he won a noble prize in one field of science does not make him expert in all others. Many other scientists went on to support things of dubious merit after doing real science.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

I would also note that almost no one here is actually a scientist, much less a Nobel prize winner. So no one is all that qualified to debunk his idea. There are certainly falsifiable points in his premise on race (and probably plenty of research to support it). All that need be done is produce and make the argument, and the issue should be closed. But no, that's not sufficient, he has to be punished.

University of Patras, Greece, few years ago: he was invited for a speech, but our -Greek- left wing ("anti"-)fascists -who don't like facts and/or different opinions-, even if they were not students there, decide that their left-wing truth must be THE truth... (thank God, Greece's future biologists know better!)

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

...the right have made it damn clear they want to do even worse to the left...

What does "do even worse" mean here? Please be specific about what "the right" will do and how "they made it damn clear". Are you talking about something that happened 60-100 years ago?

The "mob" you reffer to is the body of top scientists, and if he's not guilty of racism, he's guilty of supporting ideas proven scientificly false. At very least he's promoting bad science. Just because he won a noble prize in one field of science does not make him expert in all others. Many other scientists went on to support things of dubious merit after doing real science.

Making a few remarks -- and then later apologizing and clarifying -- is hardly "promoting bad science". No one was harmed. Why not disagree and offer a counter-argument rather than censor and destroy people?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

Except your missing the fact that the opinions of a scientist are not equal to science.

Your treating science as a religeon, something men in lab coats say and you unquestioningly believe.

Science is a method. Its not believing unquestioningly what scientists say. Science has standards for ascertaining truths based on observation. Watson's claims are not backed by science, but by his own personal prejudices and political views. That alone is good reason to kick someone out of the scientific community.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[serviscope_minor]

I would also note that almost no one here is actually a scientist, much less a Nobel prize winner.

There are plenty of scientists here. And I don't need t obe a Nobel prize winner to know that for instance ESP does not exist (unlike Brian Josephsson). You don't need to have a Nobel prize to know when a prizewinner is talking crap.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

And yes to terrorizing women.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[phantomfive]

He's as bad as Jefferson saying blacks can't be educated because Jefferson never met an educated black man.

Jefferson was worse, because he had, in fact, met an educated black man. He should have known better.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

"Science has standards for ascertaining truths based on observation."

Since the 1940s these standards have eroded to the point of worthlessness. Look up NHST hybrid, which is a method disproving a strawman with math.

Real science consists of theories that make precise predictions. What real science are you referring to? I am confident no real evidence exists either way on these matters.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

Except your missing the fact that the opinions of a scientist are not equal to science.

Your treating science as a religeon, something men in lab coats say and you unquestioningly believe.

Science is a method. Its not believing unquestioningly what scientists say. Science has standards for ascertaining truths based on observation. Watson's claims are not backed by science, but by his own personal prejudices and political views. That alone is good reason to kick someone out of the scientific community.

For science to work you must be able to state an unpopular opinion and not get slaughtered for it.
I'm not for sure how substantial his claims were but there is no denying that there are differences between races.
How many white people do you see in professional sports? And there is a reason we split men and women
sports apart. An average male athlete would have no problem competing at the olympic level in many sports
if they were allowed to compete on the female side. I've heard somewhere that an average 50 percentile male is
stronger than 90%+ females. Even pointing this out though can get you persecuted and heaven forbid someone
mentions that there are IQ difference between races.
We're talking about a very smart guy that helped discover DNA. If he says that there is a DNA element to
intelligence (and everyone knows there is) and that it varies by race (again, this is a no brainer) then what is
the big deal, he's speaking the truth. Now how much is based on race/genetics is a nature/nurture debate
that we're a long way from solving but the fact that there is a genetic basis to intelligence is undeniable however
much people stick their heads in the sand and try to deny it.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

uncensored internet content terrorizes women

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Brett Buck]

The latter is exactly my point. I would think the man's premise would be quickly and easily refuted. And it was and is.

      But the "community" couldn't let it go at that. He had to be punished for the way he thought, because it made everybody feel better.

 

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

A little attention whore, is he?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[AthanasiusKircher]

You are probably right about the confirmation bias. But one should be able to make that argument without hounding someone out of a profession. That is more-or-less what happened here.

No it's not. The guy has continued to revise his books and memoirs and other publications in recent years, which is more than you can say for most 86-year-olds. He has continued to publish new scientific ideas in recent years.

What actually happened is that he wrote a memoir about his life which was intended for a POPULAR audience, and in the early stages of gearing up for his book tour, he made the remarks everyone's been talking about. Most of his appearances on that book tour were then cancelled, because of reactions to a public figure who basically implied that the science on the genetics of race was settled (when it's really not -- there may be some studies that appear to agree with his claims, but there are about as many that show the opposite) and then made racist implications on the basis of this.

He was not at all "hounded out of a profession," unless you consider "being a public intellectual" a profession. Show me evidence that people have refused to publish his research or took away memberships in academic societies or whatever -- then you can say he was "hounded out of the profession." He wasn't. He did lose a high-profile administrative position, but he continued to advise and do research at that place. He just lost his audence to talk to the public, which he should, given that he has a long history of saying rather nasty things and claiming a scientific basis for them when there generally isn't.

This is a classic case of claims of "Science!" being used as a cover for political correctness. More like "Science! (so shut the hell up)".

Huh? Look, you want to be a "normal scientist" and go about your day, doing research, publishing papers, whatever -- that's great. And chances are if you make some crass or racist remark to some random friends, nothing's going to happen to you.

But if you want to be a world-famous scientist and live in the public eye, you are subject to public scrutiny -- which means when you say something that's not true AND offends people in the process, you might lose your public audience.

That has nothing to do with "science." It's just the reality of being a public figure. It would be one thing if this were a single off-hand comment from Watson. It was not. He has a history of saying things that are racist, sexist, homophobic, etc., and he's been doing it for decades. (He's also, frankly, a bit of a kook in his old age, but that's a separate issue.)

You want press? You get to accept what press you create for yourself....

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

Even if he is correct the people controlling government funding of research (the primary source these days) would not support him in gathering evidence for his theory. The evidence really does not matter here, "science" will appear to go against him just due to selective funding.

I don't even know what he said or really care, I am more interested in the gradual transformation of science into a type of religion we are observing. The PC aspect is interesting because there are UN declarations specifically stating that genetic research cannot discover anything suggesting inequality of races/etc. I do not know whether this is a good or bad thing in the end.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

#GamerGate ACs say no to censoring nobel prize winning scientists -- and no to censoring everyone else except women

Fixed that for you.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

What is this "punishment" fetish? Was he prevented from speaking or selling his prize or posting racist rants on his blog or wherever?

Is this purely a "social" punishment you're so frightened of? Do you want to legislate how society should treat Watson when he spouts racism that is easily refutable by my own personal experience (he said "anyone who's had a black employee knows I'm right about blacks being inferior" or something similar)? But if someone like me says something you disagree with, then it's okay to punish them socially?

Is that the double standard you're espousing here?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[AthanasiusKircher]

For science to work you must be able to state an unpopular opinion and not get slaughtered for it.

Agreed. Has anyone discounted any of Watson's other scientific discoveries on the basis of this remark? I don't think so. And if not, science is still working as it should.

We're talking about a very smart guy that helped discover DNA.

I'm sensing a fallacious appeal to authority coming up....

If he says that there is a DNA element to intelligence (and everyone knows there is)

Yes, that's a true statement.

and that it varies by race (again, this is a no brainer)

If you're looking for the place where your post went from "misguided appeal to authority" to "racist rant," this is where it happens. Exactly why is it a "no brainer" that intelligence varies significantly by race?? I've personally met some very smart people of all sorts of races, and I've met idiots from all sorts of races too. I don't feel like I've accumulated enough data to say it's a "no brainer" that one race is smarter than another -- what dataset do you have access to where you feel like this is a "no brainer"?

