We had a very interesting debate on the topic “How would you react to uncertainties presented by scientists concerning the ‘2 degree limit’? What are your demands towards scientists’ communications? “ from the perspective of different people in life.
As Children, they don’t know what uncertainty means and in their short life they haven’t experienced changes in temperature.As SICSS student, they already have a preliminary concept of uncertainty. In the future they hope to develop models to reduce this uncertainty. As professor of physics, they more concern about how to use media for climate change education. As VW’s retails, they expect their technicians to work on uncertainties. They are concern about carbon emission. Even though the climate debate is uncertain they want to produce less emissions because they are concerned about their customers but they cannot talk to their customers about uncertainties.
Coffee shop owners who care about current events know a little more about climate change than ordinary people. Climate change affects the origin of coffee, this maybe have a little impact on their business.
We have started to focus on energy conservation, emission reduction and uncertainty. All human activities produce carbon dioxide. Even as a child, you cannot say that you have no contribution on the growth of climate change. For instance, having more toys made by plastics requests more oil which is the raw material for plastics. Some scientists have shown that the most effective way to reduce emissions is family planning. Then why is 2 degree target so important. First If the global average temperature is more than 2°C above the pre-industrial level, then the impact of climate warming on economic growth and environment will become more serious. Second, in order to achieve the 2 degree goal, the negative growth caused by emission reduction and transformation is 1.6 %. It is very small compared to the annual economic growth rate of 20 %. Finally, 2 degrees is a convenient number to communicate and remember than a figure of 1.5 degrees. It is easier for public to remember.