Why does the Telegraph (Daily and Sunday) invariably take such a negative attitude towards any serious attempt to confront our transport problems (Satellite tracking will drive up cost of school run, 8 June, 2003)? I am sorry to say that you show little appreciation of the importance and magnitude of these problems. Correct me if I am wrong, but my impression is that you all have your nice motorcars and sufficient income to be able to fly off around the world once or twice a year, so your attitude is more-or-less one of, "I'm alright Jack!" Except, of course, that you want travel conditions improved (more roads and runways) and prices kept down.

What you miss, or choose to ignore, is that because of its global impact on Earth's finite resources and carrying capacity, transport policy needs to be considered in its global context. We cannot reasonably (although unreasonably this is what you and most others do) consider our own means of getting about without considering how the world's other 6 (soon to be 7 - 9) billion inhabitants are, or are going to do so, as well. 

The fact is that the levels of motorisation and air travel, which have become a way of life and are probably the single most important economic factor in industrialised countries like Britain, are not sustainable in the long term, even for the relatively small fraction of the world's population which can currently afford them. 

It is not just you at the Telegraph, of course. Virtually everyone is ignoring, playing down or denying the problem. Why? Because I am the one who is mistaken? I don't think so. Although reading the advertisement for "Dr Rath's Constitution"* in today's Daily Telegraph reminds me of how deluded presumably anyone can be. Perhaps in my way, I'm just as deluded as he is. Again, I don't think so. But Dr Rath, no doubt, feels the same.

How do we objectively judge our own view of the world, when we are captives of our own subjectivity? By applying reason. Which is what, to my (deluded?) mind, I have done above.

Why do you and most other people fail to understand my reasoning on transport policy?

The first reason is that you accept what one might refer to as the "insanities of normality", because they are "normal". "Normal" is naturally taken to mean "okay". Because most people in this and other "civilised" countries own a car it is seen as being "normal" and thus by definition must be okay. This is not just semantics, but very powerful human psychology.

The second reason is that we all (myself included) have interests (personal, social and/or economic) in the motor car and air travel more-or-less as we are now used to them, while the fact that they are non-sustainable hardly affects us at the moment, is of little more than academic interest, so that when it is mentioned, the reaction one gets is much the same as from a teenage smoker when you try warning them about the dangers of smoking . . . (which, actually, is a very good analogy).

I hope that you will give what I am saying some serious consideration, because, without wishing to sound alarmist, if I am the one who is mistaken, it is not the end of the world, but if I'm not, it could be, or something very much like it . . . .