To the Editor.— In Knochel's fine article, Pathophysiology of Severe Hypophosphatemia, which appeared in the FebruaryArchives(137:203-220, 1977), on page 209 under the heading Possible Role of Hypocalcemia in the Pathogenesis of Phosphate Depletion in a Patient With Chronic Alcoholism, appears the sentence, Since alcoholics are hypomagnesemic, it seems possible that.... This statement is obviously what the author intended, because in the previous column he speaks about alcoholics who are, in fact, The statement is therefore false and should be corrected. Probably what was intended is the statement, Since alcoholics are hypomagnesemic, it seems possible that.... This type of error is logic (misplacement of a quantifier) is common, but is to be avoided especially in scholarly journals, whose readers, one would hope, would know that all alcoholics are hypomagnesemic means something decidedly different from not alcoholics are hypomagnesemic.