…and this is a 
Spiegel has a wonderful interview with Venter. The more I hear from Venter, the more I like him; he's very much a no-BS sort of fellow. He's the guy who really drove the human genome project to completion, and he's entirely open about explaining that its medical significance was grossly overstated.
SPIEGEL: So the significance of the genome isn't so great after all?
Venter: Not at all. I can tell you from my own experience. I put my own genome on the Internet. People had the notion this was the scariest thing out there. But what happened? Nothing.
There really was a lot of hysteria in the early days about how the insurance companies would abuse the information in the genome, and there was also the GATTACA dystopia. None of it has, and I daresay none of it will, come to pass.
Venter: That's what you say. And what else have I learned from my genome? Very little. We couldn't even be certain from my genome what my eye color was. Isn't that sad? Everyone was looking for miracle 'yes/no' answers in the genome. "Yes, you'll have cancer." Or "No, you won't have cancer." But that's just not the way it is.
SPIEGEL: So the Human Genome Project has had very little medical benefits so far?
Venter: Close to zero to put it precisely.
SPIEGEL: Did it at least provide us with some new knowledge?
Venter: It certainly has. Eleven years ago, we didn't even know how many genes humans have. Many estimated that number at 100,000, and some went as high as 300,000. We made a lot of enemies when we claimed that there appeared to be considerably fewer -- probably closer to the neighborhood of 40,000! And then we found out that there are only half as many. I was just in Stockholm for the 200th anniversary of the Karolinska Institute. The first presentation was about the many achievements the decoding of the genome has brought. Then I spoke and said that this century will be remembered for how little, and not how much, happened in this field.
Hmmm…I seem to recall that Venter's company was one that was trying to patent an inflated number of genes, which contradicts what he's claiming here. But otherwise, yes, the HGP isn't yet a source of useful medical information, but it's a trove of scientific information; I'd also add that the technology race put a lot of useful techniques in our hands.
Venter: Exactly. Why did people think there were so many human genes? It's because they thought there was going to be one gene for each human trait. And if you want to cure greed, you change the greed gene, right? Or the envy gene, which is probably far more dangerous. But it turns out that we're pretty complex. If you want to find out why someone gets Alzheimer's or cancer, then it is not enough to look at one gene. To do so, we have to have the whole picture. It's like saying you want to explore Valencia and the only thing you can see is this table. You see a little rust, but that tells you nothing about Valencia other than that the air is maybe salty. That's where we are with the genome. We know nothing.
Exactly! Traits are products of overlapping networks of genes. Venter also explains that a lot of the effects of genes are developmental, so you can't expect to be able to take a pill to correct something that went wrong in the assembly process in the embryo.
Here's my favorite exchange from the interview.
Venter: Yes, and I find them frightening. I can read your genome, you know? Nobody's been able to do that in history before. But that is not about God-like powers, it's about scientific power. The real problem is that the understanding of science in our society is so shallow. In the future, if we want to have enough water, enough food and enough energy without totally destroying our planet, then we will have to be dependent on good science.
SPIEGEL: Some scientist don't rule out a belief in God. Francis Collins, for example ...
Venter: ... That's his issue to reconcile, not mine. For me, it's either faith or science - you can't have both.
SPIEGEL: So you don't consider Collins to be a true scientist?
Venter: Let's just say he's a government administrator.
Oh, snap.
Life Science
Comments
Posted by: Steve LaBonne
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July 30, 2010 11:51 AM
Oh my, that last bit had to leave not just a mark, but a huge welt.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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July 30, 2010 11:53 AM
Somewhere, a frozen waterfall just shattered.
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:55 AM
Haha! The last line was great.
You may also call him accomodationist in chief.
Posted by: mikka
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July 30, 2010 12:05 PM
He'll be the Eldon Tyrell of our generation.
Posted by: te24hours
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July 30, 2010 12:09 PM
That's a sad attitude. I don't know anything about Collins, and I don't care. But when it comes to science, who gives a shit what a person believes? It should be about the results! If the result is good, peer reviewed, and reproducible, I don't care if it was done by someone who thinks David Copperfield made the Statue of Liberty vanish.
For fuck sake, thousands of great scientists have held religious beliefs, and even more great physicians have. It doesn't matter what the person believes if the SCIENCE is good.
Posted by: Cerberus, unnatural product of en-OMnomnom-ification
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July 30, 2010 12:09 PM
Well, I'm among those who believe that private insurance companies will abuse the genetic information when scientists unravel the various bits.
But then, that's only because private insurance companies are in the business of seeking any excuse whatsoever to deny coverage. It's why any half-civilized first-world nation either heavily regulates them or doesn't treat them as first and last resort for coverage. It doesn't mean one should not pursue scientific discovery any more than it means one shouldn't pass civil rights laws for fear of "backlash" from bigots.
And anyone who believes otherwise and is only obsessed with a dystopian future is grossly ignorant of our dystopian present.
And I think the "genome project will have instantaneous medical benefits" shit is not only because of overselling by Collins et al, but also because public understanding of science is generally oversimplified by the mass media and the general population.
Most of the most exciting discoveries are the culmination of a thousand little experiments all creating a body of evidence, but the public wants to see science as something some brilliant person does with a set of beakers that "cures cancer" or something instantaneously.
This also leads to the bullshit sort of responses you get from time to time like "fruit fly research, why would we want to fund that, that's not real beaker science that creates super cures".
The problem is the public and how they are being under- and misinformed about science for the benefit of those who want people to have a shallow understanding of science and other disciplines (economics, sociology, and history are also things that certain groups want to keep shallow as well).
