Editing Erwin Chargaff (section)

==Later life==
Beginning in the 1950s, Chargaff became increasingly outspoken about the failure of the field of [[molecular biology]], claiming that molecular biology was "running riot and doing things that can never be justified".<ref name=newton13>{{Cite book|title=DNA Technology: A Reference Handbook, 2nd Edition|last=Newton|first=David E.|date=2016-12-12|page=189|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=9781440850486|language=en|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ogypDQAAQBAJ&pg=PA189}}</ref> He believed that human knowledge will always be limited in relation to the complexity of the natural world, and that it is simply dangerous when humans believe that the world is a machine, even assuming that humans can have full knowledge of its workings. He also believed that in a world that functions as a complex system of interdependency and interconnectedness, [[genetic engineering]] of life will inevitably have [[unforeseen consequence]]s.<ref name=gobit />

After [[Francis Crick]], [[James Watson]] and [[Maurice Wilkins]] received the 1962 [[Nobel Prize]] for their work on discovering the double helix of DNA, Chargaff withdrew from his lab and wrote to scientists all over the world about his exclusion.<ref name="nytimesnobel">{{cite news |title=No Nobel Prize for Whining |last=Judson |first=Horace |date=20 October 2003  |work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/20/opinion/no-nobel-prize-for-whining.html |access-date=2007-08-03}}</ref>

Chargaff warned in his 1978 book ''Heraclitean Fire'' of a "molecular [[Auschwitz]]" that "the technology of [[genetic engineering]] poses a greater threat to the world than the advent of nuclear technology. An irreversible attack on the [[biosphere]] is something so unheard of, so unthinkable to previous generations, that I only wish that mine had not been guilty of it".<ref name=pb11>{{Cite web|url=http://phyllisbowman.blogspot.com/2011/08/gigantic-slaughterhouse.html|title = Check the Facts: "A Gigantic Slaughterhouse ..."|date = August 2011}}</ref><ref name="baran13">{{cite book |doi=10.1007/978-1-4614-8541-4_12|chapter=Genetic Engineering|title=Healthcare and Biomedical Technology in the 21st Century|year=2014|last1=Baran|first1=George R.|last2=Kiani|first2=Mohammad F.|last3=Samuel|first3=Solomon Praveen|pages=383–416|isbn=978-1-4614-8540-7}}</ref><ref name=iatp>{{Cite web|url=https://www.iatp.org/news/eminent-scientists-comment-on-the-dangers-of-genetically-engineered-foods|title=Eminent Scientists Comment on the Dangers of Genetically Engineered Foods}}</ref>

{{quotation|text=Helping a few couples condemned to childlessness towards getting a child may strike the obstetrical cytologist as such a laudable step, but we can see the beginning of human [[husbandry]], of [[Intensive animal farming|industrial breeding factories]]... Who can deny the scientific interest attaching to the production of [[Chimera_(genetics)|chimaeras]], to the study of human embryonic growth in an animal uterus? ... What I see coming is a gigantic slaughterhouse, a molecular Auschwitz, in which valuable [[enzymes]], [[hormones]] and so on will be extracted instead of gold teeth.|sign=Erwin Chargaff |source=''Heraclitean Fire''}}

The [[IVF]] technique earned his scathing disapprobation. In 1987, "Engineering a Molecular Nightmare" was published in the journal ''[[Nature (journal)|Nature]]'',<ref name="chargaff87">{{cite journal |doi=10.1038/327199a0|title=Engineering a molecular nightmare|year=1987|last1=Chargaff|first1=Erwin|journal=Nature|volume=327|issue=6119|pages=199–200|pmid=3472081|bibcode=1987Natur.327..199C|s2cid=28373983}}</ref> which was then sent by [[David Alton]] and his colleagues in the [[All-party_parliamentary_group#Examples|All-Party Parliamentary Pro-Life Group]] (APPPLG) to every [[Member of parliament|Westminster MP]] in an effort to minimise the forthcoming harm caused by the [[Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990]].<ref name=pb11 />

Chargaff wrote in 2002 that "There are two nuclei that man should never have touched: the [[atomic nucleus]] and the [[cell nucleus]]. The technology of [[genetic engineering]] poses a greater threat to the world than the advent of [[nuclear technology]]."<ref name="serra">{{cite news |last1=Serra |first1=Miquel Àngel |title="Genetics and human improvement" |url=https://www.fundaciogrifols.org/en/web/fundacio/calendar/-/bscw_activities/37546777 |publisher=Fundacio Víctor Grífols i Lucas Foundation |date=20 February 2018}}</ref>

{{quote|My life has been marked by two immense and fateful discoveries: the splitting of the atom, the recognition of the chemistry of heredity and its subsequent manipulation. It is the mistreatment of nucleus that, in both instances, lies at the basis: the nucleus of the atom, the nucleus of the cell. In both instances do I have the feeling that science has transgressed a barrier that should have remained inviolate. As happens often in science, the first discoveries were made by thoroughly admirable men, but the crowd that came right after had a more [[Mefitis|mephitic]] smell.|source=Chargaff in Weintraub (2002)}}

Chargaff died later that year on 20 June 2002 in [[Manhattan]], [[New York City]].<ref>{{cite news |first=Nicholas |last=Wade |title=Erwin Chargaff, 96, Pioneer In DNA Chemical Research |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/30/nyregion/erwin-chargaff-96-pioneer-in-dna-chemical-research.html |quote=Erwin Chargaff, whose research into the chemical composition of DNA helped lay the groundwork for James Watson and Francis Crick's discovery of its double-helix structure — the pivotal finding of 20th-century biology — died on June 20 in a New York hospital. He was 96. |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=June 30, 2002 |access-date=2014-12-23 }}</ref> He is buried in [[Mount Carmel Cemetery (Queens)]].<ref>[https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/95983059/erwin-chargaff Erwin Chargaff in Findagrave.com]</ref>