People ought to take into account a discipline' s blemished origins when assessing the scientific value of that discipline. Take, for example, chemistry. It must be considered that many of its landmark results were obtained by alchemists -- a group whose superstitions and appeals to magic dominated the early development of chemical theory. The reasoning above is most susceptible to criticism because the author ["fails to consider how chemistry's current theories and practices differ from those of the alchemists mentioned", 'uses the word "discipline"in two different senses', 'uses an example to contradict the principle under consideration', 'fails to establish that disciplines with unblemished origins are scientifically valuable']