Posted on 12/10/2014 5:33:30 AM PST by ek_hornbeck
Russia's richest man has revealed that he bought US scientist James Watson's Nobel Prize gold medal, and intends to return it to him.
Steel and telecoms tycoon Alisher Usmanov said Mr Watson "deserved" the medal, and that he was "distressed" the scientist had felt forced to sell it.
The medal, awarded in 1962 for the discovery of the structure of DNA, sold for $4.8m (£3m) at auction.
The medal was the first Nobel Prize to be put on sale by a living recipient.
The 1962 prize was awarded to Watson, along with Maurice Wilkins and Francis Crick, with each receiving a gold medal.
Mr Watson, 86, has said he planned to donate part of the proceeds to charities and to support scientific research.
In an interview with the Financial Times recently, Mr Watson said he had been made to feel like an "unperson" since a Sunday Times interview seven years ago in which he linked race to intelligence.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
That is a nice story. I always suspect alterior motives so shame on me.
As an oligarch, Usmanov no doubt has ex-KGB or mafia ties (or both) as a pre-requisite for getting rich in Russia, but this is still a noble gesture.
Watson treated like Charles Murray after publication of The Bell Curve, which also revealed the correlation between race and intelligence. Other studies find similar results: Orientals > Caucasians > Negroes. Too bad, so.sad...facts are facts.
I’m not particularly bothered or offended by the observation that the average Korean or Japanese person has a somewhat higher IQ than the average white person, so why do black activists and their self-styled defenders get so bent out of shape about this?
I read that Watson wasn’t, necessarily, forced to sell his medal. He did it, mainly, because there was an expensive work of art he wanted and needed money to acquire it.
Exactly. IQ does not equate to success, which as Mr. Edison said is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.
My problem with Watson’s original remark is that it has no upside. True or not, there is literally no value in saying that whites are smarter than blacks.
All that remark can do is sow social hatred. No upside, plenty of downside.
Does somebody deserve to have his career, reputation, and life ruined because you and others perceive his remarks to have no upside?
The point Watson was making was that all of the aid money we give to Africa may be misguided and do more harm than good because it's based on the assumption that the only thing holding Africa back is poverty and racism, rather than their own culture and mindset. The same point applies to welfare spending in the US.
The Nobel Peace prize is purely political and basically worthless, especially recently. Nobel prizes in the hard sciences are still worth something, because you can't BS your way through deciphering the DNA code in the way that Obama and Gore could BS their way into high office.
Because it would force liberals to admit that for many people being on the bottom is their own fault. They wouldn't be able to blame whitey for black failure.
Liberals will go to great lengths to deny the fact of IQ, but then try to get some black killers pardoned because they have low IQs. You figure the "logic" of that out.
It does not guarantee success, but let me ask you, would you rather have a 75 IQ or a 175 IQ?
Liberal doublethink in action:
When studies show that blacks and hispanics have lower IQs than whites and asians, IQ is "culturally biased" and a worthless measurement.
When a spurious survey on Huffington Post alleges that average "red state" IQ is lower than "blue state" IQ, suddenly IQ matters.
Liberals also love to talk about "low IQ rednecks in trailer parks." I guess IQ matters there, or else it's always sky-high in the inner cities and the barrios by comparison.
IQ testing seems to agree that Orientals > Caucasians > Negroes, but why does it seem that european caucasian culture (tecnology, healthcare, etc.) is far more advanced at an earlier time than any other culture on earth? There must be some other objective qualities we're missing here that dictate a successful culture...
Excellent comment.And the same can be said for Muslim countries.
Here are the uncomfortable facts for liberals: the economic status of virtually every ethnic group in the U.S. is directly correlated to their IQs. Jews and east Asians on top, non-Jewish whites in the middle, Hispanics near the bottom, and blacks on the bottom. Nothing I’ve read or seen has dissuaded me from my belief that IQ is destiny for most people.
Of course not. The free exchange of ideas is important. My point is that in Watson's case there was no upside. Sort of like playing a gambling game where you can either lose or break even. One is free to play such games, but they are best avoided.
And Watson was talking about black intelligence, not just black culture and mindset. Watson, from Wikipedia:
"[I am] inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa [because] all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours—whereas all the testing says not really."
Most of the asians I know are busy serving pork fried rice..
Well, serving pork fried rice or working at a convenience store is still many rungs above running in a gang or collecting food stamps.
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