Category: science journalism

My take on Jason Arday and the journal Nature, published in The Chronicle of Higher Education

September 10, 2026 • 8:15 am

A week ago I wrote a critique of a really misguided (and unsigned) editorial in Nature, blaming the death of Jason Arday on his hounding by a racist press as well as “systemic racism” in academia. You can see that editorial by clicking the screenshot below:

The “deep reflection” that Nature demands involves us examining our souls for our complicity in Arday’s death, as well as realizing the harm caused by the press’s reporting of the Arday affair, as well as by Cambridge University’s announcement that they were investigating accusations against him. (That announcement itself was said by Nature to violate Arday’s confidentiality, perhaps also leading to his suicide. But if you read the actual announcement, it’s nothing that’s sp unusual when a university announces a public accusations.)

Perhaps the most ridiculous aspect of the Nature piece is that it almost completely ignores the lies, fraud, and fabulism issued by Arday, as well as the palpable fact that a man with almost no qualifications, and a background of duplicity (including probable research theft and fraudulent assertions on his c.v.) was appointed and lionized as a full professor of sociology at Cambridge. What Nature construes as “racism” is really “antiracism” by Cambridge: putting Arday’s ethnicity and claimed disability above his merit. If there’s any silver lining to the Arday tragedy, is that the outrageous claims by Arday touted have now made it okay to discuss how race-and-disability-based hiring can conflict with merit—that the term “inclusive excellence” might be an oxymoron. (There are of course very good black scholars, but Arday wasn’t one.)

At any rate, it was both misguided and even shameful for Nature to advance such a dumb argument, and I took it apart in my post.  That post caught the eye of folks at The Chronicle of Higher Education (CHE), and they asked me to rewrite it for publication on their site.  I did that, with the help of an excellent editor, and it was published yesterday. You can read it by clicking on the screenshot below. (You may have to “subscribe” by giving the CHE your email, but they do not send out promotional emails, and you can read a couple of articles a month for free.

I will not reproduce the whole piece I wrote there, but have put a few excerpts (indented) below.  I should be able to put it somewhere free, and in toto, next week. (I also see that it’s archived here for free.)

A few excerpts:

One of the more distressing changes in science is its infection by politics and ideology, a change visible in what I call “journal creep.” Until recently, the primary function of scientific journals was to disseminate research. Now, however, many journals have adopted an additional mission: promoting ideological, moral, or political positions. This newer mission, which endangers not only the reputation but also the practice of science, is seen clearly in a recent editorial in one of the world’s most prestigious scientific journals, Nature.

The Nature editorial centers on the tragic story of Jason Arday, a sociologist who at 37 became the youngest Black full professor ever appointed at the University of Cambridge. In July, it was revealed that Arday had plagiarized significant portions of his Ph.D. thesis at Liverpool John Moores University. This in turn prompted extensive investigations by the press. What they found was not pretty: more evidence of plagiarism, falsified research, fabricated claims on his curriculum vitae, and, most striking, a breathtaking record of biographical fabulism.

. . . Nature’s editorial is titled “The Death of Jason Arday Must Prompt Deep Reflection.” Unfortunately, the reflection Nature demands does not involve asking how someone with such a thin academic record and a history of exaggeration and lying managed to secure such a prestigious position. Rather, Nature is concerned with assigning blame for Arday’s downfall and death, and the blame falls on everyone but Arday himself.

Most at fault, says Nature, was “persistent media attention” largely fostered by racism. Cambridge also deserves blame both for participating in the “systemic racism in academia” that supposedly made Arday’s life intolerable, and for announcing that they would investigate him, which, says Nature, was a violation of “confidentiality.” But all Cambridge announced was that it was investigating Arday’s “academic qualifications and honorary appointments” as well as allegations of “academic misconduct”— nothing more. Since the media was already intensively focused on Arday, announcing an investigation without giving details doesn’t seem out of line. American universities do it all the time, saying things like: “We are not commenting pending an investigation of these accusations.”

Oddly absent from Nature’s editorial is any serious acknowledgement of Arday’s apparent fabulism, plagiarism, errors, and lies. Nor is there any attempt to grapple with the fact that Arday’s decision to publish a memoir with a major commercial publisher further drew the media’s spotlight.

. . . Disparaging merit in favor of equity, shifting research funding towards progressive topics, misrepresenting science by skewing citations towards researchers having approved backgrounds, censoring papers, controlling language, and distorting accepted science so that it conforms to certain narratives while proscribing research on topics considered taboo — such symptoms of ideological pollution are present in journals across the sciences. Here are three examples, all involving Nature journals.

I then give three examples.  Nature, like many journals (I’m looking at you The Lancet, as well as at Science) has gone “progressive” (a polite word for “woke”), and the examples show that clearly.

 

. . . A scientific journal, like a university, should remain ideologically and politically neutral, with the possible exception of matters that directly affect the mission of the journal itself. Pinning blame for the death of Jason Arday on the press and on the University of Cambridge, and flippantly characterizing science as ridden with “structural racism,” are not issues within the remit of Nature. Although Arday was the author of his own tragedy, Nature asks all of us to search our souls for traces of the racism that, they claim, make us coauthors:

It is incumbent on all of us in the media and academia to reflect on our roles and responsibilities. Both research and media organizations have an obligation to communicate information fairly and accurately — and to avoid causing harm to the people they employ or report on. We can and must learn from this tragedy.

Sadly, Nature has learned the wrong lessons.

Nature extols Jason Arday

September 3, 2026 • 10:00 am

I thought I was through writing about Jason Arday, but I didn’t anticipate that he would become some kind of hero, or at least that many people would emphasize how he was hounded to death—always pushing the “racism” angle and blaming Cambridge and the press but neglecting the fabulism and preferential hiring that got Arday so much attention.  Now the prestigious journal Nature has published an editorial (see below) that completely neglects two of the main reasons why Arday got so much attention, and pinning the blame for his death on nearly everyone. Luana brought the article to my attention by sending this tweet (note the “Community Note” below it).

As I said, I think there are two reasons why the Arday case got so much attention. The first is the breathtaking extent of his fabulism, involving extensive (and now verified) instances of plagiarism in his Ph.D. thesis, claims of appearances on t.v. shows that he was not on, claims of marathons that he actually did not run, claims of extreme autism that have not been substantiated, threats he said he got that also couldn’t be verified, multiple instances of cancer (also not verified), and many other stories he told that were not credible. Not to mention that he padded his c.v., larding it with positions he never held. Beyond the plagiarm, the Times of London reported that Arday stole another researcher’s work (as well as quotes that the researcher obtained in interviews), publishing it as Arday’s own. If true, this is wholesale academic fraud.

Second, Arday was the youngest black full professor at the University of Cambridge (his speciality was the sociology of education), and one of the few at the University. He apparently had an engaging personality and was lionized by his department, with Hilary Cremin (head of Cambridge’s Faculty of Education and the person who oversaw Arday’s appointment) praising him to the skies in the statement below as “the best in the world at some of the research [he did].”

