Joshua Lederberg
Joshua Lederberg
Joshua Lederberg, ForMemRS was an American molecular biologist known for his work in microbial genetics, artificial intelligence, and the United States space program. He was 33 years old when he won the 1958 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for discovering that bacteria can mate and exchange genes. He shared the prize with Edward Tatum and George Beadle who won for their work with genetics...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth23 May 1925
CountryUnited States of America
Everybody has to learn for the first time.
I was a bad practicing physician because I was never sure of the diagnosis or of the treatment.
I wish I had a talent for dropping things as well as taking on new ones. It gets to be quite a clutter after a while.
When I was in high school, I became interested in cytochemistry: chemical analysis under the microscope, and trying to understand the composition of cells.
Try hard to find out what you're good at and what your passions are, and where the two converge, and build your life around that.
I hope I've lived a life of science whose style will encourage younger people.
If we have isolated individuals able to inflict enormous harm, imagine what a single lunatic can do with a nuclear weapon. I think the whole base of civil society is at risk.
I started on the use of the Internet for scientific communication. Our research group was one of the very first to make really systematic use of it as a way of managing research projects.
My ambitions were already very clearly fixed by the time I was 6 or 7.
If you wanted to dissect the structure of living cells, genetic analysis was an extremely powerful method, so my interest turned to that.
If lifespan jumps by 30 or 40 years, that has enormous implications.
If it takes you 20 or 25 years to establish yourself in one field, you really ought to be careful not to stray too far.
All of civility depends on being able to contain the rage of individuals.
I'd like to put in a vote for the intrinsic fascination of science.