Letter: Barbaric scientist

From Dr Steve Jones

Sir: I am the Steve Jones referred to by Bryan Appleyard ("A disease that's made in the mind", 31 October) as a "scientistic barbarian". Perhaps it will help your readers to understand why Mr Appleyard is so upset if they learn that the phrase to which he takes such objection ("philosophy is to science what pornography is to sex") was coined by me in a review of his own remarkably silly book, Understanding the Present.

Yours faithfully,

Steve Jones

London, NW1

31 October