It is not clear to me what problem Paul Morland (Encounter, 12 July) is seeking to solve. Indeed, it may be that he is making an existing one worse. First, there is no evidence that women will wish to give up their hard-won economic and personal freedom in pursuit of childbearing. All policy efforts to reverse this have failed. Second, “too few people” needs to be set in context. The peak of the world’s population is expected at 10.3 billion in about 60 years. That figure is 25 per cent above the current population. It means that every day for the next 60 years the population is expected to increase on average by about 100,000. What price climate change goals? Third, demography, like politics, is local. People will be concerned, for example, about sub-Saharan Africa, but they will also be worried about what lies ahead for them.
There are no projections that suggest the UK’s population will decline within this century. The most favoured projection suggests it will increase by five million. With all the challenges that this entails for public services, food and water security, climate change and social cohesion, are more babies really the answer?
Robin Hodgson, House of Lords
Despicable quacks
The cult of Donald Trump as the messiah born to save America by the grace of God is terrifyingly described by Katie Stallard (Letter from Washington, 19 July). But the idea of Trump’s singularity does not withstand exposure to the longer view history affords us. Of all the devastating criticisms Samuel Johnson made in 1757 of Soame Jenyns, MP for Cambridgeshire and author of A Free Enquiry into the Nature and Origin of Evil, he was happy to endorse the remark that: “No immoral man… can possibly be a true patriot; and of all those who profess outrageous zeal for the liberty and prosperity of their country, and at the same time infringe her laws, and debauch her people, are but despicable quacks, by fraud or ignorance increasing the disorders they pretend to remedy.” Verification, then, of the wisdom of Ecclesiastes 1:9 that however unparalleled Trump may seem, “there is no new thing under the sun”.
Philip Smallwood, Bristol
The only way forward
Raja Shehadeh’s question “What if this war should end not by a ceasefire or a truce, but with a comprehensive resolution to the century-old conflict between the Palestinian and Israeli people?” (Encounter, 19 July) is not simply his hope, but also the most likely conclusion to the Gaza conflict.
I have spoken to no one since 7 October who believes a return to some false “status quo” is feasible, nor to any representative of Arab states who is willing to pour billions of dollars into the reconstruction of Gaza if there is a likelihood of it being destroyed again in a few years’ time.
The only way to prevent that is a resolution that ends the occupation of the West Bank, resolves the issue of East Jerusalem, ensures statehood and self-determination for the Palestinian people and delivers security for the state of Israel, including universal rejection of ideology calling for Israel’s destruction.
The hope for a peaceful future cannot be achieved by marginalising the Palestinian issue ever again. The victims of the generational trauma now unleashed deserve no less than that comprehensive resolution being rightly demanded.
Alistair Burt, minister for the Middle East, 2010-13 and 2017-19
A venerable history
I’m surprised that Finn McRedmond objects to London Underground as a space for poetry (Out of the Ordinary, 19 July). It has always prioritised high-quality art, including iconic station designs and a sans serif typeface for signage. Early posters inviting commuters to take the Tube were designed by the best contemporary artists, often including lines by Shakespeare or Robert Bridges, poet laureate in 1913. Eduardo Paolozzi transformed Tottenham Court Road Station with a grand mosaic design, completed in 1986. David Gentleman’s superb 1970s Charing Cross mural is still pristine. More recently, Art on the Underground commissioned new artworks for display throughout the Tube system.
London Underground has maintained Poems on the Underground for close to 40 years because the project has proved so popular. Evidently most Londoners agree that the arts should be part of ordinary life, not the preserve of academic enclaves.
Judith Chernaik, co-founder, Poems on the Underground
Computer says no
I enjoyed visiting John Searle’s Chinese Room in the company of David Edmonds (Philosophy Matters, 19 July). Searle’s argument is still as effective as ever and, in the era of GPT-4, even more relevant. However, there is one fundamental point I think Edmonds should have brought to the fore. When we use language we operate with words and sentences and the meanings we create connect with the world. Computers, however, reduce language to strings of numbers. Their output is not meaningful in itself; this string is arrived at by calculating probabilities. When one interacts with the machines, one could easily be deceived into thinking they understand their own outputs. But as Searle pointed out with his Chinese Room argument, a very slick simulation is still only a simulation, and the difference between a meaningful sentence and a number string is inescapable.
Les Reid, Edinburgh
We love you Rovers
I must correct Hunter Davies’ comment that Keir Starmer is the first real football fan to occupy No 10 since Harold Wilson (The Fan, 19 July). I well remember Gordon Brown obsessing about football in his student days. He was and remains Raith Rovers’ most prominent fan, maybe along with Val McDermid. Interviewed at a match recently at Starks Park, he reeled off great Raith teams from the past just as Wilson could do for Huddersfield. I hope he will invite both Starmer and Davies to Kirkcaldy in the near future for a football summit, with politics definitely off the agenda.
Eric Summers, Kirriemuir
It’s all French to me
Lyndsey Stonebridge asserts, in her discussion of Biden’s favourite lines from Heaney, that hope and history will never rhyme (Critics, 19 July). Fortunately for Macron and the French, however, they do (l’espoir/l’histoire)!
Jill Sharp, Swindon, Wilts
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This article appears in the 25 Jul 2024 issue of the New Statesman, Summer Special 2024