From Prof E. Brian Davies.

Sir, I usually read John Kay’s column with great enjoyment, but fear that when he took on Martin Rees, the president of the Royal Society (“Science is the pursuit of truth, not consensus”, October 10) he did not display his usual good judgment. Scientists do indeed aim to find out the truth, even though this is often much more complex than many people realise. Galileo promoted the Copernican theory with the support of evidence obtained from his telescope, and his views proved to be right. We now criticise the church not because it disagreed with him but because it forcibly prevented him from continuing to express his views.