To the editor:

Since its start in 1998, the most commented-on section of the Adirondack Explorer magazine has been the presentation of opposing sides on issues of importance to the Adirondack Park. This page is titled “It’s Debatable,” and the question up for discussion in the current (March-April) issue is this: “Should renewable energy be an Adirondack Park Agency priority?”

John Droz Jr. took the “NO” position. Similar views recently surfaced in another of his commentaries in the Adirondack Daily Enterprise. That he is a climate-change denier came out loud and clear in his attitude toward “anthropogenic global warming (AGW)” — that is, human-caused climate change. Like Donald Trump and many of his supporters, including a depressing number of Republicans in Congress, Mr. Droz rejects the notion that human activity has been causing our climate to heat up.

“Despite what the media propagate,” Mr. Droz stated in the Adirondack Explorer debate, “the AGW hypothesis is not scientifically known.” Never mind that almost every climate scientist in the world believes that global warming is primarily caused by the burning of fossil fuels by human beings.

Mr. Droz is identified in the Enterprise as a “physicist,” though his scientific credentials are not disclosed. At the end of his Explorer commentary, he is also identified as an “environmental advocate.” That label is especially hard to swallow. Mr. Droz may actually see himself in this light, but one wonders just what kind of environment this man is advocating. Intensifying droughts, floods and hurricanes? Dying forests, melting glaciers, rising and acidifying seas? An accelerating rate of extinction for many species? Millions of desperate, displaced people — basically climate refugees — seeking to escape their environmentally ravaged countries and, in the process, destabilizing governments around the world? In short, a planet that will become increasingly uninhabitable for our grandchildren and theirs?

This kind of environmental advocate is the last thing we need right now.

Dick Beamish

Middlebury, Vermont

P.S.: Beamish launched the Adirondack Explorer magazine in 1998.