The sensible Mr Watson

James Watson and Francis Crick believe that in cracking the DNA code they have discovered ?the secret of life?. It depends what you mean, says a critic

IT LOOKED set to be an historic event and, of course, it was. Fifty years and one day after he had described the double helix of DNA ? ?the secret of life? ? with Francis Crick in a paper published on 25 April 1953, James Watson was to be in conversation with the broadcaster Nick Ross as the culminating event of Newcastle?s first Science Festival.

We dragged one of our children along on the grounds that he might learn something and, in any case, some day perhaps he could tell his grandchildren all about it. As we approached the Centre for Life, where the event was to be staged, we became aware that things were more controversial than we thought they might be: a small group was handing out warning leaflets about genetics and eugenics.

There was a degree of razzmatazz, the conference hall was packed, a camera was ready to project huge images of Watson and Ross on to the wall behind them as well as a video message from Francis Crick. It was something of a show. One of the avowed aims of the Centre for Life is to promote public understanding of science, and one might have regarded this (entirely free) event as a means to that end. I left, however, with the feeling that it was rather a case of Watson having been treated to an understanding public. Our son encouraged the charitable thought ? with which we agreed ? that Watson might have been a pleasant enough man to have a cup of tea with, or a pint of beer in the pub after the great discovery. But there was nothing scintillating from the point of view of knowledge or understanding. It might have been too much to expect at what was primarily a celebration, I suppose.

The slogan ?public understanding of science? appears at times a ruse simply to encourage the public to be more understanding of scientists. Watson demonstrated (to the gallery, as it were) a considerable wit. He was asked about not speaking to the Pope, when some Nobel Prize winners were taken to the Vatican. His reply, that he did not think it was going to be worthwhile speaking with the Pope, was greeted with considerable merriment by the audience. He had (from his mother?s side) a Catholic upbringing in his earliest years, but had then, like his father, lost all belief in God. When this was compared with Einstein?s attitude to God, Watson simply told a story about Einstein visiting the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem and being put off by the antics of the worshippers. This also evoked mirth from the audience.

So scientists can be funny, even when the topic is deadly serious. The public like this sort of stuff, of course, but it was readily apparent that the concerns of the leafleteers were warranted. They reasonably stated that Watson was not a Nazi-style eugenicist, but ?a society that tells people with disabilities that the fault is in their own genes, instead of in society?s attitudes, is eugenicist?. Nick Ross?s questioning was unflinching and, indeed, Watson referred to handicapped people as a ?social burden?. He supported the notion that two deaf people have the right to choose to have a deaf child, but maintained that a ?handicap? (no politically correct talk of ?disabilities? here) is a handicap and it is ?common sense? that people would be better off without such handicaps.

That was the argument in a nutshell. Of course, the statement that handicapped people are a ?social burden? takes us a long way from biology. It raises questions of value that a social scientist would be much better placed to discuss. On several occasions, when pushed about the possibility of genetics being used for social engineering, Watson merely replied that it was ?common sense? that people would wish to look nicer or be less inclined to illness.

Part of my irritated boredom, therefore, stemmed from the lack of any deeper analysis, nor even any apparent awareness of the deeper issues. I suppose one has become used to the idea that some scientists can point to their scientific discoveries and state that they do not now need God to explain the world. For Watson, DNA explains life, and that is that. He commented ironically that when he and Crick said this sort of thing people went off and wrote that there was more to life than DNA. (Bizarre that anyone might have suggested, perhaps, that Watson?s love for his wife and children ? which emerged ? was more than just a matter of his DNA having been zipped this way rather than that.) But for him, biologically, it is all there in the double helix. Of course, a physicist might ask rather deeper questions, as might a philosopher (or the Pope), about the existence of anything at all, over against nothing, and hence the tendency of an Einstein to think rather more about God.

So, I wondered as I subsequently bought Watson?s new book DNA: the secret of life, must biology stop at the naming of parts and the very clever working out of their arrangement? Well, of course it does not. The point about DNA, as Watson and his co-author Andrew Berry acknowledge in the book, is that it has raised a host of practical, social and ethical questions. But even if the written account is more considered than Watson?s live performance (and the scientific account is certainly accessible and stimulating), the blind spots in terms of broader analysis remain evident.

For example, Watson suggests that ?no citizen be deprived of civil or human rights on the basis of what might be inscribed in his or her genes?; but, in the same sentence, he says that ?legislation ought not [to] deflect our ambition to exploit the full potential of DNA to alleviate human suffering?. What if, however, there were to be a conflict between the citizen?s human right to privacy and society?s ?fight against disease?? Genetic privacy, says Watson, ?should be a touchstone, but not necessarily the ultimate objective?. The blind spot is the failure to take seriously other values in the world apart from those around scientific and medical research.

This leads Watson to declare: ?Surely, given some form of pre-emptive diagnosis, anyone would think twice before choosing to bring a child with Tay-Sachs into the world?. Well, some people do not think twice, because they value other things. Watson states clearly that no woman should be required to have an abortion because of a genetic disorder, but ?the fact remains that screening can only reduce the incidence of affliction, and that is an unambiguous social good?. But this is only the case if you are blind to the ambiguous nature of the social goodness of abortion. (Incidentally, which afflictions? Albinism?)

On the final pages of the book Watson touchingly quotes St Paul, but then asserts his surety ?that the capacity to love is inscribed in our DNA?. Let us hope so. Unfortunately, however, the distinction between a causal explanation of love (or life even) and an understanding of what constitutes love (or a good life) seems to pass Watson by. The consequence is a blind spot to the possibility that our loves and our lives might be constituted by more than DNA (by our love for a child with Tay-Sachs or Down?s, for instance).

To return to the conversation with Nick Ross, Watson simply has no worries about the possible misuse of genetic knowledge. He is optimistic that it will be used to do the nice things he imagines. He would have welcomed it if his parents had been able genetically to modify his hands to make them bigger so that he could play softball better. Where is the harm in that? And he just does not consider the possibility that a state might use the knowledge to select out certain sorts of people. Asked by Ross whether he considered being an expert in biology gave him any greater expertise in issues to do with bioethics, he replied that such things seemed to him just ?common sense?.

Watson might have argued, but he did not, that he is just a scientist, meaning that these bigger social and philosophical questions are not his concern. Instead, he seemed to expect his views just to be commonly accepted. And the worrying thing was that many of the audience (at least as judged by their laughter and applause) seemed to be loving it: life is just DNA (no need for God); handicapped people have rights (but they are a ?social burden?); there is no need to worry about anything nasty being done by anyone to anyone using genetic knowledge.

The assumption was that the alternative views that might be put forward by sociologists, by ethicists, by philosophers, by theologians, by ?handicapped? people themselves, could all be ignored if they did not conform to the ?common sense? of Watson. The public understanding of this sort of science seems to require public misunderstanding of the possibility that there are some things (our shared and disputed values perhaps) more important than the advancement of science.

Dr Julian Hughes is a consultant at Newcastle General Hospital and a lecturer at the University of Newcastle.