Posted by: jay.sweet
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July 30, 2010 12:10 PM
B-B-B-but, lookie here, there are people who are religious and scientists, so, uh, so uh, like, doesn't that mean you have to um... I dunno. um. Tolerance mumble mumble separate magisteria mrph smrph grumble, ummm....
Hey, Ventner, stop being a dick!
Posted by: te24hours
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July 30, 2010 12:11 PM
Ok, yes, it matters some. But the results matter the most.
Posted by: Scott_SGG
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July 30, 2010 12:11 PM
Since TIGR, I'd always mainly loved Venter for what he continuously accomplished and his belief that we can always push forward.
At the same time, the brashness that made such progress possible was always a bit hard to swallow. Actually, that's an understatement.
And the synthetic genome prong of his work... if it's truly supervised and judiciously used, it's amazing and potentially revolutionary. I just want some independent outside referees (not "regulators", just other scientists) to look over these things as they get developed. This *is* new territory (sort of), so it deserves scrutiny for a while.
On the whole, his work and contributions are a very strong net positive to the world.
Posted by: littleoutrage
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July 30, 2010 12:13 PM
Venter is such a jerk! I love him.
Posted by: Silič O'Nopolitanopoulos, Färschdbischuf Beesknees aus Ulm und Klein Elguth, Elector Pharynguline.
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July 30, 2010 12:22 PM
Hey. A good administrator is worth their weight in gold.
Of course, I don't know if Collins is good, but that does seem to be the general consensus.
Oppenheimer tried poisoning Patrick Blackett in Cambridge, but would we have had the Bomb without him? (That soon, at least.)
But Oppenheimer, of course, was a real scientist beforehand.
Posted by: Lynna, OM
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July 30, 2010 12:23 PM
Insurance companies will begin by misunderstanding genetic information ... then they will use the corrupted information in an unethical manner.
Basically, insurance companies are not looking for information that will improve health care, they are looking for information they can use as an excuse to deny health care, or to deny payments for health care.
Venter's blunt, no-nonsense approach may help to stem the abuse-of-genetic-information tide. I hope so.
Posted by: colluvial
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July 30, 2010 12:33 PM
Well, I would disagree. You CAN have both, just not at the same time. That's what makes an administrator like Collins worrisome - you may not always know which compartment of his brain he's talking out of.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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July 30, 2010 12:36 PM
well, except for the ego thing
Posted by: Jason Dick
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July 30, 2010 12:37 PM
One thing I wonder is if you could get reasonably-reliable risk factors through relatively simple correlations between genes and disease sampled over tens of thousands of people.
For example, we might find things like, "People tend to get disease X if at least three genes out of these five are some variant other than 'nominal'."
This is made a bit challenging because the genome is a discrete data set instead of a continuous one. But I imagine some sort of genetic algorithm for applying and testing random sets of rules against a database of genome and medical information, and then optimizing the rules for the best correlation between the chosen disease and the genetic factors, should provide reasonable results.
Obviously one would have to engage in relatively normal cross-checks, such as training the set of rules against half the data set, then checking it against the other half (in an attempt to insure it's not just spurious correlation). And obviously many diseases aren't going to have that many genetic factors at all (but may instead be epigenetic, for instance). But it seems to me that if we can develop a large database of medical and genetic information, we should really be able to find out just how much our genes have to say about disease (and potentially other things as well).
Posted by: Paul
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July 30, 2010 12:38 PM
It may have an effect, but it will not stem the abuse. There is simply no way to outside of legislation. Insurance companies are in the business of numbers. Even if a gene is only part of a possible causality for a condition, a portion of the time, it's in their best interest to deny coverage (or charge higher premiums) if providing care for people with said conditions costs more than they lose in premiums by excluding said people (and this will be true in many cases, especially for rare/particularly debilitating conditions). It's inherent to the system as part of the incentive structure. Insurance is a crock when it comes to necessary health care.
Posted by: Murtzuphlus
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July 30, 2010 12:43 PM
Lynna # 12
Damn right. But I disagree that insurance companies will abuse (Cerberus #6) the information. They will will simply use it to deny coverage. Take it from an insurance clerk...
Posted by: Cerberus, unnatural product of en-OMnomnom-ification
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July 30, 2010 12:46 PM
I also don't know what's up with the weird obsession among the American public of trying to make science personally responsible for things like the abuse of American-style "free market" capitalism.
Okay, science needs to watch itself and what it invents or discovers or just in general, because some unscrupulous forces could use the massive hard-on America has for "unfettered" capitalism to screw people in new and inventive ways?
Yeah, cause greedy industrialist types really need new and exciting discoveries to fuck over people and destroy the environment. Yup, they are completely incapable of using the same damn industries and technologies that have existed for a long time to fuck over people. Furthermore, it's not at all a problem with our economic system or the insane free-range we give capitalism owing to our existential terror of socialism.
Nope, science needs to reign itself in in order to protect us from more capitalism.
Also, women need to dress more modestly to stop the rape crisis.
I swear it's just a cognitive dissonance clusterfuck.
"Gosh, "pure" capitalism doesn't seem to be working very well for us."
"That's evil to think, it makes you a socialist."
"Gosh, you are right, hmm, maybe it's all the fault of a group I already hate because of Jesus."
"Hey, what about those damn scientists, things they invent end up in the free market, right?"
"Ah, good, yup, scientists better watch themselves. Wouldn't want to end up in some dystopic future because of their inventions...that the same greedy bastards would just misuse as they do all the stuff they do today."
"No, friend, you are doing it all wrong, stop thinking and just suck on this bottle of sacred oil."
