(Dr. Mark Ptashne, Lecturer on Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, traveled to Hanoi this June to lecture before a group of North Vietnamese scientists. Ptashne also visited Laos and South Vietnam on his trip. He was interviewed by CRIMSON reporters Michael J. Ryan and Thomas P. Southwick.)

Q. You spent a week in Hanoi this summer. What circumstances led you to go there?

A. Since 1964, the beginning of what the North Vietnamese call the American War of Destruction, there has been a steady stream of Americans who have gone in small groups-journalists, people associated with the peace movement and so on. About a month before I went Noam Chomsky from M. I. T. went to Hanoi and while he was there was unexpectedly asked to lecture on linguistics. When he was leaving the North Vietnamese told him they wanted to receive more Americans, especially doctors and biologists. So, on rather short notice, I went with two other guys especially for the purpose, in my case, of lecturing on molecular biology.

Q. You told me of meeting a biochemistry professor in Hanoi who seemed to be well versed in current trends in molecular biology. Is she typical of North Vietnamese scientists?

A. Well, its hard to say what's typical when you see a country for week. Perhaps I should tell you what I did while I was there. One full day I spent lecturing, starting at 7:30 a. m. and ending about 7:30 p. m. There was a group of about 100 people in the room, most of them professors and teachers of various sorts, some of them students. Most of these were interested in things related to what I do-genetics, biochemistry and so on.

Now, I think that it's only fair to get some picture of the situation there, to realize the extent to which North Vietnam is an underdeveloped country. You see almost no cars in Hanoi or outside where we visited. There are no facilities for color photography in North Vietnam, very little printing facilities, the few posters I saw were originals and were not duplicated. In other words it's a country that by outward appearances is enormously poor. Now you might think that in their situation the typical scientist would be more directed toward practical things. The kind of stuff I do is of questionable interest to underdeveloped countries. But the fact of the matter is that among these hundred people the interest was enormous. What they knew and what they were interested in, I must confess, surprised me.

Q. Do the North Vietnamese have access to papers and journals published in the west?

A. So far as I can tell they do, but the major problem is that they receive them as late as a year after publication. Since coming back I've raised some money to send them an airmail subscription to Nature, and I hope that we can raise money to send them airmail subscriptions to other journals. The one thing that I think is clear is that they will be read and used there.

Q. One of the problems of underdeveloped countries in the West is that people are brought to the United States and taught things that aren't really valuable when they go back to their countries. Where are North Vietnamese scientists trained and do they learn things which are relevant to the development of their country or do they learn skills which can't be used there?

A. Well, its a complicated question. First of all there are Vietnamese who are studying outside the country, though I don't know how many, most of them in Eastern Europe, some in Russia and, I think, a few in China. One important point is that one is struck by the almost total absence of foreign influence in Hanoi. This extends to their education too. The textbooks are written in Vietnamese. They explicitly reject having foreigners teach them. This seems characteristic of their society in general.

The other thing you mentioned was "do they study things which are relevant to their country?" This was really one of the most interesting things to me about my contact with them. With the little amount of research they are able to do, they really can't afford to conduct it in areas which don't have a practical application. Certainly they don't intend to compete with the American or other developed countries in doing basic research.

On the other hand, when I asked them why they were so keenly interested in molecular biology, the answer came from a professor of biochemistry. After some discussion with the other Vietnamese he stood up and said, "We are in the process of building our future society and it is very important for us to know all of these things for building that society." This seems to me to summarize a lot of what I was feeling while I was there. There is a feeling of purpose, a feeling that they are going to build a society in which science and other forms of cultural activity will be used intelligently and used for their ends. The reason this was so moving I think is that all of us are becoming aware of the anxiety that young people, especially Americans, feel about doing science. My feeling is that young Americans feel that to devote one's self to doing straight science is somehow copping out, and there are great pressures, with which I am sympathetic, to spend one's time doing other things.

Q. Could you talk a little about the education system in general and the system of night schools and universities?

A. I visited one night school for factory workers which is part of a supplementary education program which reportedly enrolls more than a million people in North Vietnam. The classes met for 21/2 hours twice a week for people who entered the work force before completing secondary education. Upon completion of this course about half of those enrolled in the final year pass a national exam and enter a higher technical correspondence school.

The more typical primary and secondary education begins at age seven and lasts, in principle, 10 years. As of now, the first degree is mandatory, and the second degree will be required by 1972. There are in addition 28 special schools, one in each province, which teach advanced classes, particularly in mathematics. In 1967-68 there were reportedly over three and one half million pupils enrolled in the primary and secondary schools. This becomes particularly meaningful when one recalls that in 1945 nearly 95 per cent of the country was illiterate.