Science: Skeptics' Prize

Honors for doubting Thomases

Late into the night, veteran Associated Press Science Writer Rennie Taylor discussed the question with his friend, A.P. Science Editor Alton Blakeslee. To whom—or what—should Taylor bequeath his estate? That night the American Tentative Society was conceived. Its goal: to encourage independent scientific thinking. Why "tentative"? Because, as Society President Blakeslee explains, "all ideas should be regarded as tentative. Otherwise we become prisoners of yesterday, stuck with dogmas."

Last week, some 15 years later, the society took its first big step toward encouraging its iconoclastic objective. Dipping into the...