From Peter F Coleman:

Re: Mysterious ball lightning may be brain illusion (May 19): This is basically an invitation to engage in a debate on ball lightning if you are in any way curious as to what it is. It is pure science and it is a paradox that has survived at least 150 years or more of scrutiny by many scientists and is linked to unexplained aerial objects. So. . .

Would you be interested in the debate on ball lightning's existence/origin to 'air' a different perception of ball lightning than that recently claimed by some scientists (Peer and Kendl) who unthinkingly assert that most BLs are not real in a paper published in Physics A (Elsevier) ie 'Transcranial stimulability of phosphenes by long lightning electromagnetic pulses. '

This paper was published with little or no understanding of past work on ball lightning. I tried to engage in this debate with the editor of the Journal with a written submission but I was ignored with a dismissive reply after 4 weeks.

I have instead argued that not only is ball lightning real but there is a suitable theory to describe the types of observations. I congratulate the editors of this journal, Journal of Scientific Exploration but also Weather, and the Journal of Atmospheric and Solar Terrestrial Physics in publishing my work and keeping alive this most interesting debate.