To the Editor:

Allow me to correct Brian Thompson (“Gore’s global warming an ideological scapegoat,” 10/24).

Yes, so far, global warming is indicative of a one-degree rise in average global temperature. What this actually means (and what Mr. Thompson decided to ignore) is that temperatures at the poles have risen an average of 15 degrees Fahrenheit (average does not mean “equal everywhere”). So, polar bears “desperately enrolling in swimming lessons” are actually indicative of a greater problem: melting ice.

Unless Mr. Thompson took an environmental economics class with a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (he didn’t), he wouldn’t know that climate changes are predicted by the world’s foremost climate scientists (not, Mr. Thompson, by Yale seniors who fail to do their research) to increase weather extremes. This means warmer summers, colder winters, drier deserts and wetter tropics.

One should notice that U.S. agriculture is heavily based on irrigation; anyone that has been paying attention to resource issues would know that water use is becoming a major problem. The arid parts of the United States, where agriculture is a large part of the economy, are going to have major trouble in the future as they become more arid and water becomes more scarce.

To assume technology will save us from ourselves would be sadly naive. Technology can only help if we put it to the right use; we must be willing to make tough changes in order for innovation to have any effect.

Avinash Gandhi

Oct. 25

Gandhi is a sophomore in Pierson College.