Letter: Action needed now on climate

HAS Geoffrey Lean considered that scepticism about global warming may be due not so much to the strength of the arguments against it, but to the woolliness of some of the arguments advanced in favour of the theory?

I was particularly baffled by his claim that 'since the Seventies, the Antarctic summer has lengthened by 50 per cent'. How does he define the beginning and end of 'summer'? My own view is that whether or not it is summer depends on how late the sun sets, or, in the Antarctic, whether it sets at all. Unless global warming has caused the earth to tilt on its axis we must assume that Mr Lean is using some other definition. If he wants to be taken seriously he will have to tell us what this is so that we can make up our minds whether we believe him or not.

Dr David Sutton

London WC1