Colin Blakemore
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June 2013 Harkness Report The Newsletter of the Harkness Fellows Association What’s Inside Profile of a Harkness hero ver the page there is a profile of a new Harkness OFellow, Geraint Lewis, to complement this page’s feature on Colin Blakemore. Geraint was already winning prizes before he won his fellowship in 2008. On page 4 a thoughtful feature from Peter Jenkins (HF 1971-73) reminds readers of the two different types of American presidents, as noted by Senator Fulbright in ‘The Arrogance of Power’ in 1966. On the opposite page is an obituary of Jonathon Harvey (HF 1969), best known for compositions involving electronics, Colin Blakemore but who composed both ancient and modern music. There is another obit on pg 5 of Robert Johnston, ven among the many eminent There was one prize, however, which he the former director of the Harkness people to emerge from a Harkness did not get: the knighthood which all programme in London for 15 years Fellowship, it will be difficult to previous and subsequent heads of the from 1963-78. find a person who has collected Medical Research Council have received. Emore honours, awards and prizes The scandal was exposed by the Sunday There has been a positive response than Colin Blakemore (1965-68), the Times, which discovered he had been by fellows to email appeals for an neuroscientist specialising in vision and nominated for the 2004 New Year’s update on their activities. They run the development of the brain. There was Honours List, only to be eliminated by through pages 6 to 8. Keep them an early signal of success to come at the nervous Whitehall civil servants worried coming to [email protected]. Then end of his Harkness Fellowship at Berkeley, that his research was ‘controversial’. follow two edited lectures from the where he completed his Ph D in 1968 Colin’s response was robust: he threatened Association’s excellent series on BRIC in two years and five months when the to resign declaring his position as chief nations. The first by Richard Lapper, average time for such awards was over executive had become untenable: ‘How former Financial Times Latin American five years. His grade average was 3.99 out can I go to our scientists and ask them to editor, describes the rise of Brazil of 4. risk talking about animal research, when and examines its future prospects. Some 44 years on, having reached 67 there now appears to be evidence that The second is a fascinating look at last year, the Oxford retirement age, he in secret the government disapproves.’ It the future of India from Sir Michael had collected 10 honorary degrees and prompted open declarations of support Arthur, former UK High Commissioner 47 other awards and prizes from some for such research from the Government’s in Delhi. of the world’s leading scientific societies Chief Scientific Adviser David King, the and medical academies. They included: Science Minister Lord Sainsbury, Prime The back page reports on last year’s the Royal College of Physicians Baly Minister Tony Blair along with leading summer event gives an update on the gold medal in 2001; the Society for UK science institutions. He didn’t get his Plowden Fellowships and lists three Neuroscience’s highest award (2012); knighthood, but more importantly he promising future events: China’s highest honour for foreigners established widespread support for such Sir Nigel Sheinwald on the future of (2012); along with American, French, work when it had been under intense American foreign policy (June 13); Swiss, Czech and Indian honours. pressure from animal rights activists. Sir Liam Donaldson (July 2), former Not bad for a man who was brought Chief Medical Officer, on the up in a humble two up and two down Family under siege challenges facing health services at rented house in a poor area of Coventry. No-one had been subjected to more home and abroad; and a tour of the The headmaster of the local primary was pressure than Colin Blakemore. His family studio of sculptor Nigel Hall (July 6) the first to identify his talent, urging his had endured a decade of assaults. Not (HF 1967-69). parents to transfer him to the junior school just regular non-violent activists protesting of the local grammar at the age of nine outside their Oxford home with speakers, Malcolm Dean Editor and because no one had passed the 11 plus but much more seriously violent extremists Veronica Plowden Assistant Editor from the primary. who had sent letters laced with razor Colin Blakemore Profile of a Harkness hero Contd blades, made threatening phone calls, one third higher – over £700 million – its that the visual part of the cerebral cortex smashed windows and attempted to pull relations with the Department of Health undergoes active, adaptive change shortly down the front