Our first role play took place and had four groups of active discussion participants (note my free interpretation):
- Scientists, who are convinced their modeling is correct and supports the need for action;
- Scientists, who think that modeling is not so valuable but still support strongly the need for action;
- Politicians, who argue in line with climate activists and urge for changes of our behavior for the sake of climate protection;
- Politicians, who are in favor of a business friendly “business as usual” line, arguing that evidence is not enough to take strong action.
I found the discussion very well prepared and the arguments exchanged were – seen from each of the perspectives – very reasonable. I hope the discussion showed that there is no simple answer.
In hindsight, I would like to reflect on the role of uncertainty in this discussion. There were a few instances, where this was actually mentioned:
- Lena presented a figure of the (modeled) Arctic sea ice extend, where one model driven by slightly perturbed initial data showed quite some spread in the final result (though the trends were very similar indeed);
- Lars Kutzbach showed a figure, in which the measured global temperature curve was plotted against IPCC scenarios and was at the very low end of the spread, indicating that the models possibly overestimate the true warming;
- The conservative (I wouldn’t actually call them conservatives, since they play with our future instead of conserving our habitat, but anyhow…) politicians argued that uncertainty in the results is large and does not grant immediate action.
What I find striking is the fact that this uncertainty is somewhat hijacked in order to prevent us from taking strong decisions. So, I was wondering if the term of uncertainty or the whole frame thereoff needs to be taken into account and put into different context. My observation – when looking at myself and my reception of the topic – was that for me as an educated scientist there is not much of an uncertainty. The facts appear cristal clear to me and there is not much left to argue about any longer. But I have a clear understanding of the role each of the uncertainties play. I know that the measured temperature as well as the projected modeled temperature trend involve uncertainties, but that within their confidence intervalls they are matching very well. From this it is also clear that there is not much doubt about the accuracy of our predictive skill over the next couple decades.
So, we need to be aware that uncertainty is hijacked!
My question now is, how can we prevent this from happening? And I am not talking about the fundamental climate deniers. I am talking about the open minded but sceptical public.
I am looking forward to your thoughts in the discussion below!
I would like to look at this problem from a different angle: evolutionary psycology.
Humans have developed an efficient mechanism of daily risk assessment and risk management in their daily lives. Whether it be coming up with a solution to finding shelter during a storm in prehistoric ages or optimizing ways for being on time for an important job interview in the modern times, we are pretty successful in dealing with short-term uncertainties and risks associated with them. This fast-acting risk assessment and management mechanism, mainly evolved due to hominids being prey rather than predators, has a downside: being myopic to large-scale uncertainties. Given the relative short lifespan of humans, we tend to deal with the short-term uncertainties more efficiently compared to long-term uncertainties ( a curious manifestation of this can be found in the concept of time preferance of money). Under high uncertainty & short-term situations, the individual doesn’t look for more evidence or reassureances because the threat is imminent and action has to be taken. On the moderate uncertainty & long-term situations the individual look for certainty because a) there is “enough” time for preparing and b) the adversity can happen after the individual is long gone.
All in all, I think that even the most well-informed individual could be prone to this evolutionary myopia towards long-term uncertainties (or laziness, so to speak) and I believe this is a reason why uncertainty in climate science is hijacked or exploited.
This is a very intersting thought! You are probably right in your observation. It would be interesting to study, if making the psychological mechanisms of dealing with uncertainty in the short term more visible and rationalize them would lead to a strategy that can be applied to the longer term uncertainty management.
I think the reconsideration of the role of uncertainties regarding climate policy is very important. And I agree with Julia here, that it is absurd to waist precious time under the pretence of waiting for more certain results.
Yet I think we might need to go even one step further, which would be to ask why exact projections of future decade’s climate are expected in the first place. After all, nobody expects science to predict child poverty or ocean plastics for the next decades. And that is not hindering people to embrace the reduction of both politically.
Somehow, climate science got associated with the impression of delivering exact scenarios for the whole century. While this can be justified in the scientific sense, I do not think that this image of ‘forecasters’ is very helpful in the public discourse.
I think that uncertainties around climate models were very important in the public for establishing the “if” and the “approximately how much” of anthropogenic climate change. Now that those are established, I don’t think there’s much value for the public discourse to focus so much on model predictions, because the inevitable uncertainties will inevitably be instrumentalised by political adversaries.
I don’t completely now where I’m going with this but I think it might be worth thinking about why people expect “exact predictions” from climate science in the first place – and how that might prove to be an extra obstacle at this stage.
I believe it should be made clear that there are still large uncertainties, and that they can never be ruled out completely, but that we anyhow should take action. In this context, it can be useful to stress the precautionary principle even more and that it would be reckless letting all of us slide into a temperature range that humankind has never witnessed before, just because we are too unwilling or lazy to act now and pretending we still have to wait for results with reduced uncertainties. Until “certainty” could be established, it might be too late to do so. I think many people of the general public are not aware of this, they have the impression due to lack of knowledge we cannot act.
Also I think some parts of the public actually don’t care so much about the uncertainties but more about their economic situation or their comfort, and that is why they don’t want to take action. Maybe it should also be highlighted that a transformation of our economy does not only contain challenges and losses, but can also come with advantages and future benefits, so it won’t always be used as an excuse for inaction but instead motivate people to support climate protection.