Posted by: Cerberus, unnatural product of en-OMnomnom-ification
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July 30, 2010 12:52 PM
Murtzuphlus @17
That's pretty much the "abuse" I imagine, with maybe some additional things like trying to rule inherited genetic disorders as "pre-existent" conditions and then constantly broadening the definition of "inherited genetic disorder".
But basically, yeah, the thing they will do is seek any excuse to deny coverage. Which is what they do now, because unregulated private health care coverage tied to employment is one of the dumbest ideas in the world for any nation that wants to fancy itself a first world nation.
Not really a "science" problem, more an argument for putting Teabagger grandpas on ice floes.
Posted by: Vicki, Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief
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July 30, 2010 12:53 PM
te24hours:
The "his beliefs are irrelevant" answer stops being valid when the person in question tries to make them relevant. We're talking about the founder of the BioLogos [CamelCaps sic] Foundation. According to its own website, "The BioLogos Foundation explores, promotes and celebrates the integration of science and Christian faith."
Posted by: Murtzuphlus
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July 30, 2010 12:55 PM
Paul #16
I suspect I am speaking to the choir on this, but I am utterly, completely uncapable of understanding why the glorius country of U.S. of A (no irony involved) don't have a universal healthcare system.
Posted by: Murtzuphlus
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July 30, 2010 12:56 PM
... and normal people would be incapable. Sorry..
Posted by: raven
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July 30, 2010 1:03 PM
Not going to agree with Venter here about the medical significance of the Human Genome Project.
We will be using that knowledge until the end of time or civilization. The payoff will be there, it just won't be quick.
Already we know that schizophrenia and autism have a strong genetic basis and the anti-vax quacks will just have to sit in the corner and babble on about mercury or vaccines.
The fact that these syndromes have hundreds of genes, most with small effects is also important information. It tells one that it is unlikely that there will be a breakthrough but only incremental progress. Not the greatest news but it is always better to know than not.
Posted by: te24hours
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July 30, 2010 1:06 PM
@vicki, agreed. If you try to use science to justify the unjustifiable, you're not doing science.
Posted by: Paul
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July 30, 2010 1:08 PM
Very, very much so. Of course, I could not say "glorious country of U.S of A" without irony at this point (although that is due to excessive cultural expectations -- doubtless it is glorious compared to many other countries).
Posted by: Cerberus, unnatural product of en-OMnomnom-ification
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July 30, 2010 1:15 PM
Murtzuphlus @21
1) Senate rules deliberately designed to slow necessary social changes and create a House of Lords type situation where decisions are made by the insanely wealthy and insanely wealthy people even more rich people have bought.
2) Any industry with a large enough racket going can bribe congressmen away from solving their problems, bully the media into supporting their frames, and otherwise try and block any threat to the existing monopolies or oligarchies, especially with the threat of "massive loss of jobs", which is traumatic precisely because of the withered safety net including lack of health coverage for unemployed people.
3) McCarthy campaign and decades of fear-mongering nearly completely destroyed socialism in America, reducing the main resistances against the excesses of American-style capitalism and the class warfare against the poor, thus reducing ground-level support and providing opponents with a one-stop smear against proponents (especially effective to blue-dog democrats and other "moderates").
4) Racism. Black people are more likely to be poor and the Republican Party has been milking white resentment for decades. In the 80s, realizing that they couldn't be obvious, they turned to couching the racism in "economic arguments", so that they could be seen as being pragmatic or at least only classist rather than racist. However, this is the reason that white poor people will gladly fuck themselves over in order to protect against the idea that some black poor person would get any kind of help or support whatsoever. The whole, I'll live in a tent under the bridge grilling a seagull in a trashcan if the blacks' tent doesn't have a seagull.
5) The status quo. A lot of people hate change, because people fear the unknown and thus many people will accept a terrible status quo over proven methodologies to fix it, because massive changes will occur which will be semi-unpredictable and might mean one has to relearn new things. The main reason old people tend to go conservative is that they promise a lack of change and many elderly feel that "too much changed" during their lives and they were left behind on learning about it all and they want it all to stop and go back to nostalgic ideas of a time that never happened.
And those are the main 5 that make it so hard to fix the problem.
Posted by: frog, Inc.
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July 30, 2010 1:18 PM
raven: The fact that these syndromes have hundreds of genes, most with small effects is also important information. It tells one that it is unlikely that there will be a breakthrough but only incremental progress. Not the greatest news but it is always better to know than not.
No, no, no. What it's telling us is that we're looking at the wrong level altogether. That these aren't "genetic" diseases, like say Charcot. These are developmental diseases, and you need to look at how systems inter-relate.
Some day, we will have a huge breakthrough. But it won't be by manipulating genes directly -- but by forming the proper higher level abstractions that we can work on.
Here's a simple metaphor: the floor is hard. You can stand on it. The abstractions to manipulate this are embedded throughout all land-living animals. It is simple.
The ultimate cause are the Pauli exclusion principles and quantum nature of energy levels. There's no way you can directly calculate from the basic principles that floors are hard and you can stand on them. You can see one you know that floors are hard that it's quantum principles that lead to it -- but you'd never go from ab initio calculations to the conclusion that falls are hard.
It doesn't even help you to know the quantum principles except in some corner cases.
Genes for most cases are like quantum principles. Yes -- they are the "underlying cause". But they're not the useful abstraction. The dynamics of development are much more important. Knowing them can be helpful for corner cases -- but we won't deal with developmental diseases by looking at the genes primarily, but by looking at development at the level they happen.
