Letters: Climate solutions

Sir: The ideas being developed by the Nobel laureate Professor Paul Crutzen and John Latham at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (letter, 8 August), both of which involve injecting particles into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight away from our warming globe, are born out of a desperation which condemns them.

If we cannot see and react to the danger by dealing with its cause, then what hope is there that the cause will be dealt with while some atmospheric paracetamol is applied to the feverish planet? The human nature that led to the problem will then be given a parole which it is likely to ignore. With the immediate threat of warming diminished, any urgency to reduce our destructive ways would be lessened, the outpouring of CO2 continued, and our predicament worsened.

To imagine the leaders of the world sorting the problems of overpopulation, overconsumption and destruction of the life-giving properties of our planet because scientists have given them a few years' grace is dangerously naive.

Better if our most intelligent minds applied themselves to convincing the politicians and population that a new age of economic contraction and global convergence of wealth and poverty must begin. This would give us the chance of an honourable cure rather than a dishonourable delay of the inevitable.

DR COLIN BANNON

CRAPSTONE, DEVON

Sir: The Independent deserves a lot of credit for the prominence it has consistently given climate change. However your leader of 3 August, "When alarmist language is justified", misrepresents the conclusions of the our research and provides a prime example of the type of language that can disempower people from action. You rightly point out that discourse analysis is a recognised and valuable exercise, which is why we commissioned two of the leading experts, Gill Ereaut and Nat Segnit, to carry out this piece of work. It was their analysis that coined the phrase "climate porn": the phrase was not an invention of our press office.

The report does not assume that climate change can be communicated without using language that may alarm people. But it does warn that some alarmist language can distance people from the reality of the problem and could cause inaction. This is particularly the case when the solutions offered are "small actions" that encourage a large number of people to do a few small things to counter climate change such as switching off appliances or changing to energy-efficient light bulbs. People ask: how can this really make a difference?

The research argues that everyone with an interest in climate change needs to have a greater awareness of how they communicate and the impact of the solutions they present.

SIMON RETALLACK

HEAD OF CLIMATE CHANGE, INSTITUTE FOR PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH, LONDON WC2

Blair's phoney war over 'values'

Sir: Yet again Britain has been subjected to chaos and confusion as the alleged plot to blow up transatlantic airliners unfolds. George Bush ascribes this to Islamic fascism. It is however wrong to call this Islam. There is nothing in the Koran or the teaching of Islam in general which calls on its followers to exact such mayhem.

There was no need for Britain ever to have followed America down the disastrous path of war against the Muslim world, and we should detach ourselves in every way as quickly as we can. Mr Blair chose to express this as a war of "values". He is wrong.

I have travelled extensively in the Middle East and I have found that its diverse peoples do in fact share our values. They want to have safe lives, to send their children to good schools, to achieve a decent standard of living and above all to have something worthwhile to look forward to.

They need electricity every day and petrol stations with petrol, a reliable water supply and a roof over their heads. They worry about discipline in the classroom, about drugs, about internet chat rooms, about how much pocket money to give just as much as anyone in this country, and it doesn't matter whether the worriers are Christian, Muslim, secular, religious, veiled or unveiled, bearded or clean-shaven.

They also want the right to decide upon their form of government, a system they know will work, and not have some half-baked ideas forced upon them under the misnomer of democracy. Above all, if they do vote, they want to see their choice installed and not arrested en masse as happened recently in Gaza. Where is the clash of values in all this?

Standing "shoulder to shoulder" with Mr Bush may enhance Mr Blair's self-image in his own eyes, but it has compromised and discredited the foreign policy of this country for a long time to come. He may have gained many valuable photo-ops in the USA over the last few days, opportunities which no doubt will enhance his status and job prospects on the others side of the pond but at this time of crisis, his place is in his country. The silence of Mr Brown is eloquent, the invisibility of Mr Prescott indicative and the absence of Mr Blair a dereliction of duty unparalleled.