This lionization was wholly unwarranted. Nature doesn’t mention that this is another reason why Arday’s tragic life and death got so much attention: the case was so egregious that it finally became okay to discuss whether ethnicity and disability should override merit in academic appointments. The fact that many people and media sources fault Cambridge University—even blaming (as does Nature) for Arday’s apparent suicide—shows clearly that Arday’s appointment was questionable at best. (As I’ve said, nobody is responsible for Arday’s death save Arday himself.) It is because of the clear-cut nature of this case that the media jumped on it, though, as I said, one cannot reject the notion that some racism (against Arday) was involved.

Instead, Nature takes up several issues about Arday’s life, ultimately blaming his death on “systemic racism” in academia and in the media.

The first issue is Arday’s plagiarism, which Nature fobs off as having been dismissed by Arday’s Ph.D. university. As Nature says below:

Liverpool John Moores University, the UK institution that awarded the PhD, investigated the allegations [of plagiarism] and concluded that the PhD stands.

But the allegations were correct and John Moores University simply dropped the ball on the whole affair, perhaps to protect what reputation it has. Nature doesn’t mention the academic fraud uncovered by the Times of London.

Nature also blames Cambridge—not for appointing an unqualified professor, but for publicly announcing their investigation of Arday, which, says Nature, violates the confidential nature of the UK disciplinary process. But all Cambridge announced, as far as I know, is that they were investigating the charges—and nothing more (I don’t even think they said which issues they were investigating). Since the media was on Cambridge’s case about Arday, I don’t think that announcing an investigation without giving details is out of line: American universities do it all the time, saying things like “We are not commenting pending an investigation of these accusations.”

It is true that Arday apparently killed himself after Cambridge’s announcement, but it’s not clear that the announcement played the decisive role in the apparent suicide.  Yes, it’s very sad that Arday killed himself when, if he’d been fired from Cambridge, he still could have gone on to have a productive life. He also had kids who now have no dad. But the frenzy to blame every person and institution for Arday’s death save Arday himself just shows that virtue signaling is still with us despite the other side: the more open debate of equity versus merit.

Finally, Nature rushes to blame systemic racism on Arday’s death, and by “systemic” they mean that racism is embedded in the rules and structure of the University itself.  That is surely wrong, though of course one cannot rule out that racism was somehow involved in the media and social-media attention that Arday got.

But systemic racism? Many would say the opposite: that anti-racism is pervasive in academia, to the extent that someone like Arday could even be hired.  Anti-racism is embodied in DEI policies in play at many schools. As I said, now it’s possible to discuss this tension without being demonized as a racist, and in that sense Arday’s life and death could constitute a watershed moment in our discussions of race.

You can read Nature‘s editorial below, which answers the question “Who is to blame for the death of Jason Arday?” by answering, “Academia, the University of Cambridge, systemic racism, and the media.” In other words, everyone but Arday himself.

I’ll just quote part of the article in case you don’t want to read the whole thing, but the link is above and it’s free, so you can read it all. I’ve already given my own comments above, except to say that Nature has really outdone itself this time with both virtue signaling and pointing the fingers at the wrong people.

. . . Arday died after relentless media coverage of his professional and personal life. It is an enormous tragedy for his family, friends, students and colleagues. It is also a catastrophe for the research community. The death of an autistic Black scholar who inspired a generation is shocking. The persistent media attention, the racism that pervaded much of that coverage and the plagiarism allegations against Arday, and the University of Cambridge’s handling of his case all raise difficult questions. These are concerns not only for the institutions involved, but for everyone in higher education and the media.

In this Editorial, we focus on two issues in what is a complex and evolving situation. One is how academic institutions should treat investigations into research misconduct amid unrelenting media attention. Investigations need to be carried out according to transparent processes with appropriate confidentiality for those involved, including whistle-blowers, whose testimony is often central to the outcome. These processes exist to ensure that all concerned are treated fairly and protected from harm, but were they followed? The other, related issue is how the media should ensure fairness when reporting on research misconduct and how it can do so without causing harm.

Arday’s fate is distressing, and especially so for Black scholars and those from other communities that are under-represented in academic research, many members of which report feeling vulnerable and unsupported at this time. There is systemic racism in academia. It is an unwelcoming place for many who enter it through hardship and struggle, as Arday’s story illustrates. It is not acceptable that these barriers persist. On top of this, scholars from Black and other under-represented communities fear that the intensity of attention Arday faced could one day be focused on them. The question many are asking is: ‘Could I be next?’

. . . Matt Walsh, head of journalism at Cardiff University, UK, did an initial analysis of UK media reporting of Arday between 25 July this year — when the latest wave of coverage of the plagiarism allegations started — and 20 August. He counted 242 substantive articles published in the print editions of UK national newspapers and concluded that there is strong evidence of racism. “Framing associated with race is present throughout the sample, and some articles explicitly accuse Cambridge of only appointing Arday as a professor because of the colour of his skin,” Walsh wrote in an article for The Conversation news website that describes his analysis.

. , ,Media organizations are not the only ones whose role in events must now be scrutinized. The University of Cambridge must also explain the decisions it made — in particular its announcement on 5 August, amid sustained media coverage, that it would investigate matters. On the same day, Arday resigned.

According to the code of practice from Acas, the independent UK body responsible for workplace arbitration, including at universities, an employee under investigation is entitled to confidentiality. An investigation is not a disciplinary process, but rather a fact-finding effort to explore whether there is a case to answer. But Cambridge’s decision to announce the investigation amid a media feeding frenzy offered no possibility of confidentiality — and risked adding to the impression that Arday had done something wrong before due processes had been completed.

. . .In his resignation letter, Arday wrote: “The relentless accusations, speculation and public commentary have taken a profound toll on me and on those I love.” He added: “For my own wellbeing, for my family, and for those who have stood by me throughout this difficult period, I have concluded that the only way to bring this chapter to an end is to step away.” He also promised to return “stronger, wiser and with the same determination that has always defined my journey”.

Arday did not return, so it is incumbent on all of us in the media and academia to reflect on our roles and responsibilities. Both research and media organizations have an obligation to communicate information fairly and accurately — and to avoid causing harm to the people they employ or report on. We can and must learn from this tragedy.

I think Nature is learning the wrong lessons.

Scientific American on the skids, sold by Springer Nature to another company

August 31, 2026 • 9:00 am

Well, I suspect that the magazine Scientific American, now 121 years old, has one foot in the grave and another on a banana peel. Apparently it’s been going downhill for some time, losing revenue and subscribers, and went even farther downhill content-wise under the previous editor Laura Helmuth, who decided to use the magazine as a “progressive ideological” mouthpiece (see my posts on this issue here).

Research Information (RI) and Legal Insurrection (LI) are among the several places announcing that Scientific American, until recently owned by Springer Nature, has been sold to another company because it was unprofitable (h/t Howie). There’s no announcement on the journal’s website itself, but the content looks tepid, as it has been for some time. Scientific American used to have articles on real science written by real scientists, but that pretty much stopped a lont time ago.  As Wikipedia notes, the journal was founded in 1845, and:

Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Prize-winners having been featured since its inception.

This is sad, but the morbidity of the journal probably reflects waning interest in magazines and especially in popular-science journalism. The only newspaper I can think of that still has a dedicated science section is The New York Times (every Tuesday), though I may be missing some venues because I don’t read newspapers on paper. To me, another sign of this waning interest is the lack of science books in many compilations of “best books of the year,” and I don’t think that’s due to a paucity of good science books.