Shit, basic geometry helps more. Knowing some of the constraints is good -- it's like knowing what kind of materials will have what kind of dipole moments. But that's all -- once you have the constraint, you can ignore the low level altogether.
Posted by: Dae
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July 30, 2010 1:27 PM
Cerberus (18):
I think you hit the nail on the head. And it adds into the fact that we live in a very blame-obsessed culture to begin with - the ambulance chasers want to make sure you get compensation you DESERVE for having the bad luck to be hurt; if good, "normal" white middle class heterosexual Christians have any problems at all, it's Obama's fault for being a "socialist," it's the LGBT community's fault for "undermining the sanctity of marriage and a strong family," it's those damn evil-utionists' fault for daring to demand we keep the woo out of classrooms, it's the Muslims' fault for the terrorists in other countries; if overprivileged sociopaths abuse women, the women "were asking for it" by being not-virgin/married/wearing a short skirt/wearing tight clothing/wearing red/wearing- ah fuck it, whatever the hell she's wearing/moving "provocatively"...
...That got a little more soapboxy than I intended. The point is, I'M A LOUD, PRIVILEGE-OBSESSED AMERICAN, AND MY ISSUES ARE ANYONE'S FAULT BUT MY OWN. :P
Posted by: Hurin, Nattering Nabob of Negativism.
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July 30, 2010 1:44 PM
Hmm... I don't know that I would go so far as to deny people their status as scientists for believing in God. I have colleagues who appear to be both devout believers, and competent chemists. While I'm not sure how they manage to avoid looking critically at their belief systems, I don't think said beliefs are grounds for questioning their synthetic work. It brings to mind a verse from Leaves of Grass: "do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes".
The trouble with Collins specifically is that he insists that he doesn't contradict himself. He's deluded himself into believing that he can prove that faith and science are compatible, and his efforts to do so are drivel.
I still think its better to have a consistent epistemic framework for the universe, but I suppose if you can keep your nonsense beliefs from overlapping with your science, then it shouldn't be a problem.
That having been said, Collins currently is more of an administrator than a scientist.
Posted by: cd
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July 30, 2010 2:15 PM
I'll note my skepticism about Venter's style and scientific soundness of the TIGR work because I know some of best lead investigators on the HGP side.
Having said that, I do like that Venter's willing to say publicly that the vast amount of the data cannot be assigned meaning and that the correlation studies are largely useless. In my field (development) I remember the eyeball rolling and sighs as the genome crowd P.R. went so shamelessly and ludicrously over the top with their claims of medical breakthroughs just around the corner in the late Nineties. We knew the shmancy statistical linkage methods were weak and the classical genetic groundwork being done grossly insufficient. (Back of the envelope calculations suggested that mutations in roughly 200-300 distinct loci were needed to explain the worldwide rate of schizophrenia under the most reasonable model.) The money necessarily going to get dumped into naive molecular linkage analysis was relatively ginormous and so there was going to be enormous pressure to publish weak correlations that they were going to have foist on journals, then bury those under even more publications as their analyses get somewhat better.
Folks like us working up from particular genes and gene classes realized we were going to have to do the real scientific heavy lifting (as per usual). The sequence is a good thing, but everyone across biomedicine suffers the consequences of the genome careerists' overpromising and sucking up so much funding and public goodwill and imagination.
Posted by: Cynickal
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July 30, 2010 2:19 PM
But... but... but... Fu(king magnets! How do they work?
Posted by: ritebrother
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July 30, 2010 2:25 PM
Jason Dick @ 15:
Actually, that is primarily what is those involved with the HGP are attempting to do. Francis Collins gave a keynote address to the Endocrine Society at our annual meeting in DC in 2009, and he related what progress has been made in their initial forays, which were focused on diabetes. Unfortunately, he had to admit that not much progress has been made (in that only very weak and in some cases contradictory correlations had been found so far), and that things are indeed more complex than even those in the field expected. But the spin was good.
Posted by: xyx
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July 30, 2010 2:30 PM
This is the idea of genome-wide association studies, which have been fairly successful. We actually know a fair amount about the genetics of some complex diseases, it's just a long step to go from knowing a gene is associated with a disease to producing a useful treatment.
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 2:32 PM
te24 the problem with Collins is exactly that the views he keeps promoting are unscientific.
Look at what he says about souls/spirits/"free" will, for example. It plainly contradicts not just neuroscience, but plainly some of the work done at the NIH.
Posted by: mabell_yah
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July 30, 2010 2:44 PM
What? The human genome isn't RISC?!?
Posted by: Epikt
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July 30, 2010 2:47 PM
Sili, The Unknown Virgin:
Most administrators are worth their weight in hot air.
Posted by: Ibis3, féministe avec un titre française de fantaisie
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July 30, 2010 3:07 PM
There's nothing wrong with, or necessarily unscientific about, being a government administrator. Public servants get a very bad rap, but many of them do valuable and crucial work and plenty of them are dedicated to good science. Here are two recent laudable examples:
http://www.cbc.ca/politics/story/2010/07/21/statistics-canada-quits.html
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2008/09/23/keen-resign.html
There is, however, something incoherent about a self-proclaimed scientist who adheres to anything by faith.
Posted by: alex.besogonov
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July 30, 2010 3:42 PM
I especially liked this one:
=====
SPIEGEL: ... How is the microbe you created doing today?
Venter: It's sitting in a freezer, doing extremely well. We'll keep it for the historians.
=====
Posted by: Jonathan Figdor
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July 30, 2010 4:19 PM
Science Burn! Venter FTW!
"SPIEGEL: So you don't consider Collins to be a true scientist?
Venter: Let's just say he's a government administrator."
