I find the frequent letters from Joseph P. Smith of the Pyro-Chem Corporation somewhat disturbing.

Last week’s letter, printed under the heading “Global Warming Is a Hoax,” is a good example. Mr. Smith, an energy company executive, discusses a letter that was the product of an effort by oil company executives to silence NASA on the subject of climate change.

Like each of these letters that regularly appear on your opinion page, this latest one was full of questionable statements and shamelessly empty rhetoric. For example, who are the “hundreds of well-known climate scientists and tens of thousands of other scientists” who claim to doubt the relationship between CO2 and climate change?

The list of 49 NASA retirees who signed the letter demanding that NASA refrain from voicing its opinion on the devastating impact of man-made carbon dioxide doesn’t include a single person with expertise in the field of climate science. I can’t help wondering if these signees also consider the disappearance of Arctic ice a hoax, along with thawing permafrost, melting glaciers and acidic oceans.

Scientists don’t try to silence those who disagree with them. Normally, they would join the debate, but there isn’t much of a debate left to join.

The coal industry has the most to lose in what’s left of it, and the scarcity of experts willing to advocate for them is a growing problem, but it isn’t insurmountable. The tobacco industry was able to find experts willing to state that their products were harmless, too.

It’s especially disheartening, however, to open one’s hometown newspaper and find yet another example of corporate propagandizing.

 

Abby Fowler

Ironton