JOANNAH YACOUB

LONDON W8

Sir: As a British Muslim I wholeheartedly support Shahid Malik MP's recent comments about Britain's Muslim community going that extra mile to address the tiny minority of young "Muslim" hotheads who wish to bring harm to their fellow British citizens and in doing so bring shame to the vast majority of peace-loving Muslims in the UK.

The irony is that most Britons have expressed concern about Iraq and the current Middle East conflict. The British people have a natural sense of justice and if our politicians have got it wrong then we punish them through the ballot box and not by blowing up innocent men women and children, no matter how strong we feel about the injustice of it all. The killing of innocent people is an evil act forbidden by the very religion these "martyrs" profess to live by.

Generally Britain has been good to its Muslim community and equally the Muslim community is hardworking and law-abiding and makes an immense contribution to our way of life.

My advice to those who wish to spoil this generally good relationship: you do so without the will of Allah and all decent people regardless of their religion.

NIC CAREEM

LONDON NW5

Sir: Many of your readers and much of the Muslim community believe that the recent arrests in the UK are an inevitable consequence of British foreign policy.

Maybe the Bali bombers (who killed 202 civilians of mixed nationalities) were complaining about the Indonesian government's decision to invade Iraq, or maybe the Nairobi bombing (which killed 207 Kenyans) was a direct result of the Kenyan government's refusal to back a Middle East UN resolution, or maybe the attack on the Australian embassy in Jakarta was punishment for the Antipodeans' subjugation of the Palestinians, or maybe the car bombs at Sharm el-Sheikh were an inevitable consequence of Egypt's invasion of Afghanistan, or maybe the truck bomb in Djerba was a totally justified response to Tunisia's unconditional support of US foreign policy?

Or perhaps there is a different common factor?

Until the leaders of one of the world's great religions stop blaming other people and start to show that its millions of followers do indeed tread a path of peace, no one is safe, anywhere.

IAN MAUDE

WHERWELL, HAMPSHIRE

Sir: I just love Yasmin Alibhai-Brown's claim that UK Muslims are forced to "agree to all government policies" and "refrain from protests" (Opinion, 14 August). The truth is that even when Muslims protest while carrying banners inciting murder in response to Danish cartoons, they are not arrested.

R S MUSGRAVE

DURHAM

Birds can avoid turbine blades

Sir: I am a great lover of birds, but do not think they are stupid. The vast majority of them will be perfectly able to see and hear, and take evasive action from, enormous new wind turbines to be constructed on Lewis or elsewhere ("Is this the price of clean fuel?", 10 August). Scandinavian surveys have demonstrated that birds can readily detect obstructions from their normal flight paths.

Did our forebears stand in the way of progress by objecting to the introduction of the motor vehicle because some birds would be killed on the roads? Perhaps the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds should campaign to stop the use of the motor vehicle to put an end to the undoubted daily slaughter of birds on our roads.

DONALD P MCDONALD

SCONE, PERTH

True spirit of English village cricket

Sir: Miles Kington has been writing about cricket at Limpley Stoke, wherever that is. He would be well advised to pay a visit to Bovey Tracey, where the standard of the game is much higher and the umpires wear baseball caps and multi-coloured shorts.

The suggestion has also been mooted that when a well-struck ball hits one of the cars parked on the perimeter of the ground an extra run will be awarded, and if a six results in the early demise of an adjacent bowls player the striker of the ball be presented with a certificate of merit. This is cricket as it should be.

ROGER MCCANN

BOVEY TRACEY, DEVON

Fate of Jews and Arabs in Palestine

Sir: Yet again we encounter the personal pleading of Holocaust survivors who regard Israel as the only country left for them to escape anti-Semitism (Lucy Mandelstam's letter, 9 August).

My parents emigrated to Israel in the 1930s to create there a new social order striving "to uphold the full social and political equality for all its citizens without distinction of religion, race and sex" (Israel's Declaration of Independence, 1948). Yet in my early childhood I witnessed the levelling of the three Arab villages surrounding my kibbutz and the expropriation of the land and homes of 750,000 Arab-Palestinian refugees driven out of Israel in the aftermath of the 1948 war.