Posted by: Silič O'Nopolitanopoulos, Färschdbischuf Beesknees aus Ulm und Klein Elguth, Elector Pharynguline.
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July 30, 2010 4:22 PM
Hence the emphasis on "good".Posted by: red
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July 30, 2010 4:22 PM
That was an awesome interview. The guy is hilariously direct.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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July 30, 2010 4:24 PM
heh
Posted by: azinyk
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July 30, 2010 4:39 PM
te24hours #5:
But Collins is a not a great scientist. He's a bureaucrat who refused to change his mind when a better idea came along (shotgun sequencing), and got scooped as a result.
Posted by: heironymous
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July 30, 2010 4:49 PM
"Let's just say he's a government administrator."
Ow... That hurt
For thousands of years, people have been forced to profess belief or be burnt at the stake.
For thousands of years, human beings did not know what we know now.
To believe in god now is just ignoring evidence, something no good scientist should do
Posted by: gregorycolby
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July 30, 2010 4:50 PM
I happened to like this part:
"SPIEGEL: The genome project hasn't just raised hopes -- but also worries. Do you understand those concerns?
Venter: Yes. There are two groups of people. People either want to know the information or they prefer to live like an ostrich with their head in the sand, not knowing anything... From the time of the first few discoveries of gene defects -- Huntington's disease, for example, everybody thought that if you knew your genome, you would know when you would die and what you would die from. That is nonsense.
SPIEGEL: Nevertheless, Jim Watson, the co-discoverer of the DNA double helix, has said he doesn't want to know which variant of the so-called ApoE gene he has -- it could say something about his risk for developing Alzheimer's, and he's afraid of that …
Venter: That was silliness. At that age? Watson is over 80."
Venter can be pretty insufferable, but I really appreciated this. I find the hand-wringing over whether or not we "want" to know this stuff to be infuriating, and not only because we don't. Knowledge is power! Even if it were possible to know our exact risk of developing Alzheimer's or Huntington's, or when we will die, from our genomes, we should WANT that information. Being able to prepare yourself and your loved ones emotionally and financially for future disability and death would allow a marked reduction in the devastation that these diseases inflict on patients and families. The fear and "sticking heads in the sand" is pathetic, because it comes from nothing more than an unwillingness to confront our mortality. I'll be honest - I don't really want to know about my own death or whether I'll develop dementia later in life, but if I had the power to find out, it would be irresponsible not to do so.
The reality, of course, is that we can't do that, which is what Venter is pointing out. But we should absolute mine the data we have for whatever we can get. Not doing so because we don't want to think about dying is stupid. Being ignorant of your risk of Huntington's Disease won't prevent you from developing it, and knowing that it is likely or inevitable would allow patients and families to meet the disease with far more certainty, preparation and dignity.
Posted by: Mr.Nerdz
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July 30, 2010 5:14 PM
I say, putting down a fellow scientist like that?
What a dick
Posted by: James F
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July 30, 2010 5:47 PM
Right, who happens to be a member of the National Academy of Sciences. By that metric, I'd be overjoyed to be in a similar category of "not a true scientist."
Posted by: MadScientist
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July 30, 2010 6:30 PM
I love Craig Venter (oh no, does that mean god hates me?) He's intelligent, very practical, and hates bullshit. He also manages to be diplomatic where I'm never diplomatic - for example, dodging the (flawed) question about Collins by saying Collins is a government administrator.
@James F: Collins' contribution to the progress of the Human Genome Project is *always* vastly overstated - in fact I would say mythical.
Posted by: Katharine
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July 30, 2010 6:48 PM
Venter's on a boat.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORTyaK3d4eA
Posted by: First Approximation, L'esprit de l'escalier
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July 30, 2010 6:53 PM
As pointed out by Oedipus, this comment by PZ before "Tom Johnson"/bilbo/Milton C/etc. came out is hilarious in hindsight:
Well, at least it the dishonesty there was coming from only one person (although Vyspyr appeared at YNH I'm not entirely sure, but the others are confirmed sock puppets).
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 6:54 PM
If being a member of the NAS is such a big deal, James, how about the 90% of them who are unbelivers? Why is this one guy getting the top job and the limelight?
Other than being a...what was it again? Oh yeah, the word is "administrator".
Posted by: First Approximation, L'esprit de l'escalier
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July 30, 2010 6:59 PM
Arghh....#50 was meant for another thread.
Posted by: James F
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July 30, 2010 7:21 PM
Insightful Ape,
Neither point is relevant to whether Collins is a "true scientist" or not. It was a ludicrous implication on Venter's part.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 8:17 PM
If you think that Venter is right about the HGP's significance being over-exaggerated, then it should be pointed out that Venter's own announcement of the "artificial cell" was vastly more overhyped for something vastly less useful (or indeed innovative).
http://itila.blogspot.com/2010/05/artificial-shakespeare-breakthrough.html
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 8:51 PM
Seriously, James? It is "irrelevant" that he got his job through politics and connections, while more prominent scientists than him didn't? It is irrelevant that he keeps peddling his religious doctrine in matters directly contradicting science (such as souls/free will) while using his position a administrator to give himself a veneer of credibility?
I don't care if are an Einstein. If you keep making unscientific claim like Dr Collins, you are not a good scientist. Venter is quite right, whether you like it or not.
Posted by: John Morales
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July 30, 2010 9:12 PM
te24hours:
What would you expect to find if you plotted the proportion of religous scientists over time?
Methinks a linear scale would not suffice.
(Trendlines are not always insignificant.)
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 9:40 PM
Dan, next time you synthesize an organism's genetic material from scratch and put it in there, let me know.
