No, you've not somehow woken up in the ’70s. The year is 2015 and a Nobel Prize winning scientist has genuinely suggested that female scientists shouldn't be allowed to work alongside men as, he claims, 'three things happen when they are in a lab: you fall in love with them, they fall in love with you and – when you criticise them – they cry.'
Sir Tim Hunt admitted that he was a 'chauvinistic pig' before making the shocking comments at a conference in South Korea hosted by female scientists and the 72-year-old's announcement apparently went down exactly as well as you'd expect. Connie St Louis, a science journalism lecturer at London's City University, witnessed the whole thing. She said: 'Some people laughed nervously. Some just sat there and put their head in their hands. It was so awful and worse – he was British.'
In an interview with the BBC this morning, the Nobel laureate tried to explain his remarks. 'I did mean the part about having trouble with girls,' he confirmed. 'It's terribly disruptive to the science.'
He continued: 'It is true that I have fallen in love with people in the lab and people in the lab have fallen in love with me, and it's very disruptive to the science. Because it's terribly important that in the lab people are on a level playing field and I found that these emotional entanglements made life difficult.'
'I mean I'm really really sorry, I didn't mean to cause offence – that's awful. I just meant to be honest,' he added.
We've got one bit of advice for you, Sir Tim: stop digging now because you're only making things worse. Your colleagues, both male and female, must be absolutely mortified on your behalf.
The #girlswithtoys hashtag was created exactly because of sexist scientists, like Sir Tim Hunt.
Female scientists have taken to Twitter to post photos of themselves with their tools and equipment, to remind men that science isn't just for the boys.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.