COURSE OFFERED FALL 2024

Public perceptions and attitudes concerning the causes and importance of globalwarming have changed. Global Climate Change provides a sound theoretical understanding of global warming through an appreciation of the Earth’s climate system and how and why this has changed through time. We will describe progress in understanding of the human and natural drivers of climate change, climate processes and attribution, and estimates of projected future climate change. We will assess scientific, tehnical, and socio-economic information relevant for the understanding of climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation.

Instructor: Michael Mann

This course will explore the physical science of the Earth’s environment and human interactions with it. Coverage will include the Earth’s various environmental systems, various environmental problems, and the direct and indirect causes of these environmental problems. Freshman seminar will mirror the ENVS 1000 recitation, and have additional discussions and social media projects.

Instructor: Alain Plante

Recitation TA: Annabelle Horton (Mann Research  PhD Student)

This course will focus on understanding the multiple ways in which climate science is communicated to publics and how they come to understand it. In the process, we will explore ways to blunt susceptibilities to misconceptions, misconstruals, and deliberate deceptions about climate science. Forms of communication on which the class will focus include consensus statements, manifestos, commentaries, court briefs, news accounts, fact checks, op-eds, letters to the editor, speeches, and media interviews. Students will have the opportunity to interact with guest lecturers, among them leading journalists, climate activists, and climate survey analysts. Students will write letters to the editor and fact checks and will participate in mock interviews designed to increase their understanding of the nature of the interactions between journalists and climate scientists. As a class project, students will collaborate on a white paper on climate discourse fallacies to be distributed at the April 3-7 Society for Environmental Journalists annual convention (hosted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center and the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability, and Media). Students will interview attendees at that conference as part of the class project.

Instructors: Kathleen Jamieson and Michael Mann