Top British Scientist Says Women Are A Trouble In The Lab

A week ago things were looking pretty good for Nobel Prize winning English biochemist Tim Hunt. But that was until he opined at the World Conference of Science Journalists in South Korea last Tuesday that women were trouble in science labs, because, well in his words “you fall in love with them, they fall in love with you, and when you criticize them, they cry.”

The knighted Hunt promptly lost his position with the European Research Council, was bounced from his role at the Roya Society, and poof went his honorary post at the University College London.

The 72-year-old Hunt laments that his career is finished, and while saying he was trying to make a joke, stands by his comment that love affairs in the laboratory are disruptive to science.

ABC’s Tom Rivers joined us from London to discuss.