Sir

As a systematist I was dismayed to read Vladimir Svetlov's comments in Correspondence (Nature 431, 897; 2004). Svetlov addresses the unfortunate publication of S. C. Meyer's ‘intelligent design’ (ID) paper (Proc. Biol. Soc. Wash. 117, 213–239; 2004). However, instead of directing criticism at that paper, he makes scathing claims about low-impact journals in general and the Proceedings in particular.

Svetlov describes the Proceedings as a journal that “enjoyed much-deserved obscurity”. This characterization is not accurate. A cursory review of authorship in the Proceedings throughout its 122-year history reveals a list of everyone who's anyone among systematic biologists, including scores of notable past and current scientists from the Smithsonian Institution.

Journals that primarily publish taxonomic descriptions (such as the Proceedings) generally have low impact factors, but the relevance of such papers is often long-lasting relative to those in high-impact journals, as they are cited across decades and centuries rather than over a period of a few years (a search of Nature's website shows that Proceedings articles have been cited in at least three Letters to Nature since 2002). Such papers are hardly “inconsequential”.

Svetlov says: “The editors and reviewers of many low-impact journals cannot provide the quality reviewing process one gets with Nature, Science, Cell and a few (very few indeed) other established magazines.” My own experience is that a journal's impact factor does not reflect the quality of the review process per se. Submissions to low-impact periodicals are often reviewed by sticklers who examine mundane conclusions with the same caution that a reviewer for Nature would use in evaluating more grandiose scientific claims. Indeed, the same experts commonly evaluate papers in both high-impact journals such as Nature and low-impact specialist journals. This is why Svetlov should perhaps not be “surprised it took so long” for a paper such as Meyer's to appear in the peer-reviewed literature.

Given the Proceedings' taxonomic focus, Meyer's ID paper is clearly out of place. Its publication represents a lapse of the journal's usual editorial policies, and has been swiftly repudiated (http://www.biolsocwash.org). However, although the publication of Meyer's paper is lamentable, it need not be used to trivialize the Proceedings' long, respectable and ongoing tradition of cataloguing global biodiversity.