From RI:

Springer Nature has announced the sale of its consumer media businesses, including the science publication Scientific Americani n the United States and Spektrum der Wissenschaft in Germany.

The publisher says the move forms part of a strategic decision to focus on its core global publishing activities across research, health and education, while supporting the long-term development of the two consumer-facing brands.

According to Springer Nature, both titles are being acquired by new owners with significant consumer media expertise and the capacity to support their future growth.

Frank Vrancken Peeters, Chief Executive Officer of Springer Nature, said: “Scientific American and Spektrum der Wissenschaft are respected and loved science media brands with a long and valued history, and we are grateful to the teams who have built and sustained them. We have taken the time to ensure these strong brands find the right homes – organisations with the consumer media expertise and ambition to invest in their future.”

Springer Nature said it is working with both buyers to ensure continuity of publication throughout the transition process. Scientific American is to be acquired by LabX Media Group, a global science-focused media company; the transaction will complete on 24 June 2026.

You can read about LabXMedia group on Wikipedia or its own web page; the organization already publishes The Scientist, a trade journal for working biologists rather than a popular-science magazine.

Author Leslie Eastman at LI is not as kind to the magazine:

I have been following the antics of Scientific American, the Bud Light of science journals, for quite some time now.

The low-lights from the magazine’s stack of articles include:

JAC: These articles of course came out under the helm of editor Laura Helmuth who, after a wild social-media rant when Trump was elected, left the magazine in 2024. On this site I documented many other wonky articles that appeared in the magazine, most of them catering to “progressive” ideology: More from Legal Insurrection:

Now comes news that Springer Nature, the publisher, announced it is divesting both of its flagship consumer science magazines, Scientific American and Spektrum der Wissenschaft (Spectrum of Science) in Germany. The company says that the sales are part of a strategic pivot to concentrate exclusively on its core academic, health, and education publishing business.

. . .The decline of Scientific American in both respect and profits offers a cautionary tale: when a once-venerable science publication abandons rigorous, evidence-based journalism in favor of ideological advocacy by endorsing political candidates, adopting contested social terminology, and framing sports injuries through a racial lens, it erodes the very credibility that made it indispensable to its readers.

Had the magazine’s leadership chosen to trust its audience’s intelligence and doubled down on accessible, accurate science coverage rooted in empirical reality, it would have retained the broad American readership that sustained it for nearly 180 years, rather than shrinking into a niche ideological outlet.

The sale to LabX Media Group may yet represent a second chance, but only if new ownership recognizes that scientific literacy and editorial integrity are the foundation on which a sustainable, respected science publication must be built. Based on the union drama, I fear it will be a significant challenge.

If the new owners don’t reset the publication’s priorities, they will find it harder to rebrand the product than Bud Light did.

I asked two AI bots for information about the profits and circulation of Scientific American over time.

From Claude:

Bottom line: the reliable, roughly comparable data points suggest the US print/print+digital base fell from around 550,000–650,000 in the mid-2000s to around 300,000 by 2020 — a decline of roughly 50%, consistent with the broader magazine industry’s collapse over that period.

From Grok:

Detailed standalone profit-and-loss numbers for Scientific American are not published. It was a small unit inside Springer Nature (and previously Nature Publishing Group/Holtzbrinck) and was not broken out in annual reports.

  • Third-party estimates put Scientific American revenue in the ~$29.5 million range, consistent with the combined €25 million figure for both titles.
  • Circulation was reported at roughly 300,000 in 2020 (about 240,000 print + digital and 22,000 digital-only). Earlier peaks were higher (around 450,000 paid subscribers mentioned in mid-2010s coverage). Print readership (including pass-along) was cited at 2.2 million in recent media kits.
  • Print advertising pages and newsstand sales have declined over decades, as they have across most consumer magazines. Digital traffic and subscriptions exist but operate in a lower-margin environment than Springer Nature’s research journals.

Judging from readers’ comments, Scientific American has been lame for a long time, well before Helmuth took over. For some reason it stopped using well known scientists to write articles (or those scientists didn’t want to write for the magazine). And under Helmuth the magazine hit rock bottom because it was not only lacking good articles by good scientists, but became ideologically captured. Will LabX Media Group bring it back? I doubt it; perhaps the days of public interest in science are gone.

More wokeness from the journal Nature, and a response from a reader

March 31, 2026 • 11:00 am

It’s hopeless: Nature, like nearly all prominent science journals, has been colonized by woke craziness.  Perhaps the word “craziness” for the present topic is a bit too strong, but the headline below suggests a degree of unhinged-ness that often comes with virtue-flaunting. And of course this isn’t the first such article in Nature.

Click the screenshot to below read the article, part of a series billed as “profiles [of] scientists with unusual career histories or outside interests”. This scientist, Dr. Anne Poelina, has the unusual habit of naming a river as the first author of her science papers:

An excerpt;

Conservationist Anne Poelina has a deep connection to the fresh water that runs through the dry red-rock landscape of the Kimberley region in Western Australia. Poelina identifies as a Nyikina Warrwa woman, and her people are the Traditional Custodians of the Martuwarra Fitzroy River. The river meanders through the region’s arid land, cutting a path of about 735 kilometres long through steep gorges, savannahs and flood plains before terminating at King Sound, a delta fringed by tidal mangroves by the Indian Ocean.

The Martuwarra Fitzroy River is one of Australia’s last-remaining relatively intact, undammed tropical river systems. For now.

The river faces many threats, for instance, from water use in agricultural irrigation. It’s also at risk from proposed plans to extract natural gas through fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, and to look for rare-earth elements and metals such as vanadium and titanium. Moreover, climate change is predicted to cause extreme floods and droughts.

. . .Poelina is connected to the river through her matrilineal heritage — her mother’s people are the Nyikina First Nation. The Nyikina’s traditional territory, or Country, lies in the river’s watershed, as do those of nine other Indigenous communities. (Country is the term that Aboriginal Australian people use to refer to their ancestral lands, its meaning is similar to the Western concept of nature.)

Poelina explains that “in terms of property rights, the river owns me. So, I have a duty of care and the fiduciary duty to protect this river’s right to life.” Because Poelina works with the river to produce fresh knowledge and assimilate ancient wisdom, she decided to recognize its contributions formally. In 2020, she started including the Martuwarra River of Life as the first author on her publications.

Poelina says, “Country is a first author for Indigenous people in the Northern Territory of Australia. So, I just did it.” Whether the journal to which she submitted her first paper assumed “that the name was human or not, I don’t know”, she adds.

Here’s a list of her papers on Google Scholar, and, sure enough, a few of them—but far from all—have “MRiverofLife” as first author, with “M” standing for “Martuwarra”. Here’s one (click to go to site):

Here’s a description of the river in northwest Australia (it’s called either “Martuwarra” or “Fitzroy”), and here’s a description of its place in local culture, where the river is called a “living ancestral being.”  It’s neither living nor an ancestral being: that is just lore. Still, the indigenous council of “river keepers” consults with the Australian government to keep the river in good shape, and that’s an admirable thing, But making a river a coauthor? Perhaps I should have made my Drosophila flies the first author of my papers, maybe disguised as “Dr. O. Sophila.”