Also, you referenced IQ earlier, and now you're talking about "intelligence" -- are you rejecting the idea that different races might have evolved different sorts of intelligence if you're presuming they've evolved differently enough to have different adaptations in this area (and maybe those localized adapations might not be measured as precisely as a test designed mostly by white people to test white people)? I'm just mentioning one of many problems with IQ as a proxy for "intelligence," even if there were obvious differences... which there aren't. When you control for demographics and other social aspects, a lot of racial differences narrow significantly.

then what is the big deal, he's speaking the truth.

The big deal is when he made these remarks, he was no longer just some smart young scientist. He was an 80-year-old dude with a history of making racist, sexist, and homophobic remarks with little basis. And, let's be honest here, even many great scientists aren't always going to be "at the top of their game" anymore at 80 years old.

So your appeal to authority here is problematic in a number of ways -- a guy was recognized for an achievement more than a half-century ago, he's old, he tends to say things that aren't true or well-thought-out in public, and yet you just assume he "speaks the truth"?

Why? THAT does not strike me as a very "scientific" attitude.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

"I would also note that almost no one here is actually a scientist, much less a Nobel prize winner. So no one is all that qualified to debunk his idea. There are certainly falsifiable points in his premise on race (and probably plenty of research to support it). All that need be done is produce and make the argument, and the issue should be closed. But no, that's not sufficient, he has to be punished."

Remember Diogenes of Sinope?

He infamously critiqued Plato's definition of man as an 'animal, biped and featherless' by appearing in the philosopher's academy with a plucked fowl exclaiming to have found 'human being.' The incident apparently caused Plato to add to his definition, "having broad nails."

Where were Diogenes's credentials? He was homeless. Science doesn't care about credentials, just the evidence. My own evidence speaks out against the Watson quotations I've read on here. I think he doesn't get out enough to meet blacks who are intelligent. Or listen to Louis Armstrong, for example.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

So should Watson. Listen to some Jelly Roll Morton.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

+1

The people complaining about punishment for being "politically incorrect" simply want the benefits of social approval when society agrees with them but do not want to pay the price of social disapproval when society disagrees with them. Live by the gun, die by the gun.

As TFS says, the guy is still a fully employed prof pulling over a third of a million in salary every year. I'll say that anyone who's had a white employee knows whites are arrogant, selfish bastards, if it will get me punished like that.

captcha: epithet!

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

Where's the prior restraint, in Watson's case?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

He had no evidence for his claim. Scientists will always jump at the opportunity to attack claims that don't have evidence and even more when they are big claims (the protein is activated since it is phosphorylated vs. this study shows that we have cured cancer).

If by punished, do you mean people decided not to associate themselves with him because they don't like his opinions. Should people be forced to be friends with him?

P.S. I'm a molecular biologist.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

"DNA element to intelligence (and everyone knows there is) and that it varies by race (again, this is a no brainer)"
You seem to be getting caried away there. An appeal to authority does not go very far in a science.
The genetic basis for height (a much simpler question than intelligence) is not even close to being figured out in detail. Besides some extreme cases (e.g. dwarfism and mental retardation) we have incredibly limited predictive capacity derived from DNA sequence.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

His remarks about Africans were in fact based on IQ test results. How is that not science?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

Go and live in Africa then! Why aren't you moving?

Because you'd rather watch the whole of Western civilisation be destroyed by non-whites, than admit you're wrong.

You seem to believe that white people create better societies than non-whites, and that therefore non-whites would be suffering if they were made to simply live around their own kind, in their own countries. Are you a 'white supremacist' then? If not, then all the races are the same, and non-whites gain no advantage from living in white societies, but in fact suffer, due to 'racism', so again would be better off LIVING IN THEIR OWN COUNTRIES WITH THEIR OWN KIND.

Perhaps you should think things through before posting the genocidal propaganda that the Jew owned media has been brainwashing you with all your life...

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[careysub]

You are probably right about the confirmation bias. But one should be able to make that argument without hounding someone out of a profession. That is more-or-less what happened here.

No, it isn't. Watson proved himself incapable, after a good 39 years as Chancellor of the Cold Harbor Laboratory, a publicly funded scientific research institution, to continue to successfully function in that position. Like it or not, carrying out such a prominent, highly-paid job puts demands on a person to act and speak responsibly, with the object of maintaining the image of the institution who trusts him to represent it.

A programmer who can no longer the job he is paid to perform gets fired.

A scientist who can no longer the job he is paid to perform gets fired.

A Chancellor who who can no longer the job he is paid to perform, well, he becomes Chancellor Emeritus with a $375,000 salary.

NB: The claim that it is up to everyone else to debunk Watson is incorrect. As a man of science he had the responsibility of being able to support his assertion.

Sorry, affirmative action for influential wealthy white men does not wash. Nothing unfair here.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Brett Buck]

I don't care what you say. Say whatever you want, I am a conservative, so I don't think it's a good idea to censor speech.

      Thwe Watson case is an absolutely classic case of PC bullying.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[AK Marc]

If he says that there is a DNA element to intelligence (and everyone knows there is) and that it varies by race (again, this is a no brainer) then what is the big deal, he's speaking the truth.

Or just confirmation bias by a racist old guy.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[KeensMustard]

For science to work you must be able to state an unpopular opinion and not get slaughtered for it.

No. You need to be able to present your research without being slaughtered for it. When it comes to opinion, scientists have the same rights and are subject to the same criticisms as anybody else.

How many white people do you see in professional sports?

Heaps.

Cricket, for instance, is dominated by white guys in Australia and England. On the other hand, India, Pakistan and the West Indies have very strong teams - why? Because cricket favours places where kids can play the game in the street. Genetics don't enter into it.

Another example: Aussie Rules versus Rugby. Aussie Rules has a disproportionate number of Aboriginal players, whereas Rugby (in Australia/NZ) is dominated by Maoris and Islanders (Samoans, Vanuatans etc). Are Aboriginals genetically pre-disposed toward Aussie Rules, or is it actually because they grow up playing and loving Aussies Rules (Whereas Samoans grow up loving and playing rugby)?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

Conservatives think it's fine to censor speech they don't agree with. Like the Bonghits 4 Jesus Supreme Court case, where conservatives were very happy that the speech was censored. Typical conservative hypocrisy.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[cascadingstylesheet]

I've personally met some very smart people of all sorts of races, and I've met idiots from all sorts of races too.

And that ... is supposed to negate the possibility of average differences? How?

You don't have to have a dog in this hunt to think that something's lacking in that thinking.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[K. S. Kyosuke]

But one should be able to make that argument without hounding someone out of a profession.

Wait a minute, you would't hound a scientist out of a job if he suffered from confirmation bias? That's like keeping a driver who gets drunk.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[K. S. Kyosuke]

I believe that's about legal inequality, not about politicians dictating mandatory results of scientific measurements.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Rich0]

If you're looking for the place where your post went from "misguided appeal to authority" to "racist rant," this is where it happens. Exactly why is it a "no brainer" that intelligence varies significantly by race??

Because it is a no-brainer that if you grab two random groups of individuals and measure ANY trait within them, you'd expect to find a difference in the mean. That is true no matter what the groups are, or what the trait is. Heck, if you grabbed 500 white people, took two samples of 50 out of that group, and compared just about any trait between the two groups of 50 you'd find differences. Hence the reason statisticians are interested in things like standard error.

Black people and white people tend not to inter-marry. I'm not saying that it never happens - only that it doesn't happen NEARLY as often as intra-racial marriage. That makes it all the more likely for genetic drift to make some genes become more predominant in one population vs the other.

Would you expect the genes that govern skin color to be any different between the average african-american and somebody of european descent? Then why not other genes?

