The Red Notebook

Letter to New Scientist:

Sir/Madam,

Compare and contrast:

“Nobody is arguing – yet – that the tree concept has outlived its usefulness in animals and plants… [I]t is still the best way of explaining how multicellular organisms are related to one another” [Graham Lawton, New Scientist, 24 Jan 2009].

“Darwin was wrong: cutting down the tree of life” [New Scientistcover, 24 Jan 2009].

I appreciate you need to hype up your headlines to sell more deadtrees, but I expected better of New Scientist – especially just oneweek after your own editorial vowed to strive to avoid sexing upheadlines in future. Do your marketing people think they’ve identifieda gap in the creationist market or something?

I presume, in future, whenever you show a clade diagram in one of yourarticles, its caption will come with the disclaimer, “Please Note:This is wrong”.

More science, less marketing hype please.

Richard Carter, FCD
The Friends of Charles Darwin
http://friendsofdarwin.com/
Charlie is our Darwin