At any rate, reader and professor Jente Ottenburghs (an evolutionary biologist who works on birds) couldn’t take it the Nature paper, and wrote me this: “This seems to be another case where a high-profile journal romanticizes indigenous knowledge (similar to the situations in New Zealand and Canada that you covered recently). I also decided to write a blog post about it, partly inspired by the book The Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsch which I am currently reading.”

Sure enough, his blog post is below, and you can access it for free by clicking the screenshot:

Two excerpts. First, on the ubiquity and sacralization of the “two-eyed seeing” trope and the sacralization of the oppressed (i.e., indigenous people). Note that yes, Australian indigenous people were badly treated by European colonists, but that is not what’s under consideration here.

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in incorporating indigenous knowledge into scientific research. There are indeed nice examples where such knowledge has proven valuable. For instance, a recent study in Oryx combined ethnospecies lists from local communities with scientific datasets to reveal a consistent decline in bird body mass across three continents. Approaches like this study demonstrate that local knowledge can complement scientific inquiry, particularly in data collection and long-term ecological observation.

However, indigenous knowledge is often romanticized, sometimes being portrayed as inherently superior to scientific knowledge. This tendency is partly driven by a legitimate desire to correct historical injustices (such as colonialism and the marginalization of local communities) and to show greater respect for indigenous perspectives. While this shift is clearly necessary and overdue, it should not come at the expense of critical evaluation of indigenous knowledge.

Many elements of indigenous knowledge consist of local myths or context-bound explanations. As such, they are often parochial rather than universal, and therefore do not qualify as good scientific explanations. This does not diminish their cultural, historical, or philosophical value, but it does mean they should not automatically be treated as reliable sources of scientific insight.

Of authorship and the river:

There appears to be growing pressure within academia to signal the recognition of indigenous knowledge, sometimes in ways that blur the distinction between cultural respect and scientific rigor. A striking example appeared in Nature, where conservationist Anne Poelina listed the Martuwarra River of Life as a co-author on her publications.

Poelina explains that “in terms of property rights, the river owns me. So, I have a duty of care and the fiduciary duty to protect this river’s right to life.” Because Poelina works with the river to produce fresh knowledge and assimilate ancient wisdom, she decided to recognize its contributions formally. In 2020, she started including the Martuwarra River of Life as the first author on her publications.

When asked why the river should be listed as first author, she responded: “Because it’s the authority. It’s where I get my authority.” This reasoning stands in direct contrast with the scientific method, which explicitly rejects appeals to authority as a basis for truth. Science operates as a culture of criticism, where ideas must withstand scrutiny regardless of their source. As physicist Richard Feynman famously put it: “If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. In that simple statement is the key to science. It doesn’t make any difference how beautiful your guess is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are, who made the guess, or what his name is … If it disagrees with experiment, it’s wrong. That’s all there is to it.”

Hence, attributing authorship to a river on the grounds of authority is not just unconventional; it reflects a fundamental misunderstanding of how knowledge is evaluated in science.

. . .A similar issue arises in arguments that emphasize the age of indigenous knowledge (or any other knowledge system). Poelina suggests that “if we have the oldest systems of thinking around science and law, shouldn’t the world be listening to what our people have to say?”. But age is not a marker of reliability. As discussed earlier, Greek myths are thousands of years old, but they obviously fail as scientific explanations because they are easily varied and lack universality.

The same principle applies more broadly: all knowledge claims (whether scientific or indigenous) must be evaluated using the same standards. Some elements of indigenous knowledge may indeed prove robust and valuable under scrutiny, while other elements may not. We still need to separate the trustworthy wheat from the superstitious chaff. And the scientific method is the best approach to do just that.

There’s a preliminary section of Ottenburghs’ paper, inspired by his reading of Deutsch, about how science works and how scientific explanations are evaluated, which fed into the post (or riposte) above.  This whole thing may seem trivial, but if we don’t keep calling out the creeping sacralization of indigenous knowledge, and the intrusion into science of myth, storytelling, and superstition, it will become stuck in science like a tick on your leg, with the potential to cause the scientific equivalent of Lyme disease.

Nature screws up again: touts need for severe revision of evolutionary theory while harboring a conflict of interest

November 9, 2025 • 10:00 am

Nature has shown some bad behaviors lately, and now you can add onto them two more: an ignorance of evolutionary biology and a lack of fact-checking. Both of these are instantiated in a recent book review, which, as we see so often, describes modern evolutionary biology as woefully incomplete.  The review, moreover, fails to mention all the critics of this “need for speed.” Finally, the review (of a book touting the deficiency of evolutionary theory), was written by a collaborator of several authors of the book, showing a severe conflict of interest. It’s no surprise that the authors’ colleague gave their book a glowing review.

A letter written by some well known evolutionary biologists pointing out these two deficiencies was promptly rejected by Nature.

I’ll give a critique of the book review first, and then show the letter sent to Nature that was rejected. Finally, I’ll give one of the signers’ responses to the rejection: Brian Charlesworth. I won’t give the names of the other signers of the letter (there were three), as Brian gave me permission to reproduce the letter but I haven’t asked the others.

First, the review. The book is Evolution Evolving: The Developmental Origins of Adaptation and Biodiversity, with authors Kevin Lala [formerly “Laland”], Tobias Uller, Natalie Feiner, Marcus Feldman and Scott Gilbert, published last winter by Princeton University Press, which apparently didn’t get the book vetted by competent evolutionists. The Nature review by Eva Jablonka, Israeli evolutionist and epigenetics maven, came out in January, so I’m a bit late to the party. Still, this shows that there remains a vocal minority of biologists who can’t resist showing us the many ways that evolutionary biology is wrong or incomplete, yet they’re singing the same old tune, one that’s been rebutted many times before.

Click below to read the fulsome review of the book; one that doesn’t even mention the many issues with the “new view of evolution” that have been pointed out for years.

Before I point out a few misguided statements, I urge you to read my take on a Nature paper called “Does evolutionary biology need a rethink?“, in which one group of “revisionists, with Laland (“Lala” above) being the first author, answers, “Yes, urgently”, while another group, with Greg Wray the first author, answers “No, all is well.”  As you’ll see from reading my piece, I side with the second group. Note that that exchange is already eleven years old, yet the promoters of the “rethink” view are advancing exactly the same arguments they made back then. These arguments are misguided because they are either flat wrong (e.g., their criticism of the neo-Darwinian view that mutations are “random”), or misleading (e.g., their view that development drives evolution, with development changing first and only then permitting adaptive genetic change). In her review above, Jablonka also throws in epigenetics, her speciality, which, while important in some respects, cannot form the basis of permanent adaptive evolution because environmentally-induced changes in DNA (“epigenetic” changes) persist at most for only two generations before the epigenetic marks are wiped away during gamete formation.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

First, for the topic of “development leading evolution,” “nongenetic forms of evolution” (learning, culture, etc.), and epigenetics, all touted in Jablonka’s article, see my post above, this one, and my several discussions of the flaws of touting epigenetics as a critical and neglected factor in adaptive evolution.  I won’t repeat my arguments, but I will point out a couple of howlers in Jablonka’s review.  Her quotes are indented below.