door, damaged the family and the burgeoning Wellcome Foundation after birth. Initially controversial, ‘plasticity’ car, and sent two bombs through the post more amicable, and its communications is now a dominant theme in neuroscience. (one of which arrived when only the three much more transparent. The plasticity of connections between children and au pair were in the house). nerve cells is thought to underlie many The home had to be fitted with panic The natural communicator different types of learning and memory. buttons, triple locks and a safe room. He was perfectly equipped to achieve True to his reputation for challenging The children had to accept police escorts the latter. At the age of 32, he was the orthodoxy, in his Ferrier prize lecture in to their schools, which suffered two bomb youngest person selected to deliver 2010 on the 350th anniversary of the threats. the BBC Reith lectures in 1976. The Royal Society, he argued that far from Colin had been advised to keep his head theme: Mechanisms of the Mind. The the growth in the human brain emerging down when he was pinpointed by the Royal Institution Christmas Lectures in through gradual evolution, something protesters. He had refused and insisted 1982-3 followed. Then there was a run more dramatic happened: a genetic on publicly explaining – to journalists, of television and radio programmes: a accident. Research suggested the sudden politicians and animal activists – why 13-part series, the Mind machine on BBC expansion happened about 200,000 years animal research was needed. It was only television; a radio series about artificial ago. He ruled out evolution because it allowed by law if there was no other intelligence, Machines with Minds; and a took almost that time before it became option. The research had been crucial channel 4 television programme, God and useful. “It’s like arguing a reptile suddenly in the creation of antibiotics, insulin, the Scientists. He has had regular articles developed fully formed wings and then vaccines for polio and cervical cancer, and in the serious press: Guardian, Observer , sat around for 200,000 years before important in achieving success with organ Times and Telegraph and a succession of realising it could fly.” He suggested it was transplants, heart by-pass surgery and popular science books, some based on his a dramatic spontaneous mutation in the HIV treatment. “Without it, we would – broadcasts others on Gender and Society, brain. “A change in a single gene would medically speaking – be stuck in the Dark Mindwaves, Images and Understanding, have been enough.” Age.” and the Oxford Companion to the Body. He has not given up research. He still has He had called for bans on animal testing He was awarded the Royal Society’s access to his Oxford laboratory and has a for cosmetics and helped set up an Faraday prize and medal in 1989 for his new post at the University of London as organisation which brought scientists public communication of medicine and Director of the School of Advanced Study’s and anti vivisectionists together to science. Centre for the Study of the Senses. He is converse. He was a committed humanist Since returning from his Harkness the only scientist in the centre but plenty and rationalist. But none of this deterred Fellowship, he has divided his time of sympathetic colleagues from cognitive the extremists. His experiments, which between Cambridge (1968-1979) and science, psychology, and philosophy required the eyelids of new born kitten to Oxford (1979-2012) with breaks for the particularly with reference to perception. be sewn down, were too good a target. MRC and visiting fellowships. When he He speaks with enthusiasm about the But it was the Blakemore experiments that began his studies, neuroscience had yet technical advances of neuroscience over led to a breakthrough in the diagnosis of to be given its name. There are now the last 40 years. “What I find most amblyopia – the most common form of 70,000 such scientists worldwide. His exciting about the science, is that it is child blindness. major contribution to the science is the starting to touch on what it means to Ironically, by the time he went to the concept of neuronal plasticity, the capacity being human. ” Medical Research Council in 2003, new of the brain to reorganise itself by the He still believes in keeping fit, but after laws and key extremists in prison meant activity passing through its connections. running 18 marathons has stopped such the worst was over for the family. By the late 1960s, he had demonstrated extreme exercise. Colin was facing a different poisoned chalice. The MRC had just suffered a damning indictment from the Commons select committee on science and technology. It was condemned for poor financial management, misguided research strategies and inadequate communications.