The Sheriff and the Cowboys: or Weaver's Support of Astbury and Pauling

Abstract

raised a number of objections. Abir-Am's originality in reinterpreting Weaver's role in the genesis of molecular biology has yielded a truly provocative alternative. The subject is now declared controversial! May I 'put my oar in' with two historiographical objections and three matters of the historical record. (1) Abir-Am's reconstruction of Rockefeller funding policy tempts the reader to cast her subjects for roles in the Western film of 'How Molecular Biology was Won' - Weaver the wicked sheriff, Astbury and Pauling the opportunistic empire builders, plundering the territory of honest biology. And Waddington and Needham? They were the genuine and God-fearing proto-molecular biologists whose attempt to reach the promised land, known to us as Watson-Crickdom, failed because Weaver barred the way. We are aware, of course, that we should resist the temptation to identify actors as 'goodies' and 'baddies'. We learned that lesson with the old story of the confrontation between science and theology, analyzed by A.D. White and others in terms of the 'Conflict Thesis'. Yet here we appear to have another conflict thesis between reductionists and anti-reductionists, between opportunistic, secure-investment, figures who did not think 'biological' (Astbury and Pauling) on the one hand, and genuine, insecure-investment, figures who thought

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