DO YOU ever read something and think “gosh, that’s really dangerous”? I’ve done it twice in the last couple of weeks while reading this very publication, as two contributors questioned whether newspapers should publish letters from people who deny that climate change is caused by human activity.

Both cited the Los Angeles Times, which apparently has stopped carrying such letters on the grounds it doesn’t publish “errors of fact”, and a major international scientific study which concluded humans were definitely behind climate change.

The first of our writers said publishing contrary views would now be “serving lies”, and argued non-publication would not be “suppressing views or denying freedom of speech”.

The first time I saw this suggestion I was somewhat perturbed, but hesitated to enter the debate for fear of being labelled a climate-change denier myself – which I’m not.

But the second time the matter was raised – and brought closer to home by questioning what sort of letters The Press was prepared to print – I felt compelled to express my fears.

My concern isn’t about the science of climate change; what bothers me is the idea that “right-minded” folk should quietly sideline views they disapprove of.

I feel forced to ask who decides when someone’s opinions are so wrong-headed they should be ignored, and how far down this road should we go?

There are many letters newspapers won’t publish; it varies from title to title, but I think generally opinions which would offend either individuals or groups, for example, on racial, religious or lifestyle grounds, are unlikely to be published.

You’ll note these criteria do not include “this is a hugely important issue and we don’t want the ill-informed or malicious muddying the waters”. That’s one reason why denying climate change isn’t the same as denying the Holocaust.

I also believe experience suggests that when people succeed in shutting up those they disagree with their appetite for the more of the same is often sharpened rather than sated, to the point where they’re no longer targeting those who disagree with them but those who broadly share the same views, but not in quite the right way.

Extreme examples include the medieval church’s pursuit of heretics and the incredibly bitter bloodletting between 20th-century Marxists.

I appreciate no one is advocating inquisitions or gulags in the climate-science debate. But actions often have unforeseen consequences. Imposing a “right” way of thinking tends to produce orthodoxies, and orthodoxies are not conducive to free debate.

My concern is that the deadening effect of this could mean potentially useful ideas being sidelined because they don’t entirely fit with the authorised version.

Many ideas which are now part of the mainstream, such as evolution and the movement of the planets, were once condemned as wrong and dangerous by people who sincerely considered themselves to be in the right and that they had the mass of learned opinion on their side.

I’m not suggesting climate-change denial is in that bracket; rather that healthy societies don’t stifle debate, particularly on the big issues. If that means letting a few people with ideas most folk entirely disagree with having their say occasionally, I honestly believe that’s less dangerous than the alternative.

One word of reassurance to those who object to my argument today; I stopped having anything to do with selecting letters for this newspaper after the 2010 general election, which finished me off. I was, I think, fairly cautious in my approach to which letters we would or wouldn’t use, but I tried my best to ensure my personal views didn’t intrude.

For example, I’m a lifelong non-smoker who resents suffering from other people’s fumes, but published more than one letter from people blaming the smoking ban for the closure of pubs.

That’s because I think letters and opinion pages are for all sorts of views, even those I completely disagree with, and long may that continue. Of course, that’s just my opinion.