Mea Culpa: It’s a fallacy to say the sun has got his hat on

In an editorial about the implications for the government’s target of net zero carbon of the appointment of Jacob Rees-Mogg as business secretary, we said: “He has cast doubt on anthropomorphic climate change...” We meant “anthropogenic”, as more than one reader wrote to let us know.

“Anthropomorphic” means treating things such as animals as if they were humans. We did not mean that the climate is like a person – that is a literary fancy known as the pathetic fallacy. “Anthropogenic”, on the other hand, means that something has been generated by humans.

The lesson of this confusion is not that we should use the right word, although that would obviously be preferable, but that we should not use long, technical and obscure words that are similar to other long, technical and obscure words. I can see why we wouldn’t want to say “man-made climate change”, but we could have said it in a simpler way, such as: “He has expressed doubts that human activity is changing the climate.”

Nothing so ex as an ex: Staying with climate change, we reported the warning to the new government from the chair of its independent committee on the subject, and commented: “Lord Deben, the former John Selwyn Gummer, is an ex-Conservative environment secretary, and no one’s idea of a violent radical.” Thanks to Roger Thetford for pointing out that Lord Deben is still a Conservative. I think he should have been described as “a Conservative former environment secretary”. To avoid using “former” twice, instead of calling him “the former John Selwyn Gummer”, we could have said something like, “better known as John Selwyn Gummer”.

Sign off: In a report of the water contamination in Jackson, Mississippi, we said: “President Joe Biden has signed off on an emergency declaration...” Mick O’Hare asked if this meant he had signed it, or just sent an email. I assume that if it was a presidential declaration, we could say that he signed it.

In and around: Thanks to Norman Stockman for writing in support of my campaign against “amid”. We used it a lot last week. We said that share prices of house building companies “have been dropping significantly in recent months amid worries of a housing market squeeze”. That’s “because of”.

In another report, we said: “Councils are bracing themselves for an influx of homeless refugees amid warnings that the government has ‘no plan’ for the continuation of its flagship Homes for Ukraine scheme.” That’s “as the government was warned that it...”

We even started a motor racing report with it: “Amid a turbulent season where Mercedes have been so far off the frontrunners ... Sunday’s topsy-turvy Dutch Grand Prix will have stung right where it hurt.” That’s “in”.