TIME-The Language of God. The pious young scientist had a question about human origins and the attention of one of the foremost geneticists in the world.
Standing up in a crowded Hilton-hotel conference room in Alexandria, Va., the inquisitive Ph.D. -M.D. candidate asked Francis Collins, who mapped the human genome, about an attempt to reconcile science and faith: Did Collins think it possible that all species are products of evolution — except for humanity, which God created separately? "Based on everything we know," the young man asked, "would that tie together evolution and [a literal reading of the Bible] and make room for God to intervene? "... Lecture 1 of 9. Dr. Francis Collins. Francis Sellers Collins (born April 14, 1950) is an American physician-geneticist noted for his discoveries of disease genes and his leadership of the Human Genome Project (HGP).
He currently serves as Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland. Before being appointed Director of NIH, Collins led the HGP and other pioneering genomics research initiatives as Director of the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), one of NIH's 27 institutes and centers. Before joining NHGRI, he earned a reputation as an innovative gene hunter at the University of Michigan.