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

Consider the abstract of Genetic Similarities Within and Between Human Populations:

Our analysis focuses on the frequency, w, with which a pair of random individuals from two different populations is genetically more similar than a pair of individuals randomly selected from any single population. We compare w to the error rates of several classification methods, using data sets that vary in number of loci, average allele frequency, populations sampled, and polymorphism ascertainment strategy. We demonstrate that classification methods achieve higher discriminatory power than w because of their use of aggregate properties of populations. The number of loci analyzed is the most critical variable: with 100 polymorphisms, accurate classification is possible, but w remains sizable, even when using populations as distinct as sub-Saharan Africans and Europeans. Phenotypes controlled by a dozen or fewer loci can therefore be expected to show substantial overlap between human populations. This provides empirical justification for caution when using population labels in biomedical settings, with broad implications for personalized medicine, pharmacogenetics, and the meaning of race.

A black from sub-Saharan Africa can donate organs to a white from Northern Europe, but not necessarily to another black from sub-Saharan Africa.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

How has he been censored? Is there prior restraint on his book? How has he been destroyed? Will $4.1 million help him or "destroy" him further?

The hyperbolic paranoia in the above post is ubiquitous amongst conservatives. They see everything as a mortal threat. They're like precious little princesses who can't sleep because there's a pea on a mattress 100 feet below them. Prima donna whiners.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[dryeo]

Come to Canada and publish something in the media calling bitumen tar instead of oil and you'll see how crazy the conservatives become about political correctness. It's gotten to the point where no-one dares call that tar like substance tar.
Conservatives have a long history of censoring things they disagree with. They just don't notice as to them it is proper

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[dryeo]

Wish I could get punished to the tune of $350,000 a year. Besides unlike him, I have enough intelligence to live on that.
Actually I can't decide if he's a scammer or so stupid that he's truly broke.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[dryeo]

His remarks about Africans were in fact based on IQ test results. How is that not science?

Did they correct for leading causes of low intelligence such as malnutrition?
Were the tests culturally targeted? A century ago the IQ test was introduced and used to show that Eastern Europeans had lower IQ tests. Tests that had questions like who won the world series or what does Smith & Wesson (sp?) manufacture. These tests were used to limit immigration into the States as science had proved that Slavs were stupid.
Funny enough the guy who basically invented the IQ test and vigorously backed the results even with people pointing out all he was doing was measuring knowledge of American culture eventually did a 180 and came to believe the IQ test was pretty well useless for testing intelligence.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

For science to work you must be able to state an unpopular opinion and not get slaughtered for it.

true, but thats not whats at stake. This is science, not art, there are real unmovable standards in science. The issue is not that his claims were offensive, but un-scientific. In fact, most of the "science" in racism was disproven long ago, and it was only "science", much because it was paid for by special intrest groups to become science.

I'm not for sure how substantial his claims

OK, stop right there. It looks like we are talking about two diffrent things. I am demanding that science be science, and your letting science be "worship of men in white lab coats". I am sure how substantial his claims are. Completely unsubstainiated. This is the issue at hand. You seem rather sure of yourself for someone who isn't even sure his political opinions are valid science. This leaves a giant hole in your logic

How many white people do you see in professional sports? And there is a reason we split men and women sports apart. An average male athlete would have no problem competing at the olympic level in many sports if they were allowed to compete on the female side. I've heard somewhere that an average 50 percentile male is stronger than 90%+ females. Even pointing this out though can get you persecuted and heaven forbid someone mentions that there are IQ difference between races.

That is casual observation and not science. Thats my point. It also contradicts what you said earlier. While you are entitled to your political views, your not entitled to pass off casual observation as science. As far as IQ diffrences between races, there is no scientific proof. There are a few books such as IQ and the Wealth of Nations, but they are not scientific, as their methodology is horrible.

We're talking about a very smart guy that helped discover DNA.

His discovery of DNA was science. As in he did scientific experiments and proved it using methods of science. DNA is not his opinion. DNA is not accepted because "He's a smart guy, and thinks it exists". This is science, he did experiments and proved it. He made casual observations as proof.

I don't think you know what science is. Its not simply listening to men in white lab coats.

However, if this were the case, and its not, you could not dismiss the fact that every other scientist on the planet refutes this, and PhDs and ground breaking scientists like Noam Chomsky say things almost dirrectly the opposite on a daily basis. I mean by your very own logic, Chomsky is really smart(and did ground breaking research at one point a long time ago), shouldn't we all worship every word that comes out of his mouth. Again, he likes to say political things unpopular with the mainstream. But of course, you'll respond to this with some form of leftist conspiracy, only believing the scientists you want.

The problem with people like you, is you don't rely on concrete logic, or worry about reproducable tests(condition of science), you are seeing what you want to see nothing more.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

average diffrences

again, you see what you want to see. Your misapplying statistics. a few points of order:

1. IQ test is considered bunk, and even if it wasn't, there are a whole plethora of tests, that yield varying results. Its very much not a mesaure like grams or meters which is absolute, and solid. 2. There are no good scientific studies on race and IQ that factor out things like education and poverty, and conclusively prove discrepencies. you don't have to a horse in this race just to see bad methodology.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

basicly the racialists and racialist apologists feel they should be able to attack everyone else with impunity, and the slightest bit of critism surmounts to an unquestionable assault.

Its the same when they say "an assault on traditional values", and the "homosexual agenda", when they really mean "the state is going to stop using force to cram their ideas down someone elses throat". Not only is it a bit of projection, its almost a bit of a conspiracy to attack other people with competing ideas

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm...

The fact that, given enough genetic data, individuals can be correctly assigned to their populations of origin is compatible with the observation that most human genetic variation is found within populations, not between them. It is also compatible with our finding that, even when the most distinct populations are considered and hundreds of loci are used, individuals are frequently more similar to members of other populations than to members of their own population. Thus, caution should be used when using geographic or genetic ancestry to make inferences about individual phenotypes.

Most human genetic variation is found within populations, not among them.

Individuals are frequently more similar to members of other populations than to members of their own population.

Thus, I share little with you, though you are presumably of my race. I feel more kinship to blacks than to whites like you.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

Because average differences are less than differences between any two individuals of the different groups. Often enough that you can't make blanket statements like Watson did, about "Anyone who's ever had a black employee..."

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sensing a fallacious appeal to authority coming up....

An appeal to authority is not necessarily a fallacy. It only becomes fallacious when the authority is irrelevant to the conclusion, and it's not irrelevant to cite his achievements on the subject when your goal is to argument his knowledge of it.

So your appeal to authority here is problematic in a number of ways -- a guy was recognized for an achievement more than a half-century ago, he's old, he tends to say things that aren't true or well-thought-out in public, and yet you just assume he "speaks the truth"?

I don't see any claims of truthfulness in regards to JW's opinion on the subject. If anything, it's a comment against making hasty judgements based on wishful thinking.

The big deal is when he made these remarks, he was no longer just some smart young scientist. He was an 80-year-old dude with a history of making racist, sexist, and homophobic remarks with little basis.

Saying that black people are dumber is not racist if you have proof, even if you are wrong. The defining trait of racism is irrational hostility, being wrong is not irrational.
Speaking of fallacies, according to his wikipedia article he is far from the senile old man you try to portray him as.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ-e5XjlmZA

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TheRaven64]

In fact, most of the "science" in racism was disproven long ago, and it was only "science", much because it was paid for by special intrest groups to become science

I don't think that's entirely fair. A lot of racist ideas follow quite logically from hypotheses that make sense from Gregor Mendel's work. The fact that they were falsified by the mid 1900s doesn't mean that they were any less science any more than the luminiferous aether and other discredited hypotheses.

All science is about ideas that are wrong. The way that you can tell that it's science is that, over time, ideas are replaced with less-wrong ideas, until eventually they're sufficiently close an approximation to reality that people lose interest in studying the difference.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TheRaven64]

Several reasons:

• IQ is largely discredited as a culturally agnostic test of intelligence.
• The studies in question did not control for social and economic factors.
• Even if you accept the studies' methodology as flawless, they showed such a small variation in intelligence that the vast majority (95%) of all three populations that they studied was in the same overlapping region.

