Science and Society

That's excellent that he's not angry. It shows he believes in science, and most importantly, isn't greedy or in it for the glory. I sure hope he can get back into science. I know what it's like to lose a job you love only to get stuck doing one you hate.

Class act. I hope someone offers him the kind of job he deserves.

This is a book and a movie, write it, make it.
Selfless men like this are a true rarity.
The guy is a genius with a humbleness that is astounding.
I applaud you. I know there are other great ideas stirring in you because we know the well has no bottom.

Didn't Gore win a Nobel prize for his movie of lies??!! I guess that "prize" comes pretty cheap anyhow.

I wonder what those fish taste like?

This was reported first on NPR.

As an academic, I know how rare this type of intellectual generosity is. I hope the man can find a position worthy of his training, but I sometimes think that those who get out of the research and funding rat race are better off.

ah, could the columnist look at this story with a critical eye?

This is much more common in science than is realized. Two famous cases were 1) Dr. Semmelweis who first suggested a tranmissible agent as a cause for puerperal fever in 1847 was ridiculed by colleagues and committed to an asylum, 2) In the 1950s Dr. Pillemer discovered the alternate complement pathway proteins and committed suicide after being ridiculed at a national meeting.

Douglas Prasher is humble and noble. May he be blessed and rewarded for it. We could use many more like him and less of the type who take advantage of people like him.

Sad brilliant people doing this while someone like Bush with a below level IQ is in charge of the country.

It illustrates what an iverted world this can be.

Also sad brilliant people working low-paid jobs while someone like Sarah Palin with an inferior IQ is in charge of Alaska. And morons like Rush Limbaugh are allowed to bellow hatred on national radio stations. Survival of the stupidest, apparently.

The other three Nobel prize winners should hold a press conference and give Prasher credit. How humbling is it, that in our society, Prasher is now driving a courtesy van.

Note from Ned Potter--

trettione, I'm sorry if you're disappointed. I did, in fact, run across some issues that I decided, rightly or wrongly, were Mr. Prasher's personal business. It took me a couple of days, amid other diversions, but I think the central point still stands, that a man who took part in significant work has left the field.

That does not detract from the work of the three researchers who won the prize. They made GFP the practical tool it now is.

In fairness to them, they were quick to give credit to Prasher and others on whose findings they relied.

Similar overtones to Prof. Donald Huffman, University of Arizona, who put Buckyballs (C60) on the global map and literally in the hands of researchers. Rules are rules, though, and no more than three people can share a Nobel.

The winners, especially Tsien as mentioned in this report, will most likely acknowledge Doug Prasher in his Nobel prize lecture, that should be documented in the history of science. A cruel lesson you need to learn is, to work on Science is a privilege, not a guaranteed right. The first thing you need to do is to find funds for your research. You need to learn to convince those who make funding decisions that you are doing important researches. It is even going to another extreme now, that those who have lot of funding are great talkers, but not necessary good scientists.

How could the guys who won the award NOT share it with him, HE SHARED THE SCIENCE WITH YOU ? If you dont, you wont be able to live with yourself. He deserves his share, please give it to him.

This reminds me of the controversy surrounding Rosalind Franklin, the dark lady of DNA. Many thought she deserved Nobel recognition and yet there were so many who contributed to Watson and Crick’s final understanding of its structure I’m certain the committee was right in their decision. I applaud Douglas Prasher for his work and hope he continues to find interest in science.

Shimomura purified the GFP protein and deserves the price. Tsien modified GFP into a set of versatile tools, and deserves the price. But Chalfie is being recognized for Prasher's ideas and work. Chalfie had members of his lab finish the last step (and a straight fordward one) in Prasher's project. Prasher had the insight to search for the GFP gene to be used as a tracer, and the skill to identify the gene. He only lacked the funds to put the full gene together and express it in a cell. That was not even done by Chalfie, but by two of his students. Chalfie's main contribution was to put his name first in the list of authors.

I agree with Pete “Survival of the stupidest, apparently.” Sad brilliant people, Prasher should go to see Tsien’ uncle, Tsien Hsue-shen and Hu insread of Bush.

Some on here have brought up Bush and Sarah Palin, but haven't explained why they are in good positions but our scientist is a shuttle driver and whether it has any relevence.

Our scientist is a driver because there is an oversupply of scientists and researchers in our country. Why is that? He is a casualty of H-1B visas.

Norm Matloff reports:
All of this ties in directly with H-1B. The reason PhD wages aren’t worth the years of study are that the NSF, as I’ve stated before, advocated bringing in foreign scientists for the express purpose of holding down PhD salaries. This also suppresses graduate stipends for doctoral students, and post doc wages too. As was pointed out in the NPR piece by Shirley M. Malcom, head of education and human resources at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, these low wages, 15-year training periods, poor career prospects and so on are direct evidence that we have an OVERsupply of scientists, not a shortage as claimed by the lobbyists. And again, this oversupply was deliberately planned for by the NSF, back when it asked Congress to establish the H-1B program. [Glowing Gene's Discoverer Left Out Of Nobel Prize, NPR, by Dan Charles October 9, 2008]

The only reason Bush needs to be brought into this is that he greatly expanded immigration, legal and illegal. Nothing is really known about Palin's views, but her husband is a believer in realism so there is hope with her.

It is ironic that someone is blaming immigration instead of the US government. So much money has been spent in wars and research funding has been cut significantly. It is easy to forget the fact: Among the three American scientists who won the Nobel prize, Shimomura is Japanese and got all his academic training in Japan; Tsien was born into a Chinese immigrant family. Without something similar to H1B, Tsien's parents and Shimomura could never have come to US.

This is in line with Paul (I'm a shill for the state) Krugman winning economics and Henry (destruction of southeast Asia) Kissinger for peace.

Krugman is a dirtbag and Kissinger is a war criminal