First, on development as the guiding factor of evolution:

Under the extended evolutionary synthesis, the questions that are fundamental to the field change. Instead of just asking what genetic mutations might give one organism an advantage over its peers, the authors argue, evolutionary biologists should also focus on the developmental mechanisms and structures that underlie fitness differences.

It’s time to admit that genes are not the blueprint for life.

A developmental focus, they say, could help in understanding phenomena that are mysterious under the modern synthesis. For example, selective breeding for ‘tameness’, whether in sheep, pigs, horses, dogs or foxes, leads to the evolution of a common series of traits that are not necessarily adaptive — including smaller brains and teeth, curly tails, white patches and flat muzzles. This link, across different animal groups, bred in different ways and at different times, baffled Darwin and others for more than a century.

. . . All these features involve the same embryonic cell type (the neural crest) and their development is thus driven by similar sets of genes.

Well, as Dawkins pointed out years ago, genes are not the “blueprint for life,” but the “recipe for life,” as one needs environmental inputs to convert the DNA into an organism. As for development guiding evolution, what Jablonka and her pals apparently mean that existing developmental pathways constrain evolution: mutations can only show their effect within and already-evolved system of gene interactions. The pleiotropic effect of “tameness” mutations on several species is easily explained because you’re selecting at the same time for the side effects of tameness genes, which happen to affect morphology and color. That’s not new, and certainly doesn’t mandate a rethink of evolution.  As Brian wrote me:

“As has always been acknowledged by anyone with half a brain, the phenotypic effects of mutations are constrained by the existing developmental system. As Haldane put it, selection on humans could produce a race with the intellect of Shakespeare and the physique of Carnera, but for a race of angels we’d have to wait for the necessary mutations, both for the wings and the moral qualities.” 

But then Jablonka as well as Lala et al. (and other miscreants like Denis Noble) use this observation to claim that NEW TRAITS AND PRESUMABLY THE MUTATIONS UNDERLYING THEM ARE NOT RANDOM. From Jablonka:

The modern synthesis dictates that genetic mutations arise at random, which makes it hard to understand why these traits would consistently evolve in all these tamed animals. But seen through a developmental lens, things are clearer. . . . Thus, new traits do not arise at random. Some are more likely than others, and suites of traits often arise together. Understanding such ‘developmental biases’ can enable researchers to better understand how traits originate, what directions future evolution might take and how rapidly evolution might proceed.

They simply do not understand what evolutionists mean when they say features (and mutations) arise “at random” in evolution. The meaning is that mutations and the traits they produce occur irrespective of whether they are good or bad for the individual’s reproduction. Of course some changes are more likely than others, and mutations often have pleiotropic (“side”) effects on other traits. This means that what is subject to selection is the net effect of a mutation on the replication rate of the mutated gene.

What are examples of the “better understanding” that comes from considering development? The ones given by Jablonka, presumably from Lala et al., are not impressive. Here’s an example called “inheritance beyond genes”:

For example, certain whales learn from their mothers how to corral schools of fish into air bubbles. Desert woodrats (Neotoma lepida) eat their mothers’ faeces, which contain gut microorganisms that allow the woodrats to digest plants rich in highly toxic creosote. And molecules called epigenetic marks, which are associated with DNA and modify gene activity, are passed down through generations too. Epigenetic marks that form when mice in the laboratory are trained to link a particular smell with an electric shock, for example, have been passed down to their grandchildren — the young mice are scared of the same smell, even though they have never received the shock.

Two quick points: have the authors ever heard of “learning”? Or that learning might be primed by genes, as our learning of languages primes us to produce comprehensible syntax, but which language we speak depends on our environment? Is imitation of adaptive parental behavior (itself either genetically primed or learned) something new? Nope.  And as for epigenesis, I have heard of the mouse study, but no epigenetic trait produced by the environment can persist for more than a handful of generations, as epigenetic modifications of DNA are wiped out during gamete formation. This form of “Lamarckian” inheritance won’t work.

Here’s one more:

Furthermore, some organisms construct environments to benefit the development of subsequent generations. Dung beetles, for instance, make balls of cow dung, into which they add their own faeces as food, and lay a single egg. The nutrients and microbes in these balls influence how the larvae develop, and in turn the sizes and shapes of the beetles and how they evolve.

Is it a revolutionary insight to discover that parents do things that benefit the fitness of their offspring? Human mothers feed their babies, and sometimes what they feed them could affect their own future evolution. Big whoop!

This all shows that the insights that supposedly mandate a new theory of evolution aren’t new at all, but are comfortably part of the already-existing Modern Synthesis of evolutionary theory.  But these authors, it seems, want to make their mark by advancing the same old tired arguments that have long been refuted.

Along with several other authors, Brian Charlesworth noted that Jablonka seems resistant to even mentioning the many objections to the “new” theory of evolution. Brian and others sent the letter below to Nature for consideration for publication. The references given in the submitted letter are included, and I’ve put in the links. Doug Futuyma’s paper is especially thorough and on the mark, and here’s his point, given in the last sentence of the abstract: “Evolutionary theory will continue to be extended, but there is no sign that it requires emendation.”

The letter:

We are writing to express our concern about the review in Nature by Eva Jablonka of the recent book by Kevin Lala et al. (Evolution Evolving)(16th January 2025 pages 539-541). The book expounds the “Extended Evolutionary Synthesis” or “EES” which is claimed by its proponents to repair problems with the science of evolutionary biology. Prof. Jablonka was a co-author with two of the book’s authors of an article promoting these claims 1, which would seem to be a conflict of interest for its reviewer. The article that accompanied that publication and refuted such claims 2, is not mentioned by Jablonka, nor are other critiques of the EES, e.g., 3. These papers make clear that several of Jablonka’s assertions are wrong, including the claim that evolutionary biologists believe that mutations “arise at random” with respect to their effects on traits, and that constraints imposed by development on evolutionary changes have been ignored by them. The review gives a false impression of the current state of the flourishing field of evolutionary biology, which owes little to the EES. It is regrettable that Nature should give a platform for such disinformation.

1          Laland, K. et al. Does evolutionary theory need a rethink? Yes, urgently. Nature 514, 161-164 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/514161a

2          Wray, G. A. et al. Does evolutionary theory need a rethink? No, all is well. Nature 514, 161-164 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/514161a

3          Futuyma, D. J. Evolutionary biology today and the call for an extended synthesis. Interface Focus 7, 20160145. http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsfs.2016.0145 (2017). [JAC: This is a Royal Society journal]

What transpired is that Brian says he heard nothing from Nature for a long time. He wrote back to the editor asking what happened to the joint letter. The editor explained that an automatic email response had been sent saying that if the authors didn’t hear anything within three weeks, then the letter was rejected. Brian says he didn’t see that response and admits it could have been binned without him reading it.  The editor also explained why the letter above was rejected, but I can’t reproduce that email without permission. However, you can get a sense of what the editor said from Brian’s final response here:

Dear EDITOR’S NAME REDACTED

Thank your for response. I and my co-authors do not consider it to besatisfactory, for the following reasons.