Drawing any meaningful conclusion from that evidence is pretty hard.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

The lack of historical perception this shows is a classic example on how the Marxist inspired PC movement acts on mass to clamp down and disqualify anyone's opinion (right or wrong) in their own self-revealed new orthodoxies..

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[AmiMoJo]

As the GP pointed out there isn't a single "intelligence" trait, and your argument doesn't address that. IQ tests measure a very specific ability, and one which has been improving in all races for decades. IQ is affected by many environmental factors too, and it's hard to deny that some races have, on average, much more favourable environments to live in, even within a single country. People can learn to do better at IQ tests with practice.

At most we can say that the evidence suggests that some races are intelligent in different ways, similar to how some people learn visually and some learn through experience. To leap to "black people are dumb", as Watson did, is ridiculous.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[AthanasiusKircher]

Because it is a no-brainer that if you grab two random groups of individuals and measure ANY trait within them, you'd expect to find a difference in the mean. That is true no matter what the groups are, or what the trait is. Heck, if you grabbed 500 white people, took two samples of 50 out of that group, and compared just about any trait between the two groups of 50 you'd find differences. Hence the reason statisticians are interested in things like standard error.

Yes, all of this is true. And I think you've just proved my point. All sorts of "differences" can show up in random groups. The question is whether those differences are significant and meaningful (i.e., not caused by improper control groups or other confounding factors).

The variance among people of any given race in intelligence is larger than variance between races. So the question is whether those relatively minor variances seen between races are meaningful.

Black people and white people tend not to inter-marry. I'm not saying that it never happens - only that it doesn't happen NEARLY as often as intra-racial marriage. That makes it all the more likely for genetic drift to make some genes become more predominant in one population vs the other.

As I also said in my post, when you have appropriate control groups, most of that apparent disparity disappears. And even if it doesn't disappear completely, that doesn't mean that IQ is the sole measure of this monolithic entity called "intelligence" -- there could be many other things that lead to smart decisions and success in life other than that measured on an IQ test. (I'm not saying IQ doesn't measure something, but that doesn't mean it's the only thing....)

Would you expect the genes that govern skin color to be any different between the average african-american and somebody of european descent? Then why not other genes?

We could rephrase this question and say something like, "Would you expect the genes that govern where the heart is located inside the chest to be any different between the average african-american and somebody of european descent?" Answer -- probably not much. "Then why not other genes?"

The amount of COMMON genes between races is HUGE compared to minor differences. Those differences exist. But why would you automatically assume that any particular genes MUST be different when the vast majority of them are the same?

Look -- regardless of all of this, the reality is Watson didn't make a nuanced statement like this, "Oh, yeah, variance can reasonably happen between any group." He said nothing like that. He basically said he thought Africa was unlikely to improve its condition because black people are stupider.

That's not a nuanced statistical argument. That's stating something as a fact, and there just isn't enough evidence to support such a claim. The OP I was originally responding to was arguing that Watson's statements should be believed because he speaks the "truth."

So what I was responding to was an OP who was agreeing with a blatantly racist claim that is not supported by scientific evidence, not some nuanced "Oh, there might be some random variance" hypothesis....

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

No IQ tests are not considered bunk scientifically. The correlations are far too good for the tests to be bunk. The correlation between brothers IQ is higher than the correlation for brothers length. If the test was worthless you would not find that correlation.

The tests are considered politically bunk. Completely different.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

2. There are no good scientific studies on race and IQ that factor out things like education and poverty, and conclusively prove discrepencies.
you don't have to a horse in this race just to see bad methodology.

One reason there are not any good studies is because it's a taboo topic.
No professional would risk their career testing something like this. It would be suicide.
What's left is a bunch of fringe people on both sides that have bad methodologies.
If you want good, rigourous studies then you need to allow the studies to take place.
It's very hard to have a study take place when just vocalizing an opinion gets you
crucified before the study even begins.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

He basically said he thought Africa was unlikely to improve its condition because black people are stupider.

Although this is definitely on the extreme side of things and I don't necessarily agree with it there
is some evidence for it. Google the "lead crime hypothesis". If say the average IQ of africans
is 10 points lower than the average IQ of north americans, this might be enough to destabilize the
region. 10 points doesn't sound like much but it means there are alot more really dumb people and
alot less really smart people which might be enough to halt progress.
Again, Watson shouldn't be shooting stuff like this out of his mouth without evidence but that doesn't
mean his hypothesis is completely bogus.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TangoMargarine]

1. IQ test is considered bunk, and even if it wasn't, there are a whole plethora of tests, that yield varying results. Its very much not a mesaure like grams or meters which is absolute, and solid. 2. There are no good scientific studies on race and IQ that factor out things like education and poverty, and conclusively prove discrepencies. you don't have to a horse in this race just to see bad methodology.

Ah, but the tests themselves being crap does not prove that there isn't an average difference, which sounds like what you're saying.

Insufficient Data

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

As far as IQ diffrences between races, there is no scientific proof. There are a few books such as IQ and the Wealth of Nations, but they are not scientific, as their methodology is horrible.

Of course there is no scientific proof. There is no scientific proof against it either because no
one is allowed to study it so the only books that get written are by fringe people who are racist
and trying to prove an agenda. Whether it's worth studying is obviously debatable but it should
be allowed to be spoken about and studied without being criticized.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TangoMargarine]

What is this "punishment" fetish? Was he prevented from speaking or selling his prize or posting racist rants on his blog or wherever?

He claims he was excluded from academic positions or somesuch. So, financial loss.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TangoMargarine]

Or maybe he just wants his book to sell better. Hmm: http://science.slashdot.org/co...

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[tehcyder]

visited upon a man who had the gall to believe differently than the mob and say so.

why people fall for this leftist claptrap is beyond me.

Paedophiles and child rapists believe differently than the mob. That doesn't make their beliefs valid.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

Ehhhhh -- that's not quite what's being said. Similar to saying "There's no such thing as cultural foods, because the variations of the number of calories that one population eats is more varied within populations than among them" -- well, no kidding. You have big eaters in both groups and you have little eaters in both groups -- but one group is eating nothing but beans, corn, and tacos all day while the other group eats goulash and potatoes.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh oh -- or a car analogy. "There is more of a distinction between Ford Cars (i.e. more differences between the F-150 and the Focus) than there are between Ford's catalogue and Dodge's catalogue."

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[neonKow]

IQ is not intelligence, nor capacity for intelligence. There are plenty of studies that show that you can increase IQ with training and preparation, which goes against what people are using IQ to measure in the first place: genetically "gifted" intelligence.

In your example, the IQ to economics correlation (1) has far too small a sample size, and (2) is the result, not the cause. Poor areas tend to have lower IQs because when you don't have enough money to live, much less to get schooling, you have a lower IQ.

Also, North America is incredibly rich in natural resources, something which much of Africa is not.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[neonKow]

No one is getting offended by his use of "science", and this is severely tangential to his more important point.

And regardless, his point that more current studies that demonstrate differences between races are largely biased, untrustworthy studies is true.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[neonKow]

Pfft. People going on about PC bullying and censoring have little concept of how serious censoring actually gets, and how common it is even in current times.

People coming out in outrage at a popular guy saying something blatently offensive and ignorant is not censorship.

The government making it illegal to say certain things is censorship.

The fact that it's not illegal to say things is why everyone is free to criticize Watson.

And before you call that de facto bullying or some other nonsense that demonstrates how little you know about bullying, consider that Watson saying something so unpopular might be an indication that he's wrong! How else do you think we are supposed to respond to people who are wrong? And especially to someone disguising his personal bigotry as science.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[neonKow]

He got "punished" by not achieving more success.

He's a whiney baby that can't accept that he did something wrong.

