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Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Try to keep letters to fewer than 150 words. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here: letters@globeandmail.com

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Reality is in danger

Re In America, the Less You Know, the Cooler You Are (June 29): I just got off the phone with an old friend who drives me crazy. Despite his masters-level education, he is utterly obsessed with the conviction that all experts are wrong, period.

Not surprisingly, he is an habitué of Fox News.

I share Lawrence Martin's dismay. Somehow, the Fox tribe has become as impervious to reason as Galileo's tormentors. What ever happened to Reality (you know, the stuff Nature does)?

We had better take this question seriously because Reality is in mortal danger.

What kind of a world do we get when objective truth is on life support? Look at America.

What we need is a new Manhattan-scale project to teach philosophy and critical thinking at all levels of the education curriculum. It works. But you know, wink wink, everything I've just written is a lie …

Garth Mihalcheon, Calgary

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As more people become unemployed due to robotics and AI – both of which are the result of knowledge – there will exist fewer reasons to become educated.

If the bots take all the jobs, as they will continue to do, then why waste time and money to get an education? As we transition to the non-work society, are we also transitioning back in time to a pre-educated state of nature, where might is right, and only the strong prevail?

If we find this scenario disturbing, then we should address it by beginning the conversation about how knowledge is more than just a way to "get a good job with more pay and you're okay," as Pink Floyd sang.

Do we become educated to get a good job with more pay, or is knowledge much more fundamental to civil discourse and civil society?

Geoff Lee, Thunder Bay, Ont.

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Greenpeace replies

Re Greenpeace Is A Menace To The World (June 24): Margaret Wente referred to Greenpeace as a menace to the world. If that means challenging unchecked corporate powers and zealously acting to protect our natural environment from destruction, then certainly. We take that as a compliment.

Greenpeace will continue to challenge companies and governments based on science.

We bring solutions to the table; at a time when the forest industry is under major disruption, collaboration is essential.

Instead of working with environmental organizations, Resolute Forest Products is going the Trump-route: attack anyone that gets in its way. Using Donald Trump's U.S. law firm – and legislation designed to take down the mafia – Resolute has sued Greenpeace in Canada and in the United States for more than $300-million in an attempt to brand the organization as a criminal enterprise for criticizing its unsustainable practices in the boreal forest.

Concerned by Resolute's "excessive'' legal tactics toward Greenpeace, the CEO of Hachette Livre, one of Resolute's customers, expressed that "at a time when the United States has decided to turn its back on climate change … we believe we need more than ever independent NGOs such as Greenpeace. Without them, who will speak up for the environment in the future?"

This case is much bigger than Resolute vs. Greenpeace. A precedent such as this risks turning public advocacy into a criminal activity. Every one of us who enjoys the right to free speech has a duty to defend it.

Joanna Kerr, executive director, Greenpeace Canada

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Turtle. And Archer

Re Don't Move The Archer (June 29): The installation of Henry Moore's sculpture, The Archer, in Toronto's Nathan Phillips Square was highly controversial back in 1966. It arguably cost mayor Phil Givens his job.

As Marcus Gee points out, the sculpture's installation in Toronto's main civic space marked a watershed moment when the city was moving from provincialism to cosmopolitan sophistication.

Therefore, symbolically as well as aesthetically, Moore's Modernist masterpiece has perfectly complemented Viljo Revell's Modernist architectural masterpiece, Toronto's City Hall, for more than 50 years. It's an important, site-specific piece of our identity.

Reconciliation with the Indigenous community can and should enhance our city. Removing The Archer would be an act of vandalism.

David Teitel, Toronto

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The Archer should stay where it is. How would the spokesperson for the Indigenous cultural agency that wants to install the Turtle feel, if in 40 or 50 years, someone wanted to move it because it "doesn't represent me or my family"?

Diane Hart, Toronto

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Since the view of City Hall from Queen Street – which runs in front of it – is blocked by trucks selling hot dogs and french fries, along with the accompanying garbage and pigeons, what does it matter where the proposed Turtle sculpture goes?

Is the view to Parliament Hill in Ottawa or to the provincial Legislature at Queen's Park blocked by food trucks? The hot dog vendors and buses could move to Bay Street – and the Turtle would probably like to be near the pool.

Barbara Klunder, Toronto

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Of art and edifice

I loved your article about Ottawa's National Arts Centre, which officially opens the first phase of its renovation tomorrow on Canada Day (The Brutalist Truth about The National Arts Centre, June 24).

A recently retired federal public servant, who worked 10 years on the Prairies, then 20 in Ottawa, I have developed a profound hatred of four brutalist buildings in the National Capital Region – but the Arts Centre has been the most frustrating, because of the four, it is the one I visit most.

Before I moved to Ottawa, I needed to attend a meeting at the then-National Arts Centre and found it difficult to figure out how to even enter the building. That's because the main entrance was hidden at the back, with only a small, unmarked entrance at street level. Once I found the hidden entrance, I encountered a long corridor with scant signage and absolutely no mention of the small meeting room I needed to find – and this was the evening, with no staff to be found.

I look forward to a renewed National Arts Centre that does not seem to hate people.

Dale Shier, Orleans, Ont.

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Birds, bees and bears

Re Creator Of Beloved Paddington Bear (June 29): The obituary of Michael Bond, author of the delightful Paddington Bear books, reminded me of an amusing moment in my career as a bookseller. A customer who wanted a compilation of Paddington stories asked, "Do you have a copulation of Paddington Bear?" I wanted to say, "Well, not in the children's section, madam" – but I resisted the temptation.

John Marshall, Toronto

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