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CORRESPONDENCE On the Clash of Rival Theories In an Accounts editorial entitled “A Farewell to Anger” (July 1984) Robert Schoenfeld hails the fact that chemists no longer engage in hostile controversy. He compliments chemists for seldom raising their voices in anger at meetings or filling the journals with the clash of rival theories. He is gladdened that “Article after article in Accounts of Chemical Research relates the tale of a research group that went out to find new facts, not to disprove existing hypotheses”. I am not at all sure that chemists are kinder now than in yesteryear. The apparent lack of vindictiveness in the current literature may reflect newer avenues for venting
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hostility (i.e., grant reviews). One could well prefer a direct attack in the literature or at meetings over an unfair and anonymous review. But there is a more important criticism of the Schoenfeld editorial. He believes it is a good thing that chemists avoid the testing of hypotheses. If modern chemists are indeed abandoning inductive inference (the most powerful of all scientific methods), then we ought to voice concern rather than to distribute compliments. In this connection, the article of J. R. Platt entitled “Strong Inference” (Science (Washington, D.C.) 1964,146,347) is still relevant-perhaps now more than ever. Fredric M. Menger Professor of Chemistry
0 1985 American Chemical Society
