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Planetary Emergency:the Carbon Crisis Across the Curriculum
David Orr argues that "we are still educating the young as if there is no planetary emergency," effectively (and passionately and eloquently) declaring such an emergency. A year of reflection afforded by my sabbatical devoted to the study of climate change has convinced me that Orr is correct.
This short presentation will highlight some provocative aspects of global climate destabilization across the divisions of the university, and call for transdisciplinary action against our common enemy: ourselves.
Andy LongDepartment of Mathematics and
Statistics
Motivations....Why speak out now? Why here?
Motivations....Why speak out now? Why here?
“Faced with much uncertainty about future climate conditions, we can no longer rely on past experience to guide our decisions.
[Adaptation] calls on concepts such as transdisciplinarity....”Catherine Ste-Marie, in Chasing Climate Change -- Exploring the Option of Assisted Migration (2011) -- my emphasis
Motivations....Why speak out now? Why here?
“Faced with much uncertainty about future climate conditions, we can no longer rely on past experience to guide our decisions.
[Adaptation] calls on concepts such as transdisciplinarity....”Catherine Ste-Marie, in Chasing Climate Change -- Exploring the Option of Assisted Migration (2011) -- my emphasis
“Armed with the security of tenure and the time to study the world with care, professors would appear to have a unique opportunity to act as society’s scouts to signal impending problems.... Yet
rarely have members of the academy succeeded in discovering emerging issues and bringing them vividly to the attention of the
public.”Derek Bok (1990), former president of Harvard, quoted in David Orr’s Earth in Mind (1994)
Assumptions....
Assumptions....
Assume that the Earth’s resources are infinite.
Assumptions....
Assume that the Earth’s resources are infinite.
Yet we don’t act that way:
our atmosphere is infinite
our oceans are infinite
our forests are infinite
our agricultural lands are infinite
our aquifers are infinite
We act as though we assume that
Yet we don’t act that way:
our atmosphere is infinite
our oceans are infinite
our forests are infinite
our agricultural lands are infinite
our aquifers are infinite
We act as though we assume that
They’re not.
Recent News:
Recent News:If You Think the Water Crisis Can't Get Worse, Wait Until the Aquifers Are DrainedNational Geographic, August 19, 2014
We're pumping irreplaceable groundwater to counter the drought. When it's gone, the real crisis begins.
Recent News:
Canada leads world in forest decline, report says Edmonton Post, September 4, 2014
...scientists discovered that the pace of decline is accelerating with more than 104 million hectares – about 8.1 per cent of global undisturbed forests — lost from 2000 to 2013.If this rate of degradation continues, “business as usual will lead to destruction of most remaining intact forests this century,” Dr. Nigel Sizer, director of the forest program at the World Resources Institute, said.
If You Think the Water Crisis Can't Get Worse, Wait Until the Aquifers Are DrainedNational Geographic, August 19, 2014
We're pumping irreplaceable groundwater to counter the drought. When it's gone, the real crisis begins.
Recent News:
U.N. Draft Report Lists Unchecked Emissions’ RisksNYTimes, August 26, 2014
Runaway growth in the emission of greenhouse gases is swamping all political efforts to deal with the problem, raising the risk of “severe, pervasive and irreversible impacts” over the coming decades, according to a draft of a major new United Nations report.
Canada leads world in forest decline, report says Edmonton Post, September 4, 2014
...scientists discovered that the pace of decline is accelerating with more than 104 million hectares – about 8.1 per cent of global undisturbed forests — lost from 2000 to 2013.If this rate of degradation continues, “business as usual will lead to destruction of most remaining intact forests this century,” Dr. Nigel Sizer, director of the forest program at the World Resources Institute, said.
If You Think the Water Crisis Can't Get Worse, Wait Until the Aquifers Are DrainedNational Geographic, August 19, 2014
We're pumping irreplaceable groundwater to counter the drought. When it's gone, the real crisis begins.
So why do we behave so badly?
