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Mullis acquired a reputation for erratic behavior at Cetus, once threatening to bring a gun to work; he also engaged in “public lovers’ quarrels” with his then-girlfriend (a fellow chemist at the company) and “nearly came to blows with another scientist” at a staff party, according to California Magazine. White recalled: “It definitely put me in a tough spot. His behavior was so outrageous that the other scientists thought that the only reason I didn’t fire him outright was that he was a friend of mine.”
After resigning from Cetus in 1986, Mullis served as director of molecular biology for Xytronyx, Inc. in San Diego for two years. While inventing a UV-sensitive ink at Xytronyx, he became skeptical of the existence of the ozone hole.
And he only goes downhill from there…
Oh my does he ever.
According to California Magazine, Mullis’s HIV skepticism influenced Thabo Mbeki’s denialist policymaking throughout his tenure as president of South Africa from 1999 to 2008, contributing to as many as 330,000 unnecessary deaths.
Remember, if you want to repeat this feat or replicate it you must first delve deeply into a topic that has no solution and learn every single thing you possibly can about it until your brain is simply unable to absorb or process any more information and then do LSD about it.
Allow me to light my pipe. I’ll sit in my chair by the fire as some kind soul tells me the story…
Mullis practiced clandestine chemistry throughout his graduate studies, specializing in the synthesis of LSD; according to his friend Tom White, “I knew he was a good chemist because he’d been synthesizing hallucinogenic drugs at UC Berkeley.”[18] He detailed his experiences synthesizing and testing various psychedelic amphetamines and a difficult trip on DET in his autobiography.[50]: 167–170 In a Q&A interview published in the September 1994 issue of California Monthly, Mullis said, “Back in the 1960s and early 1970s I took plenty of LSD. A lot of people were doing that in Berkeley back then. And I found it to be a mind-opening experience. It was certainly much more important than any courses I ever took.”[55][verification needed] During a symposium held for centenarian Albert Hofmann, Hofmann said Mullis had told him that LSD had “helped him develop the polymerase chain reaction that helps amplify specific DNA sequences”.[56]
I can totally picture him seeing noodles dancing to a sick beat and then going “holy shit”