Page "Kary Mullis" Paragraph 14

The anthropologist Paul Rabinow wrote a book on the history of the PCR method in 1996 ( entitled Making PCR ) in which he discussed whether or not Mullis " invented " PCR or " merely " came up with the concept of it.

Rabinow, a Foucault scholar interested in issues of the production of knowledge, used the topic to argue against the idea that scientific discovery is the product of individual work, writing, " Committees and science journalists like the idea of associating a unique idea with a unique person, the lone genius.

PCR is, in fact, one of the classic examples of teamwork.