Oil in the Arctic 2. The Outer Continental Shelf Environmental Assessment Program

Abstract

Organic chemists are qualified by their knowledge of reaction mechanisms to attempt to predict outlines of biosynthetic sequences leading to natural molecules. The subject is an art, rather than a science, involving several interwoven strands of creative thinking. The evolutions of ideas, distinct from the discovery of facts, are difficult to elucidate from the published literature, and are explored in connection with alkaloids, flavonoids polyketides, and some terpenoids. The advantages and limitations of the chemists' type of thinking are examined with some of the reasons why biochemists have tended to ignore their hypotheses.