Adam Rutherford
Viewpoint — ‘Bigotry dressed up as biology’: Geneticist Adam Rutherford’s 8 surprising facts about eugenics
Adam Rutherford is a geneticist and the author of Control: The Dark History and Troubling Present of Eugenics where he ...
A complicated legacy: Reassessing Darwin‘s views on race and gender 150 years after the ‘The Descent of Man’
Darwin was a liberal, and an abolitionist, perhaps influenced by his taxidermy tutor in Edinburgh, a Guyanese man called John ...
Podcast: ‘How to argue with a racist’—geneticist Adam Rutherford challenges what he calls ‘pseudoscience’ in genetics and politics
Adam Rutherford explains how to argue with a racist, hunting for the ghosts in the human genome, and recreating the ...
Is ‘warrior gene’ responsible for violent behavior?
At the root of their defence was monoamine oxidase A, known as MAOA. The gene MAOA encodes an enzyme whose ...
Pseudoscience appropriates ‘epigenetics’ with promise of life-changing cures
Lots of real scientific terms – such as “neuro” or “nano” – get borrowed for a spot of buzzword scienceyness. Epigenetics is ...
How every living European is related to Charlemagne, and why this is entirely unremarkable
Sometimes I get asked if I’m related to the great physicist Ernest Rutherford. His discoveries about the atomic nucleus gave ...
Are genetic ancestry companies taking you for a ride?
I can reveal that I am a direct descendent of someone of similar greatness: Charlemagne, Carolingian King of the Franks, ...
Genetics’ shaky history with racism contrary to what science says
As someone who writes about evolution and genetics – both of which involve the study of inheritance, and both of ...
Harvard’s George Church: ‘Gene leakage research will blunt anti-GMO activist scares’
Since the 1970s we've been ushering in the next era of breeding by physically lifting individual genes from one species ...
Redheads not on verge of extinction
Redheads, rest easy: your chances of climate change-induced extinction are identical to those of people with less exhilarating hair colour ...
DNA double helix: discovery that led to 60 years of biological revolution
The following is an excerpt. The myth is that science proceeds in fits and starts, with eureka moments delivering revelation ...
Gene patents are a hindrance to innovation
The following is an excerpt. You carry a set of instructions in every cell, encrypted in DNA. Your genome, 3 billion ...
In defense of synthetic biology: Can it help create a better future for all?
Synthetic biology means different things to different people. Its leading scientists want to create, characterise and, crucially, standardise individual pieces ...
