The Nov. 13 column by Irving C. Sheldon Jr., “Gore challenged over warming,” concludes that climate change is more myth than reality. Sheldon relies entirely on the views of MIT Prof. Richard Lindzen to support this case. This approach misleads readers by failing to tell them that Lindzen’s skeptical views are widely dismissed by the larger scientific community.

It’s possible that Mr. Sheldon did not know that the views of the scientific community are well summarized in reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). These reports, written by thousands of the world’s climate scientists, have concluded: (1) The Earth is warming, (2) Human activity is very likely responsible for most of the recent warming, (3) If we do nothing, warming over the next century could be 4 to 9 Fahrenheit, and (4) The impacts of such warming could be disastrous.

IPCC reports are based on the peer-reviewed literature and are peer-reviewed themselves. They are accepted by every national government of the world (including, for example, the U.S., China and Saudi Arabia — countries not known for their “alarmist” views on climate). These reports have also been endorsed by the American Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and many others. In the end, the IPCC reports are perhaps the most thoroughly vetted documents in the history of science. As a result, there exists no credible dissent from their conclusions.

Professor Lindzen espouses a fringe view of science that stands in direct opposition to the IPCC reports. He is joined in this by perhaps a few dozen other climate scientists who are endlessly recycled by a well-organized denial machine — reminiscent of the denial machine tobacco companies put together to obfuscate the connection between cigarettes and cancer.

In fact, Professor Lindzen has also been quoted as saying that cigarettes are not firmly linked to any adverse health effects. So, when Lindzen tells you the evidence of human-induced climate change is also weak, you and Mr. Sheldon should be very skeptical indeed.

ANDREW DESSLER

CHRISTOPHER REDDY

Woods Hole, Mass.

The writers are, respectively, a professor in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University and an associate scientist in the Department of Marine Chemistry and Geochemistry at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.