Max Perutz Interviews

The Vega Science Trust – Max Perutz Interview 1 – watch the first 45 seconds to hear about Perutz’s motto, “in science, truth always wins”. And then maybe watch the rest, indulging yourself in productive procrastination.

The Vega Science Trust – Max Perutz Interview 2 – here Max Perutz talks about science (with an emphasis on crystallography of course) and other important topics, such as religious fundamentalism (9:30) and faith/atheism (42:40) and the problem of overpopulation, partly due to lack of birth control. I particularly agree with him that, as a scientist, one should take a stance against creationism, but also not go as far as people like Richard Dawkins who relentlessly attack religion, which, Perutz says, “discredits science” and “shows our arrogance”.

Also watch out for an instance of mouth pipetting at 4:45 in the video posted in the last entry (https://lovecells.wordpress.com/2014/09/14/in-science-truth-always-wins/) – this would be unheard of today!

Lastly, Perutz made an interesting prediction about whether and when the protein structure of haemoglobin would be solved in a paper from 1949:

[from: Perutz MF (1949): Recent developments in the x-ray study of haemoglobin. Roughton FJW, Kendrew JC, eds. Haemoglobin: A Symposium Based on a Conference Held at Cambridge in June 1948 in Memory of Sir Joseph Barcroft. London: Butterworths Scientific Publications, 135–147]

Funnily enough, the structure of haemoglobin was eventually solved in 1968 – a year before the Apollo 11 moon landing.