If a civil engineer said that marshmallows were what we should build bridges out of, he would get similarly "punished." And unless he retracted it, that civil engineer would probably never get hired again and would lose any significant academic positions he held.

Try it yourself. If you hold any position of responsibility, say something stupid that proves you're incapable of performing your job and see how long you hold on to your job while insisting you're right.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Anonymous Coward]

He's guilty of confirmation bias. He's as bad as Jefferson saying blacks can't be educated because Jefferson never met an educated black man. But since educated black men exist now, Watson's worse. Ignorant at best, intellectually dishonest at worst.

You obviously have little understanding of statistical distributions.

Consider the statement: men are taller than women.

And then you tell me it cannot be true because you saw a tall woman.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

IQ is just a measure of intelligence, and I agree not a perfect one.
That's not the point. The point of the "lead crime hypothesis" is that
if there is a shift downward in intelligence or a shift upward in violence, etc...
then this shift although minor might have significant effects by pushing
people below some threshold. Africa also has the problem of "brain drain"
where alot of highly intelligent people escape and move elsewhere causing
further stagnation. Just like "generational poverty" here in the USA there
are multiple factors playing together but I don't think it's safe to completely
ignore the population's intelligence when trying to figure out how to solve the
problems in africa.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[stoatwblr]

I've lived in a number of places around the world. If there's any difference it's smaller than the margin of error for tests.

Cultural and religious differences have far greater effects (people put up with bad shit because they're brainwashed into believing they're inferior/deserve it/will have a better life next time round), as does access to education.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TangoMargarine]

Sure, I'd agree that nurture has a much bigger impact than nature.

We're just throwing a lot of anecdata around here, unfortunately. It seems like people have quite a problem with, when they see an argument they disagree with, they say, "Not only are you wrong, there is no possible way that you could ever be correct"...and in this case, well, yeah...scientifically, it *is* possible that they're true to some extent. We just don't have any proof of it so we should assume there is no correlation.

Your opponent can be wrong without being an utter and total fuckwit.

(no offense, stoatwblr--you're one of the politer people I've talked to on /. lately)

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[oldmac31310]

Sorry, but this being Slashdot, there are only two races: white males of European descent and black males of African descent ; )

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

I don't think that's entirely fair. A lot of racist ideas follow quite logically from hypotheses that make sense from Gregor Mendel's work. The fact that they were falsified by the mid 1900s doesn't mean that they were any less science any more than the luminiferous aether and other discredited hypotheses.

fair enough, scientific racism is as scientific as "luminierous aether". Anyone talking about either outside the context of history herein year of of lord 2014, is a blithering fucking idiot.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

Of course there is no scientific proof.

Say it again, there is no scientific proof that diffrences between races are greater than diffrences between inviduals. In fact there is proof in the opposite.

There is no scientific proof against it either because no one is allowed to study it

What, are they being shot or something?

it so the only books that get written are by fringe people who are racist and trying to prove an agenda.

you don't say. Its always been this way. Much of the funding for "social darwinism" in the late 1800s was funded by wealthy racists with agendas.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

Ah, but the tests themselves being crap does not prove that there isn't an average difference, which sounds like what you're saying.

So you want me to prove a negative?

In this conversation, we went from someone have "absolute indeniable proof", to "we don't really know, but you can't make a hard stance otherwise". even if there was an average diffrence, you still need to prove that is soley genetics responsible. Then you need to prove that the diffrence is bigger than the margin of error. Then you need to prove that its also bigger than the variation of IQ between *inviduals*.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

No, they are considered bunk scientificly. Tell me, is the IQ excepted as an SI unit of measure? is there kIQ, MIQ, even mIQ? No. Its not. Its not accepted by science. It hasen't for a very long time.

Which is also funny, because IQ was started soley for political reasons. They were invented to for the soley determination of someone's ability to succede in western civilization, and then proven to be utterly useless.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[david_thornley]

It's a no-brainer that you'll find statistically insignificant differences between two samples of the same population. That means nothing.

It is possible that intelligence varies by race,. but I haven't seen any good evidence for it. (I've seen loads of crap evidence.) Lacking strong evidence, it can hardly be called a "no-brainer".

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[david_thornley]

That make sense from Mendel's work? I was unaware that he had a method to measure the intelligence of peas.

Intelligence is a complicated phenomenon, and not really comparable to the texture of pea pods.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Chalnoth]

His profession is intellectual. Demonstrating extreme intellectual dishonesty is absolutely a valid disqualification for working in an intellectual field. Hurting people in the process by promulgating racist bullshit is a good reason as well.

Also, he wasn't a scholar that studied the fields relevant to his reality-free claims. So literally everybody who posts in this thread is just as qualified as he is to talk about race (and I'm sure many are more qualified).

Finally, arguments matter more than qualifications, and his arguments were absolute dreck. I know people who have yet to graduate from high school who are far more knowledgeable about race than this douche canoe.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[blue trane]

"There is more of a distinction between Ford Cars (i.e. more differences between the F-150 and the Focus) than there are between Ford's catalogue and Dodge's catalogue."

Right, so can you say anything about the "intelligence" of a Ford car compared to a Dodge car, just based on one sample? The chance that the Dodge shares the same "intelligence" or "reliability" as the Ford can be greater, for any two cars selected at random, than the Ford compared to another Ford.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

Say it again, there is no scientific proof that diffrences between races are greater than diffrences between inviduals. In fact there is proof in the opposite.

Difference between individuals is greater than differences between races
is not the same as saying there are no differences between races.
There will always be outliers but there is no denying there are difference
between races. There are even diseases that attack certain races more
than others and medicine specifically targetted at those diseases.
Heck, there are traits that are specific to a particular religion like
Amish are more likely to be born with 12 fingers. Any isolated group
will start to have divergent traits. Average skin color isn't the only
difference between africans and caucasians. It would be shocking if
average intelligence, average height, etc... was exactly the same.
Whether the difference is significant is up for debate but there are
definitely going to be differences in any group isolated and allowed to
drift. I would argue that there are probably also significant differences
between the different regions of africa and definitely differences
between blacks living in africa and the ones that have lived in the
USA for several hundred years. The conditions in africa and the conditions in
the USA over the past several hundred years have been considerably
different so it only makes sense that certain traits that were advantageous
in one place and not that other were probably passed on more.
The same could probably be said of the differences between europeans
and americans. There were several selection biases that probably started
it out skewed like religious persecution. It very well could even explain
why americans on average are more religious that their european counterparts.
Sure, there's cultural influences but I wouldn't be surprised if there was
a slight genetic component too.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[cascadingstylesheet]

again, you see what you want to see. Your misapplying statistics. a few points of order:

I didn't say anything about what I want to see. I asked if what you said negated the possibility of average differences, since you seemed to think it did, from the context.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

There will always be outliers

except its not "outliers", its a good chunk of the population.

Amish are more likely to be born with 12 fingers

thats truely outliers. Outliers in statistics are generally considered more than three standard deviations away from the norm.

Whats that? Statistics? Do you not believe in that too?

The rest of your post is filled with bold speculation, and causual observation, and "what ifs".

I'm not saying you're not entitled to your views, I'm just saying its not science.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[TangoMargarine]

Him saying "absolute undeniable proof" does not give you license to say "no possible way that could ever possible be true."

Remember kids, absolutes are never right!

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Wycliffe]

The rest of your post is filled with bold speculation, and causual observation, and "what ifs".

I'm not saying you're not entitled to your views, I'm just saying its not science.

That's kindof the point of this article. So James Watson states an opinion based on
his casual observation and bold speculations and gets railroaded for it.
Here is an interesting article about it: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
Skip down to the "known facts section":
1) No one has a firm handle...
2) No one has a firm idea...
3) No one has proof...
4) As for "race", it's a sticky muck...
5) Like "intelligence", the term "race" is ill-defined...

