I think the fact that it has any credibility at all is more due to the fact that the author works at NASA.
Again, I'm not saying that the paper is any good. I'm just saying that people should refute the claims in the paper instead of attacking the delivery method.
This was done as well. However, one should look at all the available evidence to inform one's analysis. Printing in a third rate journal is the first clue that something is very wrong.
> I'm just saying that people should refute the claims in
> the paper instead of attacking the delivery method.
At the risk of merely echoing what's been said countless times: (perceived) journal quality is simply a reliable heuristic for judging paper quality. Sure, some stuff published in Nature is crap, and some third-tier journals publish important research every now and then.
But in 90% of all cases, the paper-journal quality correlation works rather well.
Again, I'm not saying that the paper is any good. I'm just saying that people should refute the claims in the paper instead of attacking the delivery method.