First, no automated response was received by me; our email was simply ignored.

Second, you say that “the comment piece cited in the review did include both pro and con arguments and authors from both camps”. I assume that you are referring to the reference to Laland et al. 2015, which is the only citation given by Jablonka. This was a polemical piece, arguing for the EES [“Extended Evolutionary Synthesis”] with a few dismissive references to works by mainstream evolutionary biologists.

Third, if asking someone to review a book by their close collaborators is not a conflict of interest, it’s hard to see what would constitute one.

Fourth, you say that “it didn’t make a fresh point that would be of broad interest to readers”. The point of our letter was to make it clear that Jablonka and other advocates of the EES consistently ignore the counterarguments made by ourselves and others in the evolutionary biology and genetics community. Indeed, her review contains the same tired old mistatements about randomness of mutations and developmental constraints that she and her clique keep on making. lt’s hardly our fault that these are not novel. The title of the review “A new vision for evolution is long overdue” gives the completely misleading impression that there are serious problems with our field. This is a view that is held only by a small, but extremely vocal, fringe group, most of whom (including Jablonka) have made no significant original research contributions to the field. No other field of science seems to get this kind of treatment from Nature.

Fifth, you say that “in the end the main goal of our book reviews is to set out issues in a readable way for readers across all disciplines, and we consider that Jablonka did a reasonable job here”. This seems to assign lesser importance to scientific accuracy. Indeed, you have just published a letter about the Jablonka review by a Chinese scientist trying to revive Darwin’s long discredited theory of pangenesis. He states that the theory was published in the last edition of the Origin of Species in 1859 (in fact, the last edition was published in 1872 and contains no reference to pangenesis, which was described in Darwin’s Variation in Animals and Plants under Domestication in 1868. Seemingly, the most basic fact checking is not done by Nature).

In view of these concerns about the treatment of the field of evolutionary biology by Nature, which are shared by my cosignatories (who are all regarded as leading figures in the field, and members of various national academies), I am cc-ing this email to your chief editor.

Yours sincerely,
Brian Charlesworth

Sadly the readers of Nature who are not evolutionary biologists will now think that Lala et al.’s book has indeed shown the need for a “new vision of evolution.” Given the history of the arguments made by the authors, and Jablonka’s summary of the book in her review, there is no such need. Nature blew it by rejecting the letter, which makes essential points (especially Jablonka’s failure to say that the “new vision” is deeply controversial), and also by getting a pal of the book’s authors to review it. What kind of review did they expect?

Science-Based Medicine has its knickers in a twist about Krauss’s new edited volume—without having read it

August 1, 2025 • 10:45 am

Yes, Science-Based Medicine (SBM) used to be a respectable place, and, indeed, still has some good articles. But it also went “progressive”, as evidenced by its cancellation of the late Harriet Hall’s favorable review of Abigail Shrier’s book Irreversible Damage, its commissioning of a negative review to replace it (progressives aren’t allowed, you see, to deal with gender dysphoria in a rational manner), and then pushing upthe dumb claim that sex isn’t binary in humans or other species (see my post about the site and its views here).

SBM is back again with a woke-like and, frankly, blinkered and misguided take on a new collection of essays edited by Lawrence Krauss, The War on Science, which I describe here (note: Luana  Maroja and I have a joint essay as one of the chapters). Here it is, click the cover to go to the Amazon page.

The book, which has been over a year in the making, largely describes the inimical effect of the “progressive” Left on science. The point, of course, is to keep science as pure as possible by keeping it unpolluted by ideology.

But the SBM take on our book, highly negative, is below; click the screenshot below to read it.

And that’s the rub for SBM.  They have their knickers in a twist because it’s about the damage done by the Left, and, author Howard argues, we should have given all of our our attention to  the palpable damage that the Right is doing to science. In other words, he wanted both-sideism and didn’t get it.  As I wrote in my description of the new volume, it’s pretty clear that, right now, Trump and his minions are indeed doing more serious damage to science, though that will hopefully be undone when we finally (fingers crossed) get a Democratic administration. But the Left also continues to damage science, and that is what the book is about.

And it’s not that we have neglected Trump’s depredations on science either (just see my Nooz this a.m. for one of many examples in which I’ve gone after Trump’s attacks on science!) It’s just that the book is about what the Left is doing to science (the authors, by the way, come from all parts of the political spectrum.   And we can’t have that.

The most curious thing is that the author of the SBM screed—neurologist and psychiatrist Jonathan Howard—didn’t even read the damn book! He’s going by the table of contents alone as well as by the authors, whom he seems to despise en masse. Not only that, but he adds that he doesn’t think that other people should read the book, either. As he says.

So no, I wont [sic] read The War on Science. Even if contains some valid points, they are completely irrelevant, like being warned about a broken taillight as my car careens over a cliff. There is no reason why anyone should care about the flaws of DEI trainings, real or imagined, in 2025. None of it matters.

And though I don’t think anyone should read this book, its mere existence has great value. It both explains and memorializes how we got to this sad moment. Many renowned scientists and scholars, some of whom should have been valuable allies, were blind to the real danger until it was too late.

As if our criticism could have stopped Trump! But yes, plenty of us have criticized what Trump has done; it’s just that we didn’t put that stuff in the book assembled a year ago–before Trump did the heavy blackmailing.

At any rate, did Dr. Howard even contemplate that reading this book might teach him something, even if only to hone his arguments? Nope.  He just thinks we needed to write about something other than what we wrote about. Granted, had I been editor I would have not chosen every single essay for publication, but a lot of them are pretty damn good. Pity that Howard won’t read them and tries to dissuade others from doing so.  Check out the table of contents here and decide for yourself if it’s worth reading—or if parts of it are worth reading.

Here are some of Howard’s criticisms of our “one-sideism”:

The War on Science is best thought of as a work of science fiction, dispatches from a parallel universe where MAGA doesn’t exist, Wokism is all-powerful, and science was obliterated by DEI and trans people. It’s a complete inversion of what’s actually happening.

. . .However, it’s not just that these renowned scientists and scholars created a fantasy world, their imaginations provided fuel and ammunition to the people who are currently taking a wrecking ball to things in the real world. Many key Trump officials, past and present, got into power by portraying themselves as woeful victims of censorship and cancel culture (Marty Makary. Vinay Prasad,JayBhattacharya, and Kennedy). These Trump officials weaponized their perceived victimhood to distract from their disinformation, attack respected scientists, and bash the institutions they are now trashing.

Predictably, these renowned scientists and scholars were happy to lend their legitimacy to this feigned victimhood. Jordan Peterson and Gad Saad recorded podcasts with future Trump officials about “silencing the opposition” about “academic freedom“. Now that they are in power, these same Trump officials are leading the way, purging, censoring, and defunding scientists. Saad’s chapter is titled Universities as Dispensers of Parasitic Ideas. As Trump crushes universities, Saad wants people to think these ticks, leeches, and mosquitoes deserve their fate.

