Sir

Hesse-Honegger's handwork is, as an aesthetic indicator of environmental pollution as described in Martin Kemp's Art and Science article, visually very attractive but may leave “corners where dark questions lurk” in areas other than those he mentions (Nature 392, 555; 1998).

The near-field of Chernobyl, Three Mile Island, and the “Chernobyl trails” in Sweden and Switzerland have very little in common radiologically, with exposures ranging from a fraction of natural levels to a thousandfold of normal. Finding consistent teratogenic effects in organisms generally known for low radiation sensitivity may have to do with poor control of important environmental parameters such as temperature during organ formation in these species. Twelve years after Chernobyl, the merits of such an assay on “radiation-mutated” bugs could have been scrutinized easily by blinding, that is, by separating bug collection and morphological assessment.

In the absence of controls, this kind of superficially convincing science may suggest that the Earth is flat, or produce even less benign claims. Aesthetic hypotheses and even politics should similarly not be absolved from critical analysis, otherwise one is not obliged to accord them any importance outside the realm of aesthetics. I hope Nature will maintain its distinction between good and bad science; there is no room in between for nice (-looking) science.