Bear in mind it's not just ego, but livelihood. People's grant lines and tenure cases rely in part on contributing to the development of the field, and having t

Bear in mind it's not just ego, but livelihood. People's grant lines and tenure cases rely in part on contributing to the development of the field, and having the basis of your research retracted usually undermines your tenure review and puts a hamper on continued grant funding. So it's not super surprising that people are defensive, but I'm always amazed at how publicly aggressive things can get.