. . .As Christina Pagel wrote in her article Donald Trump’s ‘War on Woke’ is Fast Becoming a War on Science. That’s Incredibly Dangerous:

Donald Trump’s attacks on diversity, equality and inclusion (DEI) initiatives since his January inauguration have been intense, indiscriminate and escalating. A tragic plane crash was baselessly blamed on DEI. All DEI programs within public bodies have been ended and private contractors face cancellation if they also don’t comply. Webpages that defend religious diversity in the context of Holocaust remembrance have been taken down.

Science and academia have been particularly targeted. Universities are threatened with losing federal funding if they support DEI. Government reports and government-funded research are being held back if they include prohibited terms such as “gender”, “pregnant person”, “women”, “elderly”, or “disabled”. Grants funded by the National Institutes of Health are being cancelled if they address diversity, equality or inclusion in any form.

This is what these renowned scientists and scholars enabled.

Sorry, but what Howard is arguing is what comes out of the south end of a cow facing north. We didn’t enable Trump; we criticized a threat coming from the other end of the political spectrum, and a threat that may be more permanent since much of it comes from scientists themselves.  This book, which hasn’t yet appeared, did nothing to facilitate Trump’s election, nor did our previous writings.  Howard is peeved because we didn’t write the book he wanted, and so, like a petulant two-year-old, he not only refuses to read it, but tells other people not to read it, either. Perhaps he should at least read it himself before he warns off others!

In a discussion about this with colleagues today, I got this reaction from Richard Shweder, a professor here in cultural anthropology and psychology:

It is a curious review seemingly assuming that the only threat worth attending to is the most salient one of the moment.  The threat can come from the State. It can come from the administration of a university.  And, with due respect to the founders of the AAUP who believed academic freedom would be well-served by a system faculty governance,  the threat can also come from the faculty itself.

And my colleague Dorian Abbot in Geophysical Sciences added this:

In the context of this book, “War on Science” really refers to epistemological attacks on the scientific method, rigor, and merit. A society deciding it doesn’t want to provide as much funding for science as it used to is not a war on science in this sense.  To deal with that problem we need to show the people that we are generating value for them, not political actors, and not discriminating.

Once again SBM proves itself misguided and censorious. It’s gotten too progressive for its own good, to the point where it tells people not to read books that they think are critical of what progressives are doing.  So it goes.It may pay Dr. Howard to read Alice Dreger’s new piece at the Heterodox Academy Substack site, “Why should those on the left care about open inquiry in higher ed?” It describes a panel at the recent HxA meetings I attended. Two quotes from Alice:

Despite a long-running – and troubling – stereotype among some that intellectual freedom is solely a right-wing cause, many of us who think and vote on the left have cared about threats to open inquiry for a long time. While more on the left may now be getting active in this area due to new threats from the right, left-of-center scholars have long been concerned about restrictions on research, teaching, and expression, including those originating on the left.

. . .In the lively Q&A period, challenged by an audience member who raised the concern that too much intellectual humility could lead to doubting obviously real things, Studebaker reiterated his commitment to being open to different ideas, saying we must “leave open the possibility that some idea could emerge in a room like this subsequently in time that initially might be unimaginable to us but could lead us somewhere genuinely valuable.”

“I don’t think that that’s an abdication of a commitment to human values,” Studebaker concluded. “I think it is an affirmation of human potential.”

It’s not yet time to throw John Stuart Mill in the dumpster.

Science finally retracts the 2010 “arsenic life” paper by Felisa Wolfe-Simon et al.

July 25, 2025 • 11:30 am

Fifteen years ago (!) a group of authors headed by Felisa Wolfe-Simon published a paper in Science heard ’round the world, a paper that garnered huge publicity. (If you can’t get it by clicking the second link, since the paper has largely been vanished, try this archived link.)

Why the problem? I explained this in February of this year:

A remarkable discovery appeared in the journal Science in 2010.  Felisa Wolfe-Simon and her colleagues reported finding, in California’s salty Mono Lake, a bacterium that could [in the lab] substitute arsenic for phosphorus in its metabolism.  This was stunning, as phosphorus was thought to be an essential constituent of many biological macromolecules, including proteins and DNA—the latter using phosphorus as part of its backbone.  (The bacterium was, by the way, named GFAJ-1, standing for “Give Felisa a job,” as she was apparently looking for a permanent academic position.)

At any rate, this was huge news, and implied, to many, including hype-promoting journalists, that if life could thrive on arsenic, perhaps the chances of life on other planets was higher than we thought. Wolfe-Simon herself implied that perhaps there was a “shadow biosphere,” on Earth, including organisms that we didn’t know of because their biochemistry was so different from that of life we knew.

The publicity attending this discovery was huge: NASA held a press conference in which Simon was the only one of the dozen authors to appear. Simon also gave a TED talk on this subject, and in 2011 Time Magazine named her one of “Time’s 100 people,” supposedly the most influential group in the world.

The problem, which emerged pretty rapidly, is that this discovery was wrong. The research was sloppy, the reviewers apparently didn’t have the proper expertise to review the paper, and researchers who did have the expertise began pointing out the discovery’s flaws, first online and then in a series of eight critiques published in Science.

You can see my four posts on this paper here, including the original publication plush simultaneous pushback, along with a more recent New York Times article that more or less whitewashed the paper by painting Wolfe-Simon as a victim (see Greg Mayer’s take in the same post). I wonder if the NYT will finally give a more balanced view of the controversy in which Wolfe-Simon fought like a honey badger for the accuracy of the paper’s results. She was far from being a victim.

Click below to read the editorial retraction, but I’ve reproduced it below:

Here’s what Thorp said:

 The Research Article “A bacterium that can grow by using arsenic instead of phosphorus” by F. Wolfe-Simon et al. (1) has been the subject of discussion and critique since its online publication in 2010. In 2011, Science published the print version of the paper accompanied by eight Technical Comments (2–9) and a Technical Response from Wolfe-Simon et al. (10), along with an Editor’s Note (11). In 2012, Science published two papers that failed to reproduce the finding that the GFAJ-1 bacterium can grow using arsenic instead of phosphorus (12, 13). 

Science did not retract the paper in 2012 because at that time, Retractions were reserved for the Editor-in-Chief to alert readers about data manipulation or for authors to provide information about postpublication issues. Our decision then was based on the editors’ view that there was no deliberate fraud or misconduct on the part of the authors. We maintain this view, but Science’s standards for retracting papers have expanded. If the editors determine that a paper’s reported experiments do not support its key conclusions, even if no fraud or manipulation occurred, a Retraction is considered appropriate. 

Over the years, Science has continued to receive media inquiries about the Wolfe-Simon Research Article, highlighting the extent to which the paper is still part of scientific discussions. On the basis of the 2011 Technical Comments and 2012 papers, Science has decided that this Research Article meets the criteria for retraction by today’s standards. Therefore, we are retracting the paper. Author Ronald S. Oremland is deceased. Author Peter K. Weber disagrees with the Retraction. Authors Felisa Wolfe-Simon, Jodi Switzer Blum, Thomas R. Kulp, Gwyneth W. Gordon, Shelley (Hoeft) McCann, Jennifer Pett-Ridge, John F. Stolz, Samuel M. Webb, Paul C. W. Davies, and Ariel D. Anbar also disagree with the decision to retract and have posted an online letter  explaining their objections, available at https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adu5488#elettersSection, explaining their objections. 

