Letters to the Editor, Feb. 5, 2023

ON AND OFF

Brampton possibly handing out free Faraday bags to curb car theft (Chris Doucette, Feb. 1) seems like a complicated solution to this problem. Wouldn’t it be much easier and cheaper for auto manufacturers to just put an off switch on the key fob? Not only would this negate the need for a Faraday bag, which is just another thing to misplace, it would also make fob batteries last much longer. A faraday bag will likely be detrimental to fob battery life as it desperately tries to communicate from inside its radio signal blocking prison. To paraphrase Dragnet’s Sergeant Friday, ‘We need a switch ma’am, just a switch.’

Steen Petersen
Nanaimo, B.C.

(Car manufacturers are going to have to seriously evaluate antitheft technology. It’s also important that this type of crime is punished with significant deterrence in mind)

TROUBLE IN TECH

Re “Climate Initiatives” (Letters to the Editor, Feb. 1): Anyone who says that climate change does not exist is a fool. Anyone who says that man is the only contributor to climate change is also a fool. Now I’m not saying that there isn’t some effect on the climate by our forces but let’s look at a couple of things. Firstly, the Medieval Warm Period (Google it). This is the point in time from between the years 800 and 1300 AD, the planet had warmed up. It had actually warmed up more degrees Celsius than are currently predicted by the climate models for today’s conditions. There were no cars and factories around at that time to lead to these conditions. From 1300 to 2000 it cooled down. Secondly, the Earth has been through no fewer than 11 ice ages. That means the Earth froze up, then it thawed, then it froze up, then it thawed, then it … well you get the point. The Earth is at the mercy of the sun and what the sun chooses to throw or not throw at it. Again, there were no cars and factories around to contribute to any of this. There are fossils of palm trees in the Arctic. It is the way our planet works. What we, as responsible human beings, should strive to achieve is clean water and clean air. What will contribute largely to these outcomes will be, in a word, technology.

Peter Barton
Ajax

(Some political leaders would rather just make massive pronouncements about the environment with a little thought to consequences)

NAME AND SHAME

The solution to TTC violence and elsewhere, regardless of age, sex or racial makeup, is not more police. It can, though, be summed up in four words. Named. Shamed. Prosecuted. Punished!

Roger Lewis
Brampton

(But more police presence will help too)