Posted by: john.marley
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July 30, 2010 10:11 PM
@ Scott_SGG (#()
You just saw "Splice", didn't you?
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 10:20 PM
Insightful Ape, what have my ability, willingness or resources to synthesize DNA got to do with Venter's tendency to shit on others while making self-aggrandizing statements?
Maybe his DNA story got good play with the public, because it removed any doubt that there's animus necessary to propagate life. Fine. Well marketed.
But it's a fact that in the scientific world (and among every single molecular biologist I know, without exception, from all corners of the globe) it generated a massive yawn. Yes, DNA is a molecule. Yes it can be sequenced. Yes it can be synthesized.
I recommend the Shakespeare analogy. It's fair.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 10:26 PM
PS: And if his big deal is his ability to sythesize a lot of DNA then he should be called a "technician", the same way he calls Collins an "administrator".
Posted by: John Morales
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July 30, 2010 10:32 PM
Dan,
Really.
You can, of course, support this contention?
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 10:43 PM
John, Do you want this to be about rhetorical flourishes, or are you saying I'm lying? I'll let you know when I meet someone who thought the synthetic cell business matched up to its hype, OK? In the meantime, please show me the appreciative articles. I'll remain skeptical in the meantime.
Venter's clearly a highly skilled individual (just as Collins is). But to hear him criticize someone else over hype is sheer irony. But hey, go ahead, defend him unconditionally...
Science is already full of individuals with large egos and sociopathic tendencies. We don't need more Venters, I'm sorry.
Posted by: James F
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July 30, 2010 10:50 PM
#55 InsightfulApe, my objection was not that Venter was (or that you are) evaluating Collins' qualifications as a "good scientist," but rather that Venter was intimating that Collins is not a "true scientist." We're arguing past each other.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 10:50 PM
John,
This is typical level-headed analysis:
http://sciencehouse.wordpress.com/2010/05/25/venters-synthetic-cell/
Key quotes:
you wouldn't get that picture from the media coverage.
But when not writing in public, this is more typical:
and variations on that theme.
Posted by: co
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July 30, 2010 10:56 PM
Sociopathic tendencies?
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:01 PM
Dan, I doubt we need many baseless claims, either.
Venter's work generated a "yawn"? Sources please? Any reviews in Nature, Science, etc dismissing Venter's work as nonchalantly as you do? You are not making this up, right?
Dismissing Venter as a technician is also falwed logic. Sure, plenty of techs work with DNA at academic and forensic labs. Any of them replicating Venter's coup? Let me know if you find one. Some technician.
What do your abilities have to do with the situation at hand? Well you know, I thought if you dismiss a milestone accomplishment so cavalierly, your own abilities should logically surpass that.
Collins, on the other hand, got his position through politics. He doesn't run the experiments himself, like Venter does. I don't mind if you find the word "administrator" degarding. "Politician" would be equally suiting.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:01 PM
Yes. A preponderance of people with an inability to interact properly with other humans.
There is a reason for the stereotype of the scientist with Asperger's syndrome.
Posted by: co
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July 30, 2010 11:06 PM
Oh, that's cute, Dan. Citations? And what is to "interact properly"? I work at a National Lab with, oh, about 10^4 other scientists. Sure, some of them are your typical asocial nerds. Is that "improper"? Is there a significantly higher proportion of them who are "sociopaths"? Not from what I can see.
By the way, do you know how 'sociopathy' is defined?
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:07 PM
James, when someone peddles unscientific dogma like souls or "free" will, he is not being a true scientist at that very moment.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:12 PM
Insightful Ape,
Respectfully, I did not make one iota of this up. When I say I have not met a single person who thought the synthetic cell was great science, I mean it, literally. It's possible I live a cloistered life, but that life is 99% in science (sad, I know). Surrounded 95% by biologists, of whom about 40% are molecular biologists who do sequencing and synthesis on a daily basis. I trust their judgement. Venter's announcement was met, in private, with ridicule and derision. I did not make that quote up.
To show that someone is as good as Venter, it is not his specific task that has to be replicated. That's flawed. He does not get to choose the bar by which others are measured. There are of course many results I consider to be greater coups than Venter's!
Let me reiterate my criticism, because it seems to get lost in all the apologia: for Venter to criticize others for over-hyping their work is ironic.
His being a dick toward Collins is mildly amusing but not substantive and not really worth talking about - it's just rhetorical flourish and politics.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:19 PM
Badly. ;)
This is the key question. I think the answer is "no fewer than elsewhere". But the main problem is that because of the myth of the "objective scientist", asocial behavior does not have nearly as many consequences as in the "real world".
If this is not the way you perceive modern science then I'm glad.
Posted by: desertfroglet
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July 30, 2010 11:21 PM
Dan, this:
is kinda different from this:
I do realise you're trying to put yourself forward as a superior being, but you're just coming across as a bit of a dickhead. A bit of a dickhead, incidentally, who doesn't actually know any molecular biologists, but might have seen one of television at some stage. Possibly. Although it would have been on one of those superior shows. Not anything common.
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:21 PM
"Met with ridicule and derision"?
Well that anecdote, if true, would make them highly unprofessional.
But some scientists think it was a milestone.
http://richarddawkins.net/articles/472946-craig-venter%E2%80%99s-brave-new-world
You don't have to match Venter to criticize him. That's not what I said. But "ridiculing" him while admitting that if nothing else, his work took "perspiration"? Sorry, that smacks of spite.
