Im growing weary of 1) the term liberal being employed pejoratively and, 2) the questioning of global climate research. Some of the letters to the Herald do this.
A reading of the U.S. Constitution reveals the influence of liberal philosophers including Plato, Locke, Hobbes, Montesquieu and Rousseau, as well as the conservative thinking of Edmund Burke and the poet Alexander Pope. It would be an answer to prayer if contemporary politicians and the public could synthesize the views of such conflicted thinking. Certainly conservative and liberal thinkers have contributed mightily to the development of our nation.
Secondly, how many of those claiming that the concept of global climate change is a hoax are familiar with the research literature? Do they know what a statistical test of significance is? Are they suggesting that our National Academy of Sciences is under the persuasive influence of men and women without integrity?
The term paranoid delusion, in the past, was frequently defined as a grossly mistaken idea out-of-keeping with people of like culture and training. Does this concept fit some of our current thinking? I am beginning to believe maybe it does.
Frank Tikalsky
Bayfield
