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.jpg): Failed to open stream: No such file or directory in C:\Inetpub\vhosts\kidney.de\httpdocs\pget.php on line 117 Hist+Philos+Life+Sci
2015 ; 37
(4
): 382-412
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The Third Man: comparative analysis of a science autobiography and a cinema
classic as windows into post-war life sciences research
#MMPMID26205203
Zwart H
Hist Philos Life Sci
2015[Dec]; 37
(4
): 382-412
PMID26205203
show ga
In 2003, biophysicist and Nobel Laureate Maurice Wilkins published his
autobiography entitled The Third Man. In the preface, he diffidently points out
that the title (which presents him as the 'third' man credited with the
co-discovery of the structure of DNA, besides Watson and Crick) was chosen by his
publisher, as a reference to the famous 1949 movie no doubt, featuring Orson
Welles in his classical role as penicillin racketeer Harry Lime. In this paper I
intend to show that there is much more to this title than merely its familiar
ring. If subjected to a (psychoanalytically inspired) comparative analysis,
multiple correspondences between movie and memoirs can be brought to the fore.
Taken together, these documents shed an intriguing light on the vicissitudes of
budding life sciences research during the post-war era. I will focus my
comparative analysis on issues still relevant today, such as dual use, the
handling of sensitive scientific information (in a moral setting defined by the
tension between collaboration and competition) and, finally, on the
interwovenness of science and warfare (i.e. the 'militarisation' of research and
the relationship between beauty and destruction). Thus, I will explain how
science autobiographies on the one hand and genres of the imagination (such as
novels and movies) on the other may deepen our comprehension of tensions and
dilemmas of life sciences research then and now. For that reason, science
autobiographies can provide valuable input (case material) for teaching
philosophy and history of science to science students.
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