The race to decode the human genome sparked a lot of debate about whether public efforts or private companies are better suited for handling such huge science projects. Which side won?
The evidence is absolutely clear that large genomic data production projects should be public efforts. These data sets can stimulate research in both the public and private sectors if they are immediately made available to all scientists, without any barrier to access. This can be readily seen by the success of the Human Genome Project, and the subsequent public sequencing of more than two dozen other animal genomes, the HapMap, the Mammalian Gene Collection, and the rest. No company sees big genome data generation projects with private subscriptions as a viable business plan anymore.
Are these big biology projects increasingly international?
I think genomics has led that charge. The genome project was an international effort. Scientists from six countries agreed to the same standards and joined forces. That was unprecedented. The HapMap project was the same way.
One recent report suggested that the United States may not be the leading economy by 2050. India and China may pull ahead, and biotech will be a big part of that advance. Do you agree?
It's clearly a possibility. India's primary strength has been computation, and they've been slower to join projects in human genomics, in part because of the restriction that no samples can leave the country. That policy is understandable, because there was a time when there was a lot of "biopiracy" going on, if you want to call it that. But now, in this more open environment where international collaboration means sharing samples, they are rethinking this. We've had intense collaboration with China for six or seven years—Yang Huanming, director of the Beijing Genomics Institute, was a contributor to the sequencing of the human genome. China has quickly figured out where they want to go with this, and they've done a good job of it.
Will that be bad for science in the United States?
Not necessarily. As Americans, we have mixed reactions. It's good for us to be in a scientifically prominent role. At the same time, as a physician who wants to see advances occur, I think that if some of those breakthroughs can take place in another part of the world and they are done right . . . then it's hard to be opposed to that. Meanwhile, education in this country is going the wrong way in terms of training the talent we need for America to move forward. It's a scary scenario. I don't think people have awakened to just how serious this is. I can tell you that when I came to NIH, I primarily had American postdocs in my lab. Now almost all the postdocs are noncitizens. I can't find enough young American scientists to do this work. The pipeline has just really dwindled.
Many people say that science has become more politicized under President Bush. Has that added to the problem?
Clearly there has been tension. Perhaps we haven't done enough to try to understand each other. But when I speak to a member of Congress or the administration, that conversation almost always goes well. I think if we had done that early on, there would be less digging in of positions. A major problem is the general lack of scientific familiarity across the whole population. After all, politicians are supposed to be representative of the people who elect them. If we've done a poor job of explaining science to the public, is it any surprise that it has political consequences?
Do you hope that the Democratic-controlled Congress will lift restrictions on stem cell research?
I hope it's a discussion that gets beyond the rhetoric and into some of the scientific detail. If we're going to have a meaningful discussion about ethics, we will really have to understand the science behind a particular dilemma. That was the whole intention of the Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues program of the Human Genome Project—to try to elevate the somewhat nutty depictions of possibly bad scientific outcomes and ask, "What have we just learned, what is realistically around the corner, and how can we have a reasonable, high-level public debate about where the boundaries should be?"
The media often portray the religious right in the United States as antiscience. Is that a fair characterization?
I don't think it's fair to blame believers for getting defensive about attacks on the Bible when they see their whole belief system is under attack from some members of the scientific community who are using the platform of science to say, "We don't need God anymore, that was all superstition, and you guys should get over it." Believers then feel some requirement to respond, and this has led to an unfortunate escalation of charges and countercharges. As a result of the tensions over evolution, I think we see an increasing tendency for believers to dig in about things like Genesis 1 and 2, claiming that there is just one acceptable interpretation. That's not a strong position. St. Augustine, for example, came to the conclusion that we really don't know what the writer of Genesis was trying to describe in the creation story, and we should be careful about drawing conclusions about the nature of the world based on what those verses say. He was concerned that science would ultimately prove specific narrow interpretations to be incorrect, and then faith would be put up to scorn. It was as if he was sending us a warning 16 centuries ago, saying, "Guys, watch out for this."
What motivates those who polarize the debate?
I think the people who are most fervently opposed to evolution are not doing so on a political basis. I think that many of those folks have been brought up to believe that if you accept evolution, you lose your faith. If you're presented with only that option, then as a believer you have to resist Darwin with every fiber of your being. You'll congregate with people who believe as you do, you'll listen to radio shows that agree with you, and you'll try to hold it together against what's perceived as an onslaught of Godless, secularized science that threatens your core beliefs.
Do you believe that personhood begins at conception?
You mean, is that when we get a soul?
Now we're into theology, and it's an area where science isn't really going to give you an answer. The only thing that science can say is that whatever line you draw between the fusion of sperm and egg and the birth of the baby is somewhat arbitrary. On the other hand, that doesn't prove that the soul exists right at that moment of fusion. Identical twins do not have the same soul, yet they started out as the same union of sperm and egg.
We keep hearing that the middle ground between science and faith is increasingly difficult to maintain. Do you feel that your position is precarious?
I think it's rock solid. If God chose to use the mechanism of evolution to create human beings, who are we to say He wouldn't have done it that way? It's unfortunate that this potential harmony between worldviews is perceived by some as delicate or fragile. Much of what seems to threaten this view are the ultraliteral interpretations of Genesis 1 and 2, as I mentioned, which are fairly recent arrivals on the scene and which many other theologians down through the centuries have not been comfortable accepting anyway.
Doesn't Scripture sometimes explicitly contradict science?
I don't find any troubling examples of that in the Bible, as long as you recognize that the point of Scripture was not to teach science. Can you imagine God lecturing to his chosen people about radioactive decay?
And yet people have been burned at the stake over this issue.
Before we start trashing religion, we should recognize that religion down through history has been misused by lots of people in terrible ways. But it's also done some profoundly good things. What has atheism done to help people? The worst examples of human carnage in the 20th century came from the atheist regimes of Stalin and Mao. The principles of faith are generally altruistic, gentle, and loving. The problem is when someone takes those principles and twists them to suit their own purposes—that was the Inquisition, and that is suicide bombers.
So what would you say to the scientists who are fervently opposed to religious thought and practice?
Is there any dogma more unsupported by the facts than from the scientist who stands up and says, "I know there is no God"? Science is woefully unsuited to ask the question of God in the first place. So give the religious folks a break. They are seeking the kind of spiritual truths that have always interested humankind but that science cannot really address.
