About 18 months
ago, I read Jonathan Wells' book "Icons of Evolution" and
discovered that Wells had claimed that a 1996 LIFE magazine article
on human embryos was written by "Brown University Biologist Kenneth
Miller." Well, it wasn't. Turns out that LIFE has a staff writer
who is also named "Kenneth Miller." I've got a very common
first and last name, and this kind of thing happens all the time.
Friends, be assured
that I didn't write the article.
I e-mailed Wells,
pointing out that a careful look at the magazine article would have
avoided the mistake, and asking him to correct it.
He promised to
correct it immediately.
Such a correction
was important to me, since he had used supposed "errors" in
the LIFE article to make a case that I had misled readers about human
embryology.
I picked up a
copy of the new paperback version of Icons in March 2002, and saw the
extent of his "correction:" The book (page 104) now simply
says that the LIFE article was "written by Kenneth Miller."
Since Icons refers
to me by name three other times, each time in reference to textbooks
written by "Kenneth Miller and Joseph Levine," his readers
will clearly assume that I am also the author of the LIFE article, something
that Wells now knows to be false.
To compound the
error, Wells lists just one index entry for "Kenneth Miller,"
and the pages next to that entry indicate that the same guy wrote both
the LIFE article and the textbooks. In plain language, since Wells has
known the truth for more than a year, the "correction" he
has made in his book now amounts to nothing more than a common lie.
Is he so desperate that he feels justified in falsely slurring the scientific
reputation of anyone who disagrees with him?
Why does his
book persist in making a claim of authorship which he now knows to be
false? You'd have to ask Rev. Wells, who claims to be interested only
in fairness, accuracy, and truth why he feels justified in lying about
the authorship of the LIFE Magazine article. I am sure you will get
an interesting reply!