Yen, last year honored with a lectureship from the Lee Yuan-tseh Foundation for Outstanding Talent, has drawn criticism from others in his academic field for concentrating his efforts on wooden oxen. Their attitude is that it is a waste of time to research something that belongs to the distant past.
對於去年獲選「李遠哲傑出人才基金會﹘﹘傑出人才講座」的顏鴻森埋首「做牛做馬」，學界有人不以為然，認為古時候的東西，已經過去了，何必浪費時間去研究？