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Of course I am not a creationist; nor did Wilberforce accuse Darwin and Huxley of falsification. A final note: In his letter to American Scientist, Sibley indignantly agreed that there should indeed be an investigation into his work by the Home Secretary of the NAS. When that was published, I (and separately Prof. Vincent Sarich of UC-Berkeley) wrote to Peter Raven, Home Secretary of the NAS, and outlined the outstanding charges and included documentation and reprints. Once again, here is Raven's full response to me, dated October 25, 1993: ************ Thank you very much indeed for your letter and the enclosures. I was extremely interested in what you had to say in reading the enclosures. It is obviously a very complex case and, as I am sure you understand, the National Academy of Sciences would not undertake to conduct a formal review of the activities of its members as a matter of general principle, lacking the judicial machinery to do so properly. I would add, however, that no one is elected to the Academy for a single piece of work, and thus it is incorrect, as a matter of principle, to say that "this is the work that ultimately resulted in Sibley's election to the National Academy of Sciences.....". In summary, I was very interested in the material that you sent. We will be conducting no investigation. Yours sincerely, ***************** It need hardly be observed that not investigating is the simplest course that allows the status quo to remain, forestalls any possibility of embarrassment. and permits the authors to retain the status they acquired by virtue of these fraudulent papers. This is not, in my opinion, a good model for the most prestigious science organization in America to set, if scientists are ideally supposed to (1) value integrity, and (2) have a great deal of strong curiosity.
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