I am responding to Mike Lim's letter titled Proton Advisor a Bad Choice .

Some people venerate Teilhard de Chardin as a distinguished savant of science but Nobel prize laureate Sir Peter Medwar was not impressed.

In his review of Chardin's book, The Phenomenon of Man he commented that it is 'nonsense, tricked out with a variety of metaphysical conceits.' American mathematician, philosopher and expert on eastern religions Dr Wolfgang Smith is largely in agreement with this assessment.

Now, the mainstream media has unfailingly described Dr Mahathir Mohamad as a heavyweight intellectual and even some ignorant people in the west have echoed this fulsome praise.

The point is Mahathir did not distinguish himself in medicine like for example, Dr Khalid, the endocrinologist or like the Hunterian Professors Balasegeran and Francis Silva have.

To be sure, for most of his life Mahathir was more interested in politics than medicine. But however, his book The Malay Dilemma targeted at an educated English speaking readership does not evince good science.

What little scientific information it contains is the stuff of coffee shop talk, the pastime of boisterous off duty taxi drivers. It is alarming that such a man has been selected to advise Proton.

The taxpayer will surely see more and more of his money going down a black hole.