Tag - jon beckwith

AAAS: Sociobiology on the Run

The very fact of the AAAS sponsoring this symposium on the "controversy" is an indication of the success we have had in making the claims of the sociobiologists controversial. What caught many of us in Science for the People by surprise at the AAAS meetings was the extent of the spreading negative reaction to...

Recombinant DNA: Does the Fault Lie Within Our Genes?

I have been doing research in bacterial genetics for the last 12 years at Harvard Medical School and I am a member of Science for the People. Over the last couple of years, we have been discussing in our laboratory how the recombinant DNA technique could make certain of our experiments much easier to do. However, as a...

Racism at Harvard

In the middle of May, as students at Harvard Medical School were preparing for their exams, as many medical schools around the country were completing their admissions decisions, as President Ford spoke of "alternatives to busing," Bernard D. Davis, a Professor at Harvard Medical School, stirred up a storm the impact...

The Social Impact of Modern Biology

The nightmare of genetic engineering and test-tube babies and other spectres of the misuse of science stimulated the British Society for Social Responsibility in Science (BSSRS) to call a meeting in London in late November of 1970. "The Social Impact of Modern Biology" summed up in the meeting title myriad concerns...

Letters from a Political Prisoner

Last spring the Ely Lilly Award was bestowed on Jon Beckwith a young professor at Harvard Medical School in recognition of the work of his coworkers and himself (see "Heroes of our Time", p 14). Jon turned the awarded money over to the Black Panther Party. At the 1970 meeting of the American Society of Microbiology he...