H. Holden Thorp, Editor-in-Chief, Science 

Well, now, Thorp brings up an interesting point: should papers be retracted if their data don’t support the conclusions? In my view, no.  There are tons of papers published in which authors make claims that go beyond the data but in which there is no fraud.  A famous example, and one which I criticized in two papers in Evolution, was Sewall Wright’s famous “shifting balance” theory of evolution.  By combining several real phenomena like genetic drift with speculations about possible phenomena like adaptive peak shifts, Wright confected a grand overarching theory of evolution” (SBT) that was unsupported by the data. But most evolutionists bought the SBT and it appeared in all the textbooks.

But our criticisms were on the mark.  Even Jim Crow, Wright’s colleague and friend at Wisconsin, admitted that we (Michael Turelli, Nick Barton and I) were right. Likewise, many of Theodosius Dobzhansky’s papers have conclusions unsupported by the data.  But they stand unretracted in the literature. And, indeed, even though the conclusions may have been overstated, the data are still valuable, and should not be retracted.  Retraction should be reserved for papers containing fraud or misconduct, not papers whose data don’t support the conclusions, for those papers have still gone through peer review and they have data that might be useful. The main culprits should be the reviewers who let shoddy data into the literature.

And, as Thorp noted above, the authors were given a chance to reply to the retraction. Here’s their response (references can be seen at the links):

Ariel Anbar
Paul Davies
Gwyneth Gordon
Tom Kulp
Shelley (Hoeft) McCann
Jennifer Pett-Ridge
John Stolz
Jodi Switzer Blum
Samuel Webb
Felisa Wolfe-Simon 

In 2011, we published a manuscript in Science proposing that an extremophilic microbe isolated from arsenic-rich Mono Lake, CA (GFAJ-1) utilized arsenic (As) in place of phosphorus (P) in its biochemistry (1). This provocative hypothesis was based on our interpretation of data from growth experiments and compositional studies of key biomolecules. The high-profile nature of the publication’s release focused attention on its interpretations of As-substitution in DNA, drawing widespread attention, criticism, and follow-up research (e.g., 2-5, but see also 6). In the years since, an alternative interpretation emerged that GFAJ-1 is an extremely As-resistant bacterium that remains dependent on P but uses several novel tactics to grow under P-starved conditions (2, 3). 

Nearly 15 years later, the editors of Science have retracted our publication. We do not support this retraction. While our work could have been written and discussed more carefully, we stand by the data as reported. These data were peer-reviewed, openly debated in the literature, and stimulated productive research. 

The editors’ basis for retraction is that the “paper’s reported experiments do not support its key conclusions”. No misconduct or error is alleged. This represents a major shift from the standards Science adhered to in the past, which aligned with those of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE). COPE guidelines state that “Retraction might be warranted if there is clear evidence of major errors, data fabrication, or falsification that compromise the reliability of the research findings” (7). In going beyond COPE, the editors of Science explain that “standards for retracting papers have expanded”. 

We disagree with this standard, which extends beyond matters of research integrity. Disputes about the conclusions of papers, including how well they are supported by the available evidence, are a normal part of the process of science. Scientific understanding evolves through that process, often unexpectedly, sometimes over decades. Claims should be made, tested, challenged, and ultimately judged on the scientific merits by the scientific community itself. 

I agree with the authors’ point here, though they are a bit disingenuous, not admitting that a passel of other scientists could not reproduce their data, and therefore they no longer stand by it. Instead, they dug in their heels.  Their point is right but they are not being fully honest about what happened. My solution: Science can put a disclaimer beside with the original paper saying that the results could not be reproduced, but no—no retraction.

But wait! There’s more! Thorp, a man for whom I don’t have a huge amount of respect, had to have the last word, and published the attached along with Valda Vinson, the executive editor of Science.  Again, click on the headline to read, but I’ve put Vinson and Thorp’s response to the authors’ response below:

The text of Vinson and Thorp:

On 2 December 2010, Science published online the Report “A bacterium that can grow by using arsenic Instead of phosphorus” by F. Wolfe-Simon et al., which caused a media sensation and a firestorm in the scientific community that has continued for years. Today, Science is retracting the paper.

The Wolfe-Simon et al. Report described a bacterium, GFAJ-1, that purportedly not only grew in the presence of arsenate, which is normally highly toxic, but grew “by using” the arsenic atoms and incorporating them into nucleic acids. The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which contributed authors to the paper and provided funding, held a press conference announcing the findings as proof of “arsenic life,” a breakthrough in astrobiology. The scientific community immediately expressed skepticism, raising serious questions about both the plausibility of arsenic-containing nucleic acids and the way the experiments were conducted.

Science was flooded with commentary on the problems with the paper and held off publishing it in print. Eventually, the paper was published in the 3 June 2011 issue, along with eight Technical Comments, a Technical Response from the authors, and a note from Editor-in-Chief Bruce Alberts explaining the decision and timing. The authors agreed to make the bacterium available, and in July 2012, Science published two papers showing that the bacterium was resistant to arsenate and did not incorporate it into biomolecules. One of the Technical Comments had pointed out that the nucleic acids that were analyzed were not sufficiently purified before the acquisition of spectra that suggested the presence of arsenic. Given the evidence that the results were based on contamination, Science believes that the key conclusion of the paper is based on flawed data.

At no point has there been any discussion or suggestion at Science of research misconduct or fraud by any of the authors. Nonetheless, the response of many in the scientific community, especially on social media, went beyond technical criticism and instead verbally abused the authors, especially the first author. Science emphatically rejects and condemns all ad hominem attacks that have been directed toward the authors.

In his 2011 Editor’s Note, Alberts explained that the publication of the Technical Comments was “only a step in a much longer process.” We are ending that process today by retracting the paper. We have made this decision after an extensive set of deliberations and discussions among the editors. We have consulted with the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and are confident that our decision aligns with their guidelines for research integrity.

Over the years since the paper was published, and especially in the past 5 years, as research integrity has become an even more important topic, Science has moved to retract papers more frequently for reasons other than fraud and misconduct. In this case, a number of factors led to the publication of a paper with seriously flawed content, including the peer review process and editorial decisions that we made. With this retraction—and with all retractions and corrections—we acknowledge and take responsibility for the role that we played in the paper’s publication.

The authors of the paper all disagree with our decision, as noted in the Retraction. All but one of the authors have signed an eLetter explaining their disagreement. In their eLetter, the authors state that Science “went beyond COPE” in our decision. We disagree. COPE guidelines have for some time allowed for editorial retraction due to honest error or naïve mistakes.

Despite our disagreement with the authors, we hope this decision brings the story to a close. We also hope that the scientific community will engage graciously and with professionalism in this resolution.

Valda Vinson is the Executive Editor of the Science journals. vvinson@aaas.org

H. Holden Thorp is the Editor-in-Chief of the Science journals. hthorp@aaas.org

This would have sufficed as the explanation for the original retraction, even though there should have been no retraction. Instead, what’s right above could have been the editors’ first word, not their last: an explanation of the problems with the paper. The editors simply had to have the last word, publishing two notes instead of one.