Northwestern University: Paul Lund Lecture

Date:
1976-1977
Reference:
PP/CRI/E/1/25/16
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Northwestern University: Paul Lund Lecture. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Francis Crick and his American partner in re search, biologist J. D. Watson, gained inter national fame for their studies of DNA (deoxy ribonucleic acid), the molecules that contain the genetic codes of life. In 1962, they shared the Nobel prize for medicine with biophysicist Maurice Wilkins. Crick and Watson proposed the double helical model of the DNA molecule in 1953, and the discovery of the structure of the giant molecule has been termed one of the greatest events in 20th century biology. Watson's personal account of the detective story behind the DNA mystery is contained in his book, The Double Helix. Crick is depicted as a genius who supplied the theoretical and mathematical knowledge. Born June 8, 1916, in Northampton, England, Crick studied at University College in London. He did scientific work for the admiralty during World War II and later began his studies in biology at Strangeways Laboratory in Cam bridge. In 1949 he joined the Medical Research Council Unit for Molecular Biology at Caven dish Laboratory, enrolling at the same time at Caius College in Cambridge for his doctorate which he received in 1954. A fellow of the Royal Society, Crick has held visiting professorships and fellowships at a number of institutions. In 1953-54 he worked at the Protein Structure Project of Brooklyn Polytechnic; in 1959 he was a visiting professor in the chemistry department at Harvard Uni versity and a visiting lecturer at the Rockefeller Institute of New York. In 1960-61 he was a fellow of Churchill College in Cambridge and in 1962 was again at Harvard as visiting professor of biophysics. From 1962 to 1973 he was a non resident fellow of the Salk Institute for Biologi cal Studies in San Diego and currently is a Fer- kauf Foundation Visiting Professor at the Salk Institute. Crick's philosophy of the study of biology is in his book, Of Molecules And Men. Philip Handier has been president of the American Academy of Science since 1969, after serving on the faculty of the Duke University School of Medicine, where he was chairman of the department of biochemistry. He joined Duke in 1939 as an instructor after receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. He is a member of numerous national and in ternational groups that deal with the life sci ences, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American So ciety of Biological Chemists, German Academy of Natural Sciences, Swiss Academy of Natural Sciences, Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, and the Japanese Bio chemical Society. Handler is a trustee of Rockefeller University and a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of Nova University. He served on visiting com mittees of Johns Hopkins University, Notre Dame University, Yale University, the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Institute for Cancer Research, the Scientific Advisory Committees at the Kettering Institute and at the Scripps Metabolic Clinic and Research Foundation. A member of Phi Beta Kappa, Handler has been the recipient of the C. B. Mayer Award of the New York Academy of Science, the Stevens Honor Award of the Stevens Institute of Technology, the Annual Award for Distin guished Contributions to Medical Sciences of the American Medical Association and the Townsend Harris Medal of the City College of New York. His research papers have appeared in bio chemical journals, and he is co-author of the textbook Principles of Biochemistry and editor of Biology and the Future of Man. Mario Bunge, educator, philosopher and physi cist, is concerned with problems in the philoso phy of the sciences, social as well as natural. A native of Argentina, he received his doctorate in physics and mathematics from the National University of La Plata. In 1938, at the age of 19, he founded the Universidad Obrera Argentina and a few years later he began the philosophical journal Minerva. Other associations he helped organize include the Asociación Fisica Argentina, the Asociación Rioplatense de Logica y Filosofia Científica and the Asociación Mexicana de Epistemologia. He also is the founder of the Society for Exact Philosophy. Bunge was a professor of theoretical physics at La Plata until 1959 and then received an ap pointment as professor of philosophy at the University of Buenos Aires. He also has been a visiting professor of philosophy at the Uni versities of Delaware, Pennsylvania and Texas, Freiburg University, Temple University, Aarhus University and ETH Zurich. A prolific author, Bunge has written more than 200 articles on the history, philosophy and foundations of the sciences, including mathe matics, semantics, systems theory, physics, on tology and ethics. His books include: Causality; Metascientific Queries; Intuition and Science; The Myth of Simplicity; Foundations of Physics; Scientific Research; Philosophy of Physics; Method, Model and Matter; Sense and Reference; Interpretation and Truth; The Furniture of the World.
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