While Jews all over the world have the automatic right to "return" to Israel the Arab refugees are left to rot in camps and enclaves in the West Bank, Gaza strip, Lebanon and Syria. The only option for them is slavishly to reconcile to their fate, or join grassroots resistance parties like Hizbollah and Hamas.

RUTH TENNE

LONDON NW6

Sir: Lucy Mandelstam, writing from Israel, states that, aged 19 in 1945, on being released from a concentration camp, "All I wanted to do was start a new life in my own country".

Yet Palestine was not her own country. More than two thirds of the population were Palestinian Arabs and the majority of Jewish Palestinians were immigrants who had lived there for less than 30 years. Sixty one years later with over 3 million Palestinians living behind the barbed wire fences of Gaza or the walled ghettos of much of the West bank the writer lives in denial over the disaster her bright new state caused the indigenous people of Palestine. Until Lucy Mandelstam faces up to that tragedy the legitimacy she craves for Israel and the future of her children and grandchildren will remain as elusive as ever.

LYNNE TIMPERLEY

BRACKNELL, BERKSHIRE

Sir: Lucy Mandelstam tells a terrible personal history of suffering abusive shouts of "Jews to Palestine" as a child in Vienna and of years in concentration camps; but it wasn't Palestinians who shouted at her. I am sorry that she now feels insecure living in Israel. But I am sorry too that great numbers of Palestinians, displaced for more than half a century, are still being made to pay the price for European atrocities which they had no part in.

TOM RASMUSSEN

MANCHESTER

Sir: Being Jewish by race I have a right to return to Israel should I desire. However I am so appalled by what this country stands for that I could never claim this right. Couldn't I just give it to a Palestinian refugee instead?

THOMAS EISNER

LONDON SW14

No backup

Sir: Chiara Peroni (letters, 14 August) cannot afford to lose "five years of hard scientific work" from her laptop. Computers may fail for a variety of reasons. Does she not make backup copies?

DAVID HITCHIN

SEAFORD, EAST SUSSEX

The lure of power

Sir: In the debate about the study of physics Isobel Piper (letter, 14 August) has missed an important point. The decision over nuclear power appears already to have been taken by Tony Blair. Why study physics when there is an easier, and more financially rewarding option, by becoming a politician and wielding power over reasoned and informed argument.

PETER ERRIDGE

EAST GRINSTEAD, WEST SUSSEX

Ancient Celtic oak

Sir: I disagree with Mr Duncan (letter, 11 August),who regards the "English" oak as a divisive symbol for the Conservative Party. The oak tree was revered by the ancient Celtic inhabitants of the British Isles. Oak woods were sacred to the Druids. The Irish name for oak is dar; it features in many place-names for example, Kildare and Derry.

N M TOOMEY

EAST HARLING, NORFOLK

The ethics of eating

Sir: Every year my husband beats on a local shoot and often returns with a brace of pheasants, much to the disgust of an elderly neighbour, a self-professed animal lover who does not kill flies ("It's the shooters who are the true conservationists", 14 August). He sees no irony in complaining about the cruelty of "blood" sports whilst driving to the supermarket to pay £2.50 for an intensively reared chicken which has not seen the light of day.

ANGELA ELLIOTT

WELTON LE MARSH, LINCOLNSHIRE

Sir: I consider myself a quasi-vegetarian as once or twice a month I eat hunted vermin (pigeon, rabbit etc) out of pure altruism to one's fellow citizens. After a weekend of reflection I am happy to reduce the jellyfish mountain ("Invasion of the jellyfish", 12 August). However I will require some sensible ideas on catching and cooking.

ROBERT BOSTON

WEST MALLING, KENT

Rhyme and reason

Sir: Alack and alas, alliteration is alien to Shlaine and Caine Haine. Please tell Yvonne Roberts (10 August) and your sub-editors.

BILL BURCHELL

PINNER, MIDDLESEX

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