Note that this is an article that comes out AGAINST James Watson but clearly admits
that noone knows. So a man was crucified for stating an opinion in a largely gray area.
Here is another quote from James Watson:
If someone's liver doesn't work, we blame it on the genes; if someone's brain doesn't work properly, we blame the school. It's actually more humane to think of the condition as genetic. For instance, you don't want to say that someone is born unpleasant, but sometimes that might be true.
and another:
We're not all equal, it's simply not true. That isn't science.
and another:
Our goal should be to understand our differences.
and another:
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.

James Watson firmly believes that there is a strong genetic component to intelligence and personality.
This doesn't instantly make him a racist. It makes him fall on one side of the nature/nurture debate
that is still very much up in the air. This isn't just some random part of him, if he didn't strongly believe
in the nature side then it's very probable that he would have never discovered the DNA that gave him
his nobel prize.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Rich0]

Thus, I share little with you, though you are presumably of my race. I feel more kinship to blacks than to whites like you.

Sounds like you and I have something in common. I have lots of black friends, but I tend to avoid people judge a man's character solely on the basis of a rational argument.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Rich0]

As the GP pointed out there isn't a single "intelligence" trait, and your argument doesn't address that. IQ tests measure a very specific ability, and one which has been improving in all races for decades.

Well, it seems more likely that IQ measures a collection of many abilities that are loosely related, and that all of those abilities are likely governed by many more factors of which some are genetic.

However, my point remains that those genetic factors are going to have frequency distributions, and it is very likely that they're going to be different in different populations just like virtually every other allele that has been studied.

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[Rich0]

Look -- regardless of all of this, the reality is Watson didn't make a nuanced statement like this, "Oh, yeah, variance can reasonably happen between any group." He said nothing like that. He basically said he thought Africa was unlikely to improve its condition because black people are stupider.

Interesting. That seems like a rather stupid thing to say...

Re:the evils of Political Correctness

[davydagger]

Him saying "absolute undeniable proof" does not give you license to say "no possible way that could ever possible be true."

but it does give me a license to say "social darwinism was thrown out ~100 years ago". put this in the dustbin of history along with lumineferous aether

that's one way to get a nobel prize

[schlachter]

buy it!

Re:that's one way to get a nobel prize

[Anonymous Coward]

Having a Nobel prize isn't as much fun as you might think. For example, the TSA will hassle you when you fly:

http://www.loweringthebar.net/...

On the other hand, you do get reserved parking at Berkeley:

http://www.npr.org/templates/s...

Re:that's one way to get a nobel prize

[mysidia]

I think they offer parking as a perk for being a Nobel Laureate; so it wouldn't follow the medal.

I'm not sure a carry-on laptop bag is an appropriate method of transportation for a $4 million+ piece of metal.

Banks must have some high-security methods of insured secure courier for precious specie; one of those would be more appropriate.

Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

What is the confidence rating of that Irishness metric?

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, he's got a good sense of humor, otherwise it would be very depressing to think that a pioneer in DNA believes there are "Irish genes." :-/

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

PC police pls go. There are differences in the genetic makeup of different human populations. You can pretend otherwise all you like but please keep it to your blog.

Re:Errorbars

[CaptainDork]

Fine. Just make sure you don't leverage your goddam ignorance as agenda.

Re:Errorbars

[blue trane]

Differences among individuals classified as being of the same race are greater than the differences between races.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pm...

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

But but, that's how Obama got his Nobel Prize...

Re:Errorbars

[davydagger]

social darwinist police pls go. There is the diffrence between science, and the opinion of one scientist and scientific consensus, of which was proven against mr watson's political views along time.

please keep your unfounded bigotry, misapplication of statistics, and wild conspiracy theories and "what ifs", and recycled propaganda from the last age of kings to your blog.

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

Fine. Just make sure you don't leverage your goddam ignorance as agenda.

Do you REALLY believe there are no differences in the genetic makeup of different human populations?

That native Africans routinely have children that grow up looking like Inuit?

NB that I used "believe", and not "think". That was deliberate.

What color is the sky on your planet?

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

This isn't PC bullshit; humans have only been in Ireland less than 10,000 years-- an eyeblink in evolutionary time.

Of course there are genetic differences between populations, but you've only got 1/2 of each parent's genes, 1/4 of each grandparent's, etc. It doesn't take that many generations for your "Irish blood" to get washed down the sink. The idea of "Irish blood" or "English blood" or any other lineage is just plain stupid. It's politics and history recast as phony biology.

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

But youre undermining the whole concept of European ethnic nationalism! What else have they got?

Re:Errorbars

[Anonymous Coward]

Proving what?

So...

[ArchieBunker]

He still came out a winner? Just like the guy who sold the basketball team to Paul Allen for $2 billion.

Re:So...

[Piripipiu]

Sold to Steve Balmer*

What are the Waltons going to do with the medal?

[Anonymous Coward]

*was*: What's Paul Allen going to do with the medal?
*was*: What's Mark Cuban going to do with the medal?
*was*: What's Larry Ellison going to do with the medal?
*was*: What are the Koch Brothers going to do with the medal?
*was*: What's Henry Blodgett going to do with the medal?

He doesn't have issues

[Anonymous Coward]

He doesn't have issues with women or Africans. Many people have issues with the truths he dared to mention about women and Africans, though.

He sought the truth, as best any one human can. Too many others just didn't like what he found.

Re: He doesn't have issues

[Anonymous Coward]

Nope, he committed the error of thinking he had the Truth, and justified it with his interpretations.

Re:He doesn't have issues

[davydagger]

He sought the truth, as best any one human can

He made biased claims based on his political views, not scientific research. He then hung his scientific credibility on them.

He didn't tell the truth, he flat out lied, using his position of academic credibility to forward lies based on his political biases. Thats fucking terrible. Your terrible too for not being able to distinguish opinion of a scientist, and scientific work.

Re:He doesn't have issues

[savuporo]

His comments have been on the level of "it looks like most 100m sprint finalists are black, i think they might have a genetic advantage to run faster"
Apparently this is a crime.

Re:He doesn't have issues

[Anonymous Coward]

His comments have been on the level of "it looks like most 100m sprint finalists are black, i think they might have a genetic advantage to run faster"
Apparently this is a crime.

Much like yours then.

Re:He doesn't have issues

[davydagger]

a crime, has he been arrested?

Re:He doesn't have issues

[Anonymous Coward]

What happens when prosthetics take over? "It looks like most 100m sprint winners have artificial limbs, obviously they have a genetic advantage!"

Here's an idea for him

[davmoo]

He could use some of that money to set up a memorial of some kind for the memory of Rosalind Franklin, or make a big donation to Rosalind Franklin University.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[tylikcat]

Yes, if he's trying to finance his way into redemption, that at least would be a first stab at reparations. What a creep.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[Anonymous Coward]

You and the poster you are responding to are absolutely disgusting. The man earned his Nobel the same way he was put at odds politically: by conducting sound scientific research. The fact he was ostracized from the scientific community for his research showing there are tangible intellectual differences between races and sexes because it wasn't politically correct is a travesty on par with Galileo being silenced by the church. The modern political correctness movement is everything that has ever been wrong with the world in a different guise.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[khallow]

And if he's not even remotely interested in that sort of pointless and phony redemption, he could do other, more constructive things with that money. After all, he'll still be guilty of thoughtcrime while white.

creep

What has he actually done that makes him more of a "creep" than you? He's certainly no more bigoted.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[tylikcat]

Are you even familiar with what we're referring to?

He used Franklin's data, obtained via underhanded means, without her permission, and then smeared her in his book, The Double Helix, after her death. (The controversies referred to above, while particularly outré, are hardly the first that Watson has engaged in.)

(It's fairly likely she would have shared the Nobel, but it is not granted posthumously.)

