Watson and Crick spent the 40s trying every dirty trick in the book to make sure they came out ahead Watson buddying up to Franklin's partner Maurice Wilkins to spy on them, Crick trying to become the mentor of Pauling's son when he came to the UK as an undergrad to spy on him
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Now, many years later, they were world famous and finally hanging out with their former idol/rival, who was on his downhill slide from losing interest in science and becoming a fruitcake Already beginning to shift to his new field of interest, which is how vitamin C cures cancer
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And also there was this old weird hobo John Steinbeck sitting there deliberately underdressed for the occasion and very obviously having no idea what any of them were talking about
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Watson reported it as a deeply surreal scene worthy of adapting into a stage play in and of itself
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Replying to @arthur_affect @IKacprzak
This almost sounds like it has Poe Party energy
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Replying to @Nymphomachy @IKacprzak
It's funny because Steinbeck's acceptance speech is actually him saying "I don't feel like I belong among all these smart people, but that's okay because real literature isn't about being smart, it's about ACTUALLY WORKING A REAL JOB IN REAL LIFE"
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In more diplomatic terms, but you know (A very masculine writer sentiment and one I think you'd be averse to even though you've certainly had a real job by Steinbeck standards)
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It goes on to be this highfalutin thing about how all the other geniuses here have certainly made mankind more powerful but we haven't exactly made progress in becoming more humane and if we can't do that then what's the point of all this
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It's this interesting historical moment since Pauling absolutely was trying to do that and switch from being an academic to an activist but then burned down his reputation because he caught hippie brain worms in the process
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Meanwhile James Watson was just like fuck it His later career didn't involve much actual research but did involve sitting on the boards of companies like Monsanto to give them science cred and tell everyone he approved of studying DNA to benefit capitalism
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There's this speech he gave at a conference about the use of genetic engineering in industry and the controversy over patenting genetic sequences "People like to accuse scientists of playing God. Well, the way I see it, somebody has to"
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