Letter to the Editor of The Independent:
Sir: In Johann Hari’s piece on the Heathrow protesters (20 August), he says that most scientists share his view of climate change as though all scientists are disinterested pursuers of the truth.
But this ignores a significant trend in recruitment to university science courses over the past 25 years. In the 1970s, people (including me) who had broadly left-wing views about things like welfare and crime, opted for courses in the social sciences, knowing that the content would reinforce our prejudices.
In the 1980s, as the focus of left-wing thinking shifted to green issues, many people with concerns about the environment chose to study earth and environmental sciences for similar ideological reasons, and I suspect that today’s scientific establishment includes a considerable number of these people.
Kevin Mahoney, Sheffield