And his comment on Collins is "just rhetorical flourish and politics"? Well good thing Collins himself avoids that altogether, particularly the politics part. And "BioLogos"? No "rhetorical flourish" there, either.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:29 PM
Nature rounded up some responses to the announcement:
http://blogs.nature.com/news/thegreatbeyond/2010/05/venter_watch_a_metaphysical_ea.html
The only scientist on that list is Sir Paul Nurse:
Come on, guys. Is there really any doubt that his synthetic cell result was over-hyped..? Why argue over this?
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:37 PM
IA, I respect Dawkins tremendously (and have had the pleasure of meeting him), but I think on this he is wrong.
Yeah, if it can be called "spite" when you believe someone received undeserved credit/recognition. The key word is undeserved. Hence over-hyped.
What point are you trying to make? Whoever said Collins was not a politician?! I was dismissing Venter's criticism: If nothing else, the fact that his last line was a mere rhetorical flourish makes him more similar to Collins. (The very point you are making.)
Posted by: John Morales
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July 30, 2010 11:40 PM
Dan, there's a difference yI think you're blurring between 'yawn-worthy' and 'over-hyped'.
--
Re:
Sigh.
Read the piece; it's pretty clear Ventner criticised the media portrayal of the significance of the HGP as a source of near-term medical benefits.
Of Collins, he said he was "a government administrator".
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:41 PM
"... What it is is for the first time a bacterial cell has been made which is controlled entirely by DNA that has been made in a test tube."
So there is a "first time" to it, after all.
A breakthrough is some times in the eye of the beholder. Molly the sheep was a first time, no question about it. Has it been a "breakthrough" in the sense of changing the lives of everyone on the planet? No.
But hey. Venter is not getting getting into politics like Collins. And he is not using his accomplishments (real or hyped)to mix science with religious dogma and gloss over the inconsistencies.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:42 PM
No, I don't think so. They are free to say in private what they want.
Posted by: moonkitty
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July 30, 2010 11:46 PM
Venter: "And if you want to cure greed, you change the greed gene, right? Or the envy gene, which is probably far more dangerous."
I'm pegging Venter for a libertarian.
Posted by: Dan
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July 30, 2010 11:48 PM
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:49 PM
Incidentally nothing in Paul Nurse's comment sounded like ridicule or derision. And I personally don't care what scientists say in private-if they think public should know, they are free to make it public.
Incidentally have the scientists you are so intimate with being so dismissive of Collins as well? After all, if he is to get credit for human genome project, that was also a technical challenge which had to rely heavily on "perspiration".
Posted by: John Morales
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July 30, 2010 11:49 PM
moonkitty @79: "I'm pegging Venter".
--
Context? What's that? ;)
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 30, 2010 11:56 PM
One last word: you think Dawkins is wrong. Fair enough. I think your friends who ridicule Venter are wrong. We are even there. Except that Dawkins has come forward with his opinion, and they haven't.
I will join you in dismissing Venter's work as useless and hyped if in 10 years it proves as ineffectual in producing practical results as the human genome project. Until then I will keep an open mind.
Posted by: Dan
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July 31, 2010 12:06 AM
@John, yes, that's a fair distinction. I have been assuming that "yawn-worthy" was in this case a subset of "over-hyped". :)
But let's stick to over-hyped. I won't find any evidence for "yawn-worthy" in any reputable journal.
On to the article. The article proves that he is completely full of himself. This statement
is just indefensible.The interview is peppered with jaw-droppingly outrageous statements.
OK, but on to your actual point. True, he dismisses the (over-)hype around the HGP. But he also dismisses the result, along, presumably, with his own contribution to it..? It's actually kind of strange.
It seems what he took from the genome race is "I won". He mentions that several times.
Really, I don't think that is a "scientific" attitude, in any Universe, mythical or real.
@Insightful, Please stop with the putting of words in my mouth. I said my colleagues met the result with ridicule, not Paul Nurse. If you don't want to believe my personal anecdotal evidence, you don't have to. This is a discussion forum, so I share only because I think it would enrich your data set.
About Collins, I have not polled many people, but I'm not aware of any particular love for him.
Posted by: Dan
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July 31, 2010 12:08 AM
IA, Paul Nurse's statement not good enough for you?
The HGP has produced tons of results, what are you talking about?? Don't believe everything Venter shovels to you.
Posted by: articulett
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July 31, 2010 12:20 AM
Dan clearly has more problems with social skills than Venter: I wonder if that makes him a sociopath. Or maybe it just makes him a "big yawn".
Suffice to say, I think Venter has added much more to the world than Dan.
And the evidence shows that a scientist becomes a poor scientist wherever the science conflicts with whatever the scientist feels "saved" for believing in. At the very least, religious scientists keep themselves purposefully ignorant so as to maintain their faith-- just as Collins keeps himself ignorant of the studies that indicate that "free will" is an illusion. Also Collins imagines he's getting signs from the invisible creator of the universe-- no matter how you slice it, that's more schizophrenic than scientific.
I can't imagine why the interviewer asked such a nutty question. Why should Venter care about what superstitions other scientists hold and how is that relevant to anything? Is Collins the best example we have nowadays of how one can be both a scientist and religious? Suppose he believes in demon possession, does he still get a free pass from the faitheists?
Posted by: James F
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July 31, 2010 12:32 AM
#69 InsightfulApe wrote:
So Collins is a true scientist most of the time? You're a scientist, or you aren't. Venter indicated he was not a true scientist, period, and my objection to that stands. Evaluate someone's achievements and criticize someone's positions all you want - in fact, criticism is essential for good science - but don't dismiss someone as not being a true scientist, certainly not someone with Collins' record.
Posted by: Dan
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July 31, 2010 1:08 AM
We're all have psychoses to more or lesser degree. I'm saying we shouldn't applaud dickishness and big egos in science; it's a distraction.