Re:Here's an idea for him

[Anonymous Coward]

In my copy of The Double Helix, he apologizes for his sexism and, in my recollection, makes clear how highly he thought of her work and its central place in his discovery. I don't have the text here so my impression may be wrong but surely that is as much as can be expected. Wikipedia describes his apology thus:

In the book's preface, Watson explains that he is describing his impressions at the time of the events, and not at the time he wrote the book. In the epilogue Watson writes; "Since my initial impressions about [Franklin], both scientific and personal (as recorded in the early pages of this book) were often wrong I want to say something here about her achievements." He goes on to describe her superb work, and, despite this, the enormous barriers she faced as a woman in the field of science. He also acknowledged that it took years to overcome their bickering before appreciating Franklin's generosity and integrity.

What more should he do? Apologize again?

Re:Here's an idea for him

[khallow]

He used Franklin's data, obtained via underhanded means, without her permission, and then smeared her in his book

(It's fairly likely she would have shared the Nobel, but it is not granted posthumously.)

Forgot about that. Still think you could find a better ax to grind.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[tylikcat]

I don't really know if there's much point in trying to reply to this, but I'm going to try to, anyway.

Rosalind Franklin is a figure that an awful lot of people, especially scientists (and especially, but certainly not only, women) feel pretty strongly about. She did extremely good work, and managed to work in the field at a time when it was socially quite difficult to be a working scientist as a woman. She played a pivotal role in our understanding of DNA, and meanwhile, the best known account of her, from a professional colleague says stuff like this:

I suspect that in the beginning Maurice hoped that Rosy would calm down. Yet mere inspection suggested that she would not easily bend. By choice she did not emphasize her feminine qualities. Though her features were strong, she was not unattractive and might have been quite stunning had she taken even a mild interest in clothes. This she did not. There was never lipstick to contrast with her straight black hair, while at the age of thirty-one her dresses showed all the imagination of English blue-stocking adolescents. So it was quite easy to imagine her the product of an unsatisfied mother who unduly stressed the desirability of professional careers that could save bright girls from marriages to dull men.

...strangely, he never brings that kind of focus to the appearance of any of his male colleagues. (Nor does he give them spurious nicknames or otherwise belittle them. Or expect somehow that they would "bend" rather than behave as peers. Though there does seem to have been some poor communication on behalf of the department head that set up some of this conflict.) Keep in mind, this isn't his diary or anything that was quoted out of context, this is from a book that he published.

Meanwhile, her data was taken from her, without her permission, and shown to people, one of whom would eventually describe her that way after her death and was one of those who eventually got the Nobel prize. So, yeah, a lot of people think Watson owes her, and a lot of people think she still deserves more recognition.

Watson has a pretty long history of mouthing off in public. His comments about Africans and IQ are only the latest of many (this is fairly well documented on internet, and from a certain standpoint, especially taken as a collection, somewhat amusing. If you have a dark sense of humor.) But a lot of the eye-rolling in the scientific community rests first on the misappropriation Franklin's data - and then, if perhaps to a lesser extent, following up that scientific malfeasance with writing such a sexist smear of her. It's not that uncommon, though unfortunately, for famous scientists to mouth off in public, especially outside of their area of expertise. But you don't fuck with someone else's data.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[Anonymous Coward]

Meanwhile, her data was taken from her, without her permission, and shown to people, one of whom would eventually describe her that way after her death and was one of those who eventually got the Nobel prize.

Oh my! I can only imagine how mad she must have been when that happened!

Re:Here's an idea for him

[tibit]

I think that the hullaballoo about Rosie Franklin is really getting out of hand. Fucking Watson himself wrote in The Double Helix:

In 1958, Rosalind Franklin died at the early age of thirty-seven. Since my initial impressions of her, both scientific and personal (as recorded in the early pages of this book), were often wrong, I want to say something here about her achievements. The X-ray work she did at King's is increasingly regarded as superb. The sorting out of the A and B forms, by itself, would have made her reputation; even better was her 1952 demonstration, using Patterson superposition methods, that the phosphate groups must be on the outside of the DNA molecule. Later, when she moved to Bemal's lab, she took up work on tobacco mosaic virus and quickly extended our qualitative ideas about helical construction into a precise quantitative picture, definitely establishing the essential helical parameters and locating the ribonucleic chain halfway out from the central axis.

Because I was then teaching in the States, I did not see her as often as did Francis, to whom she frequently came for advice or when she had done something very pretty, to be sure he agreed with her reasoning. By then all traces of our early bickering were forgotten, and we both came to appreciate greatly her personal honesty and generosity, realizing years too late the struggles that the intelligent woman faces to be accepted by a scientific world which often regards women as mere diversions from serious thinking. Rosalind's exemplary courage and integrity were apparent to all when, knowing she was mortally ill, she did not complain but continued working on a high level until a few weeks before her death.

Yes, he wrote it back in 1968. So lets just stop with the "poor forgotten Rosie". I mean Watson himself mentioned her often in his book, and wrote those paragraphs (amongs others) about her. Yes, she was right and she was a good experimentalist. Nobody forgot about her, expect idiots who don't read books. Double Helix is less than a 100 pages long, and is an easy read. How much simpler could it be to read about it all from a first-hand account? Anyone who has anything but the most passing interest in the history of determination of DNA's structure would have heard about her! It's in fact hard to miss her.

For everyone who doesn't know what's going on with R.F. these days: full-retard pseudo-feminists got a hold of her and are using her memory for their own devices. Fuck them.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[tibit]

the best known account of her, from a professional colleague says stuff like this

Well, if you insist on picking up such bits, then it's your problem. The book is available online and you can certainly see for yourself what Watson wrote. His account of Rosy is mostly factual. The fact is that she was as stubborn and hard to deal with as she was brilliant. Her work was recognized by Watson in spite of his objectified view of women. Again, I find no problem with such descriptions since they are factual if not very productive. If you don't like such facts, too bad.

The Double Helix was written I think shortly after Rosie had passed away, in the 1960's. That book gives her all the recognition that's called for, I think, and is, again, fairly factual as to what was going on. If people decide not to read a short, first-person account of how the structure of DNA was found, it's their own problem. Nobody's hiding Rosie's memory from anyone. People just decide to ignore it.

Re:Here's an idea for him

[Anonymous Coward]

So she is "Rosie" but he is Watson? Your own post betrays your misogyny.

He has issues ...

[CaptainDork]

... of Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler.

$375k base salary

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not my definition of "unperson". What redemption does he need?

A $375,000 base salary?

[fahrbot-bot]

I guess there's some money in being a Nobel laureate - even having "no income outside of academia" (as mentioned elsewhere).

And is that in Dollars or Pounds?

Re:A $375,000 base salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dollars. Cold Spring Harbor is in New York.

Re:A $375,000 base salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

A $375,000 base salary?

And is that in Dollars or Pounds?

Is this a trick question?

Re:A $375,000 base salary?

[Anonymous Coward]

Pesos

Re:A $375,000 base salary?

[Kyont]

Right, this whole medal-auctioning thing was sold to the public a couple weeks back as "Poor old Watson is broke because he's been a racist ass." But on $375K of retirement income, he can't be all that broke, even given New York housing prices.

Re:A $375,000 base salary?

[fahrbot-bot]

But on $375K of retirement income, he can't be all that broke, even given New York housing prices.

And he could, you know, move somewhere less expensive...

What is the point in buying?

[devent]

What is the point in buying a Nobel medal? I can only think of somebody who want to fraud people, but a simple google search would expose them.

Re:What is the point in buying?

[Anonymous Coward]

The truly rich are beyond our comprehension. If you have that much money, you can end up like the collector in Dr Who with a Dalek chained up in the basement.

Re:What is the point in buying?

[Anonymous Coward]

What is the point in buying a Nobel medal? I can only think of somebody who want to fraud people, but a simple google search would expose them.

Or as a way for an uber wealthy person or group to give support to Dr. Watson without it being seen or labeled as support for him.

