Oetober 17, 1973

Dr. Jeffrey Wolstenholme
The Ciba Foundation

41 Portland Place
London W1 ENGLAND

Dear Jeffrey,

To be sure that you have adequate time to think about it, I am
making herewith a suggestion for a symposium topic that you might wish
to adopt for 1978. This will be the 50th anniversary of the publication
of Griffith’ epochal paper on the phenomenon of transformation in the
pnewumococcus. The Society for Ceneral Microbiology already has an annual
Griffith lecture which might give you some hints as to the significance
ehat Griffith has had in modern biology. You may also have noted some
running controversial correspondence in the pages of Nature, to which I
enclose one key for retrieval.

The reanovation of biology that has accompanied the discovery of
DNA as the genetic chemical substance, and the elaboration of knowledge
concerning its specificity, structure, and synthesis, already becoming
history. This turning is widely regarded as one of the major revolutions
in biological science, no lesa significant than the Darwinian and the Mendelian
revolutions.

I had in mind a symposium that would attempt to document more carefully
than has been done so far the intellectual history that led to these innovations
of biological thought, as well as an appreciation of the current status of
the "DNA doctrine" in a variety of fields. The most obvious of these, apart
from cross-breeding genetics itself, would be enzyme induction and immunology.
Cancer is in a somewhat intermediate pesition. We still have much to learn
about the nexus of DNA and consciousness.

Robert Olby ia a young historian at Leeds who has addressed himself to
some of the more philosophical aspects of these questions. A symposium in
1978 might be timely also because a somewhat diminished but still important
number of personalities will still be living and available to help document
the transition in thinking that this half century has encompassed. The most
articulate writing in this field has been confined to Him Watson's “The Double
Helix" and "Phage and the Origin of Molecular Biology". Many biologists are
concerned that these representations are only part of an accurate picture
of the development of contemporary biology.

 

 
Dr. Jeffrey Wolstenholme -2- 10/17/73

Martin Pollack is another colleague whom I would certainly urge you to
correspond with concerning the plausibility of my suggestion and ways in
which it might be implemented.

Sincerely yours,

Joshua Lederberg
Professor of Genetics

JL/rr