James Watson

1928–2025 · American molecular biologist, geneticist, zoologist and Nobel Laureate

Topics: learning, biology, life

• To make a huge success, a scientist must be prepared to get into deep trouble.

  — James Watson

• To have success in science, you need some luck. But to succeed in science, you need a lot more than luck.

  — James Watson

• Life, we now know, is nothing but a vast array of coordinated chemical reactions. The “secret” to that coordination is the breathtakingly complex set of instructions inscribed—again, chemically—in our DNA.

  — James Watson

• The brain is the last and grandest biological frontier, the most complex thing we have yet discovered in our universe. It contains hundreds of billions of cells interlinked through trillions of connections. The brain boggles the mind.

  — James Watson

• Do things as soon as you can. If a decision needs to be made, make it. It gives you more time to change your mind.

  — James Watson