Francis Collins
Francis Collins
Francis Sellers Collinsis an American physician-geneticist noted for his discoveries of disease genes and his leadership of the Human Genome Project. He is director of the National Institutes of Healthin Bethesda, Maryland, USA...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth14 April 1950
CountryUnited States of America
believe book reading
[Decoding the human genome sequence] is the most significant undertaking that we have mounted so far in an organized way in all of science. I believe that reading our blueprints, cataloguing our own instruction book, will be judged by history as more significant than even splitting the atom or going to the moon.
kids giving enhancement
We give our kids vaccinations. That's a biological enhancement that's considered not just acceptable but actually admirable.
clubs used
What faith has not been used by demagogues as a club over somebody's head?
party thinking light
I think history would say that medical research has, throughout many changes of parties, remained as one of the shining lights of bipartisan agreement, that people are concerned about health for themselves, for their families, for their constituents.
atoms would-be molecules
I'm aware there are certain products that are being advertised - food products - with 'no chemicals whatsoever.' Well, that would be pretty hard to arrange, since everything around us is made up of atoms and molecules - chemicals - including ourselves.
healing sick interesting
It's interesting when you read the life of Christ how much of his time he spent healing the sick. There must have been a reason for that - he was modelling for us what it is we are intended to do by following his path.
trying downgrading sound
The word 'living' has so many connotations that I'm almost reluctant to try to define it scientifically because it sounds as if I'm then downgrading all the other significances of that word.
anxiety add kind
As you kind of get over the anxiety about [science and evolution], it actually adds to your sense of awe about this amazing universe that we live in, it doesn't subtract from it at all.
mean people mind
It is certainly true in the United States that there is an uneasiness about certain aspects of science, particularly evolution, because it conflicts, in some people's minds, with their sense of how we all came to be. But you know, if you are a believer in God, it's hard to imagine that God would somehow put this incontrovertible evidence in front of us about our relationship to other living organisms and expect us to disbelieve it. I mean, that doesn't make sense at all.
knowing light house
[Locating, from scratch, the gene related to a disease is like] trying to find a burned-out light bulb in a house located somewhere between the East and West coasts without knowing the state, much less the town or street the house is on.
wall couple dark
The problem [with genetic research] is, we're just starting down this path, feeling our way in the dark. We have a small lantern in the form of a gene, but the lantern doesn't penetrate more than a couple of hundred feet. We don't know whether we're going to encounter chasms, rock walls or mountain ranges along the way. We don't even know how long the path is.
passion sometimes personal-experiences
Sometimes you develop a passion for something because of some personal experience.
research disaster periods
Research is so unpredictable. There are periods when nothing works and all your experiments are a disaster and all your hypotheses are wrong.
should-have suffering disease
So much of what we are currently seeing as far as human suffering and misery comes from diseases that should have been preventable but were not.