One way or another at the least it would be seen as a Museum grade collectible, I don't even find the idea of someone spending that kind of money for it being in order to fake that it was theirs.. that's just silly, they could buy a replica for an unmeasurable fraction of that cost if that was their goal.

Re:What is the point in buying?

[Anonymous Coward]

The truly rich are beyond our comprehension. If you have that much money, you can end up like the collector in Dr Who with a Dalek chained up in the basement.

But just think of what the Dalek chained up in the basement could do for you.. with the right attachments... mmmmmm

Re:What is the point in buying?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can beat eggs and unclog drains then you have the right attachments for a Dalek.

The problem with Redemption

[Anonymous Coward]

Is he perceives he is in need of it.. but doesn't understand the nature of his crime.

Granting one self absolution smacks of self fullfillment or seeking godhood.. which is not exactly a selfless act.

So why should we expect him to do anything other than impress himself.

He's no better than any other headline seeking bizzaro

Re:The problem with Redemption

[BarbaraHudson]

"Granting one self absolution smacks of self fullfillment or seeking godhood.. which is not exactly a selfless act."

Shhh ... don't tell that to Bill Gates ... it's okay when you have more money than God.

Depreciation

[Sneftel]

Who in their right mind would pay 4 million for *his* Nobel prize? I know pure gold doesn't really tarnish... but that thing is tarnished.

Re:Depreciation

[mysidia]

A nobel prize is not pure gold. It's 18 carat green gold with 24 carat plating. That's approximately 75% gold; it probably has approximately 20% silver, 5% silver and some cadmium.

Re:Depreciation

[mysidia]

Oops... I mean 20% / 5% silver/copper, Or 20% / 5% copper/silver.

Re:Depreciation

[BarbaraHudson]

Who in their right mind would pay 4 million for *his* Nobel prize? I know pure gold doesn't really tarnish... but that thing is tarnished.

It would be funny if it were given to the people doing the ig nobels, to be awarded each year in the category "most bone-head racist research".

Re:Depreciation

[crunchygranola]

Who in their right mind would pay 4 million for *his* Nobel prize? I know pure gold doesn't really tarnish... but that thing is tarnished.

Upthread the interesting theory is offered that the fix was in, and this was a way for rich fan of Watson's unsavory remarks to kick some money his way. The buyer was anonymous of course. It would be interesting to learn if the medal is eventually loaned back to him, or to CSHL, for display only of course.

Re:Depreciation

[Anonymous Coward]

? que ?
um, if some rich fiends of watson want to give him money on the down-low, WHY resort to a PUBLIC trick to do so ? ? ?
no, that makes no sense...

Re:Depreciation

[crunchygranola]

The mass purchase of books written by right-wing commentators and politicos by right-wing organizations is well established as a form of support (aka "pay-off") is well established.

I do like the "rich fiends" bit though!

Re:Depreciation

[crunchygranola]

And only two days later the medal is being returned to him just I suggested!

It might make "no sense" to you, oh AC, but the fix WAS in from the beginning, Watson knew the billionaire who was going to buy it.

Hullo

[Anonymous Coward]

Hey censor ... go fuck yourself.

Truth is truth

[Anonymous Coward]

Whether we like the truth or not, the only way forward is to accept it.

Re:Debian rejects game dueTo authors opinion on wo

[Anonymous Coward]

ascii-art console slot machine software

omg, someone fork Debian immediately! we can't let this go undistributed.

Not really so generous

[Anonymous Coward]

He plans to donate some of the proceeds to Cold Spring, where he still draws a $375,000 base salary as chancellor emeritus [ ... ]

So, even if he gave them the lot, he'd make it back in under eleven years.

Something tells me...

[Applehu Akbar]

The buyer was probably not Al Sharpton.

Re:Debian rejects game dueTo authors opinion on wo

[Anonymous Coward]

Is professing progressive politics now a hard requirement for being allowed to contribute to free software projects?

Nope, but trolling or flamewaring in one project mailing list does not help to get the respect of this project. Moreover calling for the end of women liberties is probably something which looks really intelligent from your perspective, but that does not respect the spirit of the debian social contract.

No 1 get's the Noble Prize @ slash Dot

[Anonymous Coward]

Scientist James Watson, who has issues with women, Africans, and the scientific community, has became the only living Nobel laureate to sell his medal after it fetched over $4 million at auction.

Thanks for that, samzenpus. Really. I needed the laugh. Insolent fool.
 
captcha: fire timothy

MOD PARENT UP!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah

52%

[Ultracrepidarian]

Must be Irish on his mother's side. Second X chromosome and mitochondrial DNA.

Re:52%

[Intrepid imaginaut]

I found that comment to be as ridiculous as anything else he'd said. Ireland is possibly the least racist country on earth, and has been for a long time. This weird impression a lot of Americans have of Irish people being racist, as opposed to say the English, seems to arise from the way Irish immigrants were treated in the US, ie worse than black people. To distinguish themselves they appeared to have "gone native".

Re:52%

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you being sarcastic and I am missing it?

I lived in Ireland for four years, and yes they are most definitely racist as fuck. They even find ways to be racist against white people, the ones they call knackers, but that you might call Irish Travelers.

Re:52%

[MaizeMan]

If Watson had a second X chromosome, we'd be having a very different discussion about his (actually her at that point) sexism. ...I suppose the racism bit could stay the say though.

Re:52%

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Absolute bollocks. From around 1998 to 2004 the country experienced a massive influx of sub Saharan Africans, for the first time ever people were actually immigrating here. Almost immediately after that, the country's population increased by about 15% over the course of three years due to Eastern European economic migrants.

Race riots? None. Right wing parties emerging? None. Public unrest and disturbances, widespread racist incidents? None. Actually there was one "secret" right wing neo nazi rally but that runed out to be some Polish lads.

Show me another developed western country that can say the same.

The kids playing happily together outside my window come from every corner of the planet, and their parents get along fine too. So spare us the slurs like a good (wo)man.

Re:Debian rejects game dueTo authors opinion on wo

[Anonymous Coward]

Females should be married to men when the girls are still children.
Allowed in the Old Testament: Deuteronomy 22 28-29 (hebrew).

Not agreeing with cunts makes you look "dumb" gotcha, just like the man who discovered the DNA helix is "dumb". I bet Hans Reiser is "dumb" too.

Feminists should be killed.

Negro have no Neanderthal DNA - less IQ.

[Anonymous Coward]

The negro are genetically inferior in brain development, because they never left Africa during the pre-historic era and thus had no infuse of Neanderthal DNA. The most ancient tribes, that left Africa the earliest are the most intelligent due to highest infuse of N. DNA via hybridization. That is why jewish people have won 2/3rd to 3/4th of all Nobel prizes so far.

On the other hand, the Neanderthals had a more "brutal" physique build, making them less suited for athletics. This is why the negro, being free of N. DNA, win 100% at the Olympics, when it comes to jumping, running and proudly call themselves negro, not wanting anything of the black afro-american "politically correct" mumbo-jumbo. They are also much better weaponed than any paleface men and proud of that!

It is thereby highly visible that each race was amply provided for by the Creator, to each according to their needs! Praise upon him!

Ebola proves low black IQ, QED

[Anonymous Coward]

The present day africans are even unable to comprehend basic "white man's burden" soap hygiene and that is why ebola decimates places like Ivory Coast and Zaire. They eat halachially prohibited beasts like bats and violate monkeys unnaturally, despite being warned and forbidden by missionaries a thousand times and that's how they got ebola and AIDS in the first place. The young black are also known to be extremely violent and not receptive to reason. If you no AK47, black boy, kill thy neighbour with clubs, stones and machete, a.k.a. Rwanda. Therefore Prof. Watson is telling the truth, no matter how much Sherlock refuses to hear it. Sherlock became a drug abuser in his politically correct delirium.

Not exactly living in a ditch is he?

[tehcyder]

I love the fact that he "only" has a $375,000 salary to live on.

Cry me a river and pass out the begging bowls.