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A technological advance of a major sort almost always is overestimated in the short run for its consequences - and underestimated in the long run.

Francis Collins

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Francis Collins
Age: 74
Born: 1950
Born: April 14
Author
Chemist
Geneticist
Physician
Physicist
Virginia
United States
Francis S. Collins
Francis S Collins
F. S. Collins
F S Collins
Francis Sellers Collins
Short
Overestimated
Sort
Underestimated
Almost
Technological
Running
Advance
Long
Consequences
Always
Majors
Major
Consequence

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I think there are people who's lives have been saved because of the study of the genome.
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I trained initially as a physical chemist, and then, after becoming interested in biology, I went to medical school and learned how to be a physician. So, I'm a physician scientist.
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So much of what we are currently seeing as far as human suffering and misery comes from diseases that should have been preventable but were not.
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Prayer is, for me, not an opportunity to ask God to do stuff for me. Prayer is an opportunity to open myself, to try and understand his will, and oftentimes it's a prayer of thanksgiving, and sometimes it's a prayer of supplication, and sometimes it is just worship.
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C.S. Lewis had a big influence on me in this spiritual realm - this sort of sense of longing. A longing for a knowledge that is just outside of our reach, a knowledge for a spiritual connection.
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I had the analysis of a million or so SNPs [single nucleotide polymorphisms] just to see what was there. That's partly because I was writing a book about DNA and personalized medicine and I thought it would be a little bit disingenuous to talk about what could be done without actually having the experiment done on yourself.
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By investigating God's majestic and awesome creation, science can actually be a means of worship.
Francis Collins
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A lot of science doesn't require big ns but if you're trying to understand something about human health and you're looking at interventions that are not going to be either killing you or making you live forever - they're going to have some tweaking on the outcome - you need big numbers or you don't have enough power.
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[The tests agreed] that I was at higher risk than the average person for Type 2 diabetes, which is what my lab works on. In fact, some of the things they were testing for were variants that we had discovered.
Francis Collins
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Science is... a powerful way, indeed - to study the natural world. Science is not particularly effective... in making commentary about the supernatural world. Both worlds, for me, are quite real and quite important. They are investigated in different ways. They coexist. They illuminate each other.
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[Decoding the human genome sequence] is the most significant undertaking that we have mounted so far in an organized way in all of science. I believe that reading our blueprints, cataloguing our own instruction book, will be judged by history as more significant than even splitting the atom or going to the moon.
Francis Collins
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As our closest relatives, they (chimpanzees) tell us special things about what it means to be a primate and, ultimately, what it means to be a human at the DNA level.
Francis Collins
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Faith is not the opposite of reason. Faith rests squarely upon reason, but with the added component of revelation.
Francis Collins
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There are good reasons to believe in God, including the existence of mathematical principles and order in creation. They are positive reasons, based on knowledge, rather than default assumptions based on a temporary lack of knowledge.
Francis Collins
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In my own experience as a physician, I have not seen a miraculous healing, and I don't expect to see one.
Francis Collins
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If God made the natural laws, why could he not violate them when it was a particularly significant moment for him to do so? And if you accept the idea that Christ was also divine, which I do, then his Resurrection is not in itself a great logical leap.
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All illnesses have some heredity contribution. It's been said that genetics loads the gun and environment pulls the trigger.
Francis Collins
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I think God appreciates that we appreciate his creation.
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What wakes me up at night is this next generation and what's happening to them. And they're invariably excited about the science that they're doing, but invariably anxious about where there's a future.
Francis Collins
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The God of the Bible is also the God of the genome. He can be worshipped in the cathedral or in the laboratory. His creation is majestic, awesome, intricate, and beautiful.
Francis Collins