Dear Sir

Dr. David Mermin's review of Alan Sokal's "Beyond the hoax" (Science wars revisited, N. David Mermin, Nature 454, 276-277, 17 July 2008) makes some good points, but the overall thrust is unnecessarily and unfairly negative. Anyone who has not read Dr. Sokal's book may come away with the impression that he has spent the whole book rehashing stale debates and attacking articulate and scientifically literate targets like Latour, Keller and Plotnitsky. The fact is, the book is much more topical, and Dr. Sokal's targets are much more unscientific than Dr. Mermin's review implies. For example, Dr. Mermin does not say a single word about the chapters on pseudoscience and religion, which are very well written and well argued and constitute a very important part of the book. One would have expected a fairer and more balanced review from Nature.