Now you're just not making sense.I'm amused by the fact that you seem to think this is about Venter vs. me. :)
Next time you criticize someone famous I'll remind you that he or she has added more to the world than you have. Because that's how we rebut criticism, right? Attack ad hominem.
Posted by: Dan
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July 31, 2010 1:10 AM
This, I can agree with wholeheartedly.
Posted by: ConcernedJoe
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July 31, 2010 7:24 AM
Re: faith/science Venter was asked pertinent questions and he answered directly yet diplomatically.
Why?
1st this topic is on people's minds and of public interest in th popular press - Venter cannot help this - it just is. Formal commentators abound (example: go to HuffPo)- some downright idiotic sounding - why not solicit opinions from intelligent straight-talking practicing credentialed scientists like Venter?
2nd Venter has an association with a person who self defines as a person of faith and a person of science SIMULTANEOUSLY. This person (Collins) actually ventures to publicly combine the two; not like you do tea23hours (if you are listening) but rather literally combine the two to justify the former! Venter diplomatically and I think very gentlemanly says "that's his to reconcile ... FOR ME [nothing to reconcile]" emphasis and paraphrasing mine. My thoughts are less kind: I think Collins is delusional and/or a charlatan.
3rd there is NO god in science - there cannot be by definition - that is science must seek natural means and methods always. When can SCIENCE say "god-did-it"? Anyone that says god and proper science are reconcilable is an idiot. What one CAN say intelligently is "I get comfort from my faith that there is a god and therefore god has a place in my life" or some such plainly personal statement. Collins does not leave it personal - he is a good administrator (I'll take Venter's word) - no real scientist would write this crap: The language of God: a scientist presents evidence for belief By Francis S. Collins!
Posted by: Katharine
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July 31, 2010 9:32 AM
Sociopathic traits usually entail the person having them being very socially slick.
Asperger traits usually entail the person having them being not very socially adept to a degree to which it affects their ability to function.
Someone doesn't know anything about either one of these issues.
Posted by: raven
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July 31, 2010 9:58 AM
Dan doesn't know the difference between a sociopath and an autism spectrum disorder, i.e. Aspergers.
Dan is a low IQ moron who is ignorant of basic facts. What our society definitely doesn't need is more idiot trolls like Dan.
Posted by: Holbach
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July 31, 2010 10:23 AM
Francis Collins is split between doing science and believing in nonsense. Jacques Monod said it all to Collins and his ilk:
"A scientist who believes in a god suffers from schizophrenia".
Posted by: Scott_SGG
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July 31, 2010 10:31 AM
@john.marley:
LOL, no. Hadn't heard of "splice" until your comment. Looked it up - not into horror. No, I'm thinking about more boring but potentially problematic issues that might crop up. Not fear-mongering here. Just think any dramatically new tech should be analyzed by more than just the group that creates it. That's all.
Posted by: Dan
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July 31, 2010 11:43 AM
@Katherine, both are forms of psychopathy, and both are present in the population. I do know about these issues, I was just lazy and conflated them, because this was not the main thrust of the argument. It got pounced on by people wanting to pick a fight rather than argue the main point. And by the way, would you not agree that science has people with both sociopathic tendencies and autistic disorders?
@raven Does it really hurt you that much that I pointed out the irony of Venter's statement? This website is meant to be full of people who are sensitive to the kind of inconsistency Venter is perpetrating. I thought I was stating the obvious: Craig "Mr Hype" Venter is criticizing the HGP over hype; how quaint.
Despite his disdain for the HGP, he is still involved in many genome projects, including the sequencing of many other species.
Posted by: Dan
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July 31, 2010 11:52 AM
@desertfroglet, your inferences would be wrong. I take Nurse's comment as a "yawn" -- a very diplomatic one coming from a high-profile individual. And if you'd read what I wrote previously, you'd see that I work in science and hear these opinions first hand, not from a TV show.
Posted by: Matt "Nora" Penfold
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July 31, 2010 11:57 AM
It would be better if you were honest, and just admitted you did not know the difference until people pointed it out to you. You will find around here bullshit like you pulled does not go down well.
Posted by: helivoy
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July 31, 2010 11:57 AM
I'm a molecular neurobiologist working on alternative splicing regulation in the brain. Collins was a stunningly disappointing choice to lead the NIH, particularly by an alleged progressive favorable to science like Obama. His in-your-face religiosity will skew directions adopted by the NIH, and so will his clear predilection for large-scale "machine" research.
However, Venter is a relentless self-promoter and the emperor of hype. The TIGR for-a-fee database was not only far from complete but also full of errors. Too, he wanted his EST patent to cover not only the technique, but also all genes and all gene products. This is like someone inventing an oil drill and then saying that he owns all the wells and all the oil.
As for his latest "synthetic life", the less said the better -- but here's what I did say about it, in complete agreement with Nurse and many others in the field:
Venter's "Synthetic Life": The Faucet Drip That Would Be a Monsoon
Athena Andreadis
Starship Reckless
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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July 31, 2010 5:58 PM
James, you just don't get it, do you.
Michael Behe did some respectable work at some point in his career too.
But he is not a true scientist any more. Once you depart from what is testable and become a champion for unfalsifiable ideology-creationism in this case-you are no longer a true scientist. And the same is true for Collins, with the religious doctrine he swears is consistent with science, which it isn't.
And that is true regardless of any merits of Venter's work, or lack thereof.
Posted by: Timothy
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August 2, 2010 6:50 PM
Oh no he didn't! Ice burn burns cold, son.