The Tragedy of the Commons
The earth, like the sun, like the air, belongs to everyone — and to no one. (Edward Abbey)
The Tragedy of the Commons
"Climate change is a result of the greatest market failure the world has seen. The evidence
on the seriousness of the risks from inaction or delayed action is now overwhelming. The problem of
climate change involves a fundamental failure of markets: those who damage others by emitting
greenhouse gases generally do not pay.“
Sir Nicholas Stern (2007)
The Tragedy of the Commons
"Climate change is a result of the greatest market failure the world has seen. The evidence
on the seriousness of the risks from inaction or delayed action is now overwhelming. The problem of
climate change involves a fundamental failure of markets: those who damage others by emitting
greenhouse gases generally do not pay.“
Sir Nicholas Stern (2007)
The damages have been “externalized”.
Humans
AtmosphericCarbon
Pollution
Extinctions
Humans
AtmosphericCarbon
Pollution
OceanAcidification
GlobalWarming
18611897
Extinctions
Humans
AtmosphericCarbon
Pollution
OceanAcidification
Extinctions
ClimateChange
OceanWarming
GlobalWarming
18611897
Humans
AtmosphericCarbon
Pollution
OceanAcidification
Extinctions
ClimateChange
OceanWarming
GlobalWarming
18611897
Humans
AtmosphericCarbon
Pollution
Clathrate melt
IceMelt
OceanAcidification
OceanCirculationDisruption
Extinctions
ClimateChange
OceanWarming
Permafrost thaw
GlobalWarming
18611897
Humans
AtmosphericCarbon
Pollution
Clathrate melt
IceMelt
Forests
OceanAcidification
Aquaculture
Sea-level RiseOceanCirculationDisruption
Extinctions
ClimateChange
OceanWarming
Permafrost thaw
GlobalWarming
Agriculture
18611897
The Carbon Crisis is a Planetary Emergency
the Keeling Data (“the most important environmental data set of the 20th century”),
the U. S. National Academy of Sciences, and
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
The Carbon Crisis can be illustrated with a cast of three:
Carbon Crisis IS a Planetary Emergency:
Keeling’sAtmospheric
CO2 Data (and a
model):
Carbon Crisis IS a Planetary Emergency:
The NAS predicts global warming based on CO2 (ppm) in the atmosphere:
Keeling’sAtmospheric
CO2 Data (and a
model):
Carbon Crisis IS a Planetary Emergency:
The IPCC predicts significant species loss (20-30%) if we hit 2 degrees C of
warming....
The NAS predicts global warming based on CO2 (ppm) in the atmosphere:
Keeling’sAtmospheric
CO2 Data (and a
model):
Carbon Crisis IS a Planetary Emergency:
The IPCC predicts significant species loss (20-30%) if we hit 2 degrees C of
warming....
The NAS predicts global warming based on CO2 (ppm) in the atmosphere:
While we don’t expect infinite growth, ppm CO2 is expected
to rise until we achieve 4oC by the end of the century.
Keeling’sAtmospheric
CO2 Data (and a
model):
Carbon Crisis IS a Planetary Emergency:
At which point the IPCC predicts 40-70% of species at significant risk of extinction.
The NAS predicts global warming based on CO2 (ppm) in the atmosphere:
While we don’t expect infinite growth, ppm CO2 is expected
to rise until we achieve 4oC by the end of the century.
Keeling’sAtmospheric
CO2 Data (and a
model):
So if there’s a Planetary
Emergency,then we need to ramp up, to go on a war-time footing -- to begin to seriously battle
the foe -- which is us.
So if there’s a Planetary
Emergency,then we need to ramp up, to go on a war-time footing -- to begin to seriously battle
the foe -- which is us.
What should we be doing?What should we be telling our
students?How should education change?
“What is Education For?”
This essay, by David Orr, leads off the book Earth in Mind (1994).
Orr argues for a revolution in education to deal with our
assault upon the Earth:
“The truth is that without significant precautions, education can equip people
merely to be more effective vandals of the earth.”
David OrrAuthor of
Earth in Mind: on Education, Environment, and the Human Prospect (1994)
Down to the wire: Confronting Climate Collapse (2009)
(and others)
Orr quotes H. G. Wells: we are in “a race between education and
catastrophe.”
