176 AMPHISBAENA 



sionately passionate; and it has become very difficult to distin- 

 guish between what is an ardent search for truth and what is a 

 vigorous promotion campaign. What started as an adventure of 

 the highest has become the survival of the slickest or the quickest. 

 "Cloak and dagger" has changed to "cloak and suit". We now 

 have DNA tycoons and others have "made a kilHng" in RNA. 

 A generation of scientific quiz kids knowing the answer to every- 

 thing. But to throw pearls before young molecular biologists is 

 not the purpose of this talk. Let's return to the beginning and I 

 will ask you "What is molecular biology?" Now, if physics is the 

 science of the states, and chemistry that of the conversions, of 

 matter and biology comprises the application of their laws to 

 animate nature, what could be meant by molecular biology? 

 You can, of course, apply any adjective to any noun, but the 

 results are most often bizarre. 



y: 

 Here you go again. I could, of course, be witty, as you think you 

 are, and say that molecular biology is what is published in the 

 journal carrying that name. All academic gowns carry, strictly 

 speaking, the color of their respective payrolls — 



o: 



Here I interrupt already. Your jocular definition cannot hold, 

 since the irregular rate of appearance of this admirable journal is 

 vastly inferior to that at which molecular biologists are produced 

 nowadays. My definition, incidentally, would be that molecular 

 biology is essentially the practice of biochemistry without a license. 



y: 



This is, as you must know, a completely frivolous definition. 

 There is naturally much more to molecular biology. In order to 

 prevent you from going on endlessly, I shall agree that the 

 naming of a new science — or a new name for an old one — has 

 also its practical reasons. Symposia, congresses, new journals, 

 more money to be had more easily . . . 