Orr Rethinks Education
1. All education is environmental education.2. It is time to establish national goals for
ecological literacy and make these a vital part of the curriculum.
3. Education is not mastery of subject matter but mastery of one’s person.
4. We have to challenge the hubris buried in the hidden curriculum that says that human domination of nature is good.
1. Control Carbon
2. Protect the Global Commons
3. Warn our students
4. Speak truth to power
5. Reform education to bring it back into harmony with nature.
So: What Must We Do?
1. Control Carbon
1. We “need to understand and accept the gravity of the impacts of global warming on the human and natural world.”
2. “[N]ations must establish policies that raise the price of CO2
and other greenhouse-gas emissions.”
3. “[G]overnments and the private sector must intensively pursue low-carbon, zero-carbon, and even negative-carbon technologies.”
William Nordhaus is an economist, author of these two important works. He suggests
“Three Steps for Today”: 2013
2. Protect the Global Commons
It is not okay to foul our community’s air with your carbon.
It is not okay to poison our streams, rivers, and oceans with your agricultural wastes.
It is not okay for you to destroy virgin old-growth forest and replace it with a monoculture of pines.
It is not okay to tear the top off of a mountain and dump it into the streams to tear out the coal while poisoning people.
(and the list goes on).
The Kindergarten rule: if you make a mess, clean it up.
Demand that we internalize externalities.
3. Warn our Students:
The sixth mass extinction (sixth in 3.5 billion years) is underway.
Agricultural production is dropping; fish stocks are falling; meanwhile, a hungry population is rising.
Oceans are warming, rising, and acidifying.
Glaciers and ice caps are melting.
Methane is melting out of our oceans and permafrost.
Deforestation (often for more farmland) proceeds unabated.
Diseases and pests are spreading.
Cheap oil is gone; cheap (clean) water is gone.
This is the world that your parents and teachers bequeath you:
4. Speak truth to power
In Florida, Gov. Rick Scott said “I’m not a scientist” when asked about climate change. So scientists in Florida wrote him a letter, and said we’d like to meet with you, and explain this to you.
Kentucky Senators Mitch McConnell ('I don't buy' that climate is changing. In 1970s 'we were all concerned about the ice age coming.' -- 3/2014) and Rand Paul (“I don’t think we really want a commander-in-chief who’s battling climate change instead of terrorism” -- 9/2014 ) need to be educated. We need to meet with them, and educate them.
“The global crisis ahead is a direct result of the largest political failure in history.” Orr, DW (2009)
We need to call out our politicians who refuse to act:
5. Reform Education
We need to confess our failures and agree to seek ways to get beyond them.
Academic and Societal Failures
Economic failure (externalization -- there has been no charge for destroying the commons)
Political failure (failure of governments to act in spite of the clear warnings of scientists)
Psychological failure (human unwillingness to sacrifice today for tomorrow’s populations)
Sociological failure (famine in the midst of plenty, destined to only get worse)
Academic and Societal FailuresScientific failure (although the science is agnostic, and good, on climate; the fault is in our will to dominate nature, rather than to live as part of nature.)
Technological failure (We do things because we can, rather than because we should. We can tear down mountains, so we do -- for coal, which destroys our atmosphere, mountain ecosystems, streams, and poisons us with mercury....)
Academic and Societal Failures
Agricultural failure (big farming -- “get big or get out” -- has been a roaring success at delivering cheap food while destroying soil, forest, rivers, gulfs, and rural life)
Mathematical failure (linear thinking -- that small actions lead to small reactions -- and the failure to reflect on our own models)
Academic and Societal Failures
Mathematical failure (linear thinking, and the failure to reflect on our own models)
Let me pick on mathematics a little....
Academic and Societal Failures
Mathematical failure (linear thinking, and the failure to reflect on our own models)
Linear thinking: that small changes in behavior lead to small changes in a system (e.g. the climate system).
Linear thinking denies the existence of tipping points, or actions which seem small, but which have out-sized impacts. Examples of misplaced linear thinking:
1. That one small step at the Grand Canyon won’t hurt you.2. That the world can’t change much in a short amount of time.
Suggested change in Mathematics Education: encourage the study of non-linearity, and focus on model systems that exhibit (surprising) tipping points.
Academic and Societal Failures
Mathematical failure (linear thinking, and the failure to reflect on our own models)
Conclusions“The world has always needed a dangerous
professorate and needs one now more than ever before. It needs a professorate with ideas that are dangerous
to greed, shortsightedness, indulgence, exploitation, apathy, high-tech pedantry, and
narrowness.”
David Orr, EM (1994), p. 103
Conclusions“The world has always needed a dangerous
professorate and needs one now more than ever before. It needs a professorate with ideas that are dangerous
to greed, shortsightedness, indulgence, exploitation, apathy, high-tech pedantry, and
narrowness.”
David Orr, EM (1994), p. 103
We must be that professorate.
Conclusions“...[U]niversities continue to turn out a large
percentage of graduates who have no clue how their personal prospects are intertwined with the vital signs of the earth.... Noel Perrin (1992) believes it to be a failure of leadership: ‘Neither the trustees nor
the administration [of this or any other college or university] seems to believe that a crisis is coming.’”
EM (1994), p. 126
Conclusions“...[U]niversities continue to turn out a large
percentage of graduates who have no clue how their personal prospects are intertwined with the vital signs of the earth.... Noel Perrin (1992) believes it to be a failure of leadership: ‘Neither the trustees nor
the administration [of this or any other college or university] seems to believe that a crisis is coming.’”
EM (1994), p. 126
We must convince students that their fates are intertwined with the vital signs of the
earth.
ConclusionsDavid Orr wrote (in 1994) that “despite decades of
talk about ‘interdisciplinary courses’ or ‘transdisciplinary learning’, there is a strong belief
that such talk is just talk.” EM, p. 94
ConclusionsDavid Orr wrote (in 1994) that “despite decades of
talk about ‘interdisciplinary courses’ or ‘transdisciplinary learning’, there is a strong belief
that such talk is just talk.” EM, p. 94
Is this “just talk”? Or will we band together to educate for a planetary
emergency?
Bob Dylan On Climate
Come senators, congressmenPlease heed the callDon’t stand in the doorwayDon’t block up the hallFor he that gets hurtWill be he who has stalledThere’s a battle outside and it is ragin’It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your wallsFor the times they are a-changin’’
Bob Dylan (1963)
Transdisciplinarity definition: “connotes a research strategy that crosses many disciplinary boundaries to create a holistic approach.” (Wikipedia)
While climate change is frequently seen as a problem for hard scientists (and perhaps merely atmospheric physicists or meteorologists), the breadth of impacts suggest that global climate destabilization is actually the business of every discipline.
Hard sciences such as chemistry (ocean acidification), biology (mass extinction), oceanography (coral bleaching), atmospheric physics (runaway greenhouse effect), etc. are obviously implicated.
Social sciences are weighing in more heavily with time: economics, political science, and psychology are disciplines which must be included, although the arts (e.g. literature -- The Road, by Cormac McCarthy -- or film and more modern social media) are going to play an important role.
NKU Mission & Values
Our Mission: “As a public comprehensive university located in a major metropolitan area, Northern Kentucky University delivers innovative, student-centered education and engages in impactful scholarly and creative endeavors, all of which empower our graduates to have fulfilling careers and meaningful lives, while contributing to the economic, civic, and social vitality of the region.” http://www.nku.edu/about/mission.html
Our Core Values: These are the core values that NKU embraces as we go about our work.
We will promote a culture that fosters and celebrates EXCELLENCE in all that we do.
We will engage in honest, fair, and ethical behavior, with INTEGRITY at the heart of every decision and action.
Ours will be a community that embraces INCLUSIVENESS, diversity, and global awareness in all dimensions of our work. (my emphasis)
We will approach our work – how we teach, engage, and serve – with creativity and INNOVATION.
And we will maintain a climate of COLLEGIALITY built on respect and characterized by open communication and shared responsibility. (my ironic emphasis!:)