Category: Commentary

Social Media Apps are an Underestimated Force for Change

Like many others during the start of the covid-19 pandemic in 2020, I joined TikTok after a few months of hemming and hawing. I thought it was a children’s or teen’s app where they did dances or dumb trends (re: tide pod challenge), but not necessarily something to be taken seriously. As the algorithm got to know my interests, I saw videos on cats, recipes, canning, Tolkien, Game of Thrones, anti-racism, international issues, and a myriad of other topics. Of course, as an ecologist and someone who cares about scicomm, I also ended up on Biology and Ecology Tiktok where I saw folks sharing everything from “stop baiting deer with corn because it’s spreading chronic wasting disease (CWD)” to “here’s what your microbio prof thinks about XYZ”. Eventually this evolved into slightly more niche topics like environmentalism, ecology, and climate change. It has been the climate change piece of the videos in my algorithm that has captured my attention the most.

As with anything on the internet of a specific topic, in this case climate change, there are a ton of videos that range from cutesy, 10-ways-to-reduce-carbonfootprint to sharing active protests and ways to stay safe during protests. Something that I’ve found that I believe might be unique to TikTok is organizing against fossil fuel companies in ways that they don’t know how to deal with. I have seen various creators gather intel and share information on how to essentially bully these companies into changing policies or effectively stopping pipeline construction through political action and protest. The majority of these “clock app” climate activists also happen to be indigenous people.

Birdie Sam, otherwise known as @Showme_Yourmask on TikTok, is a T’lingit two-spirit creator who focuses on educating to arm regular people with knowledge and activism tactics in order to “bully the rich” in an effort to combat the hold the fossil fuel industries have on the world.  Birdie’s first viral videos were on learning about abuse tactics and how abusers weaponize the victim’s reactions against them. Something clicked and Birdie realized that oil companies were using the same abusive tactics to trigger public reactions and use that to their benefits.

“Somehow abusive people make their way to positions of power within those [oil] companies, and it’s world-wide.” – Birdie Sam

Realizing what abusive tactics these companies and their executives were doing, Birdie knew it could be used to their advantage to fight against them. @ShowMe_YourMask is often targeted for “violating community guidelines” for telling the truth about the damage oil companies and their executives are doing to the environment. One particularly formidable opponent for Birdie has been Enbridge, North America’s largest natural gas utility, and Birdie makes sure that people know exactly how Enbridge’s actions impact the environment and the communities they operate in. In particular, Birdie and their mutuals on TikTok were directly responsible for bringing the Stop Line 3 protest news coverage to the forefront of the country’s mind when local police officers in Minnesota started to get rough with protestors (but only after Birdie bullied local news stations into covering the protests which featured many teenaged protestors

“Every time I got a community guidelines violation for telling the truth [that] is what triggered the “bully oil executives” because the truth is bullying them somehow” – Birdie Sam

As flautist and TikTok sensation Lizzo says in her music: truth hurts; and it clearly applies to the work that Birdie has been doing and encouraging her followers to do. Birdie’s followers seem to be a diverse mix of Gen Z, LGBTQ+ folks, indigenous people, and interestingly oil workers. Birdie ended up on the side of TikTok where oil workers reside, and found that through interacting with them that oil workers have a lot of the similar health and economic issues that coal miners do. Many oil workers want to leave the industry but find it financially impossible to do – they’re trapped by the company. Birdie started to share resources on renewable energy jobs and engaging with the community in order to help.

Birdie’s particular brand of activism is not alone on TikTok and can be seen in other accounts. Climate Change is not the only activism you’ll see on the app either – activists involved with the 2022 Iranian Revolution, Russians protesting against their own government for the war in Ukraine, and Indigenous people and survivors of Residential Schools of the U.S. calling for support and action on the upcoming Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) review by the Supreme Court in mid-November.

Although TikTok has grown into more than just a trendy teen app, it’s not the only social media app activists use. Fossil Free Penn is a student-led activist group on the University of Pennsylvania’s campus and they are well-known for not just their traditional protest tactics (e.g., sit ins, encampments), but they also are known to utilize social media, particularly Instagram and Twitter, to spread the word about their activism and share their message and goals to the public. While their TikTok account is not very active, a quick search on the app will lead you to coverage of their protests. They primarily use Instagram and Twitter to communicate their mission, events, information sessions, and updates to their supporters. Fossil Free Penn is currently focusing on three overarching goals from Penn:

1. Commit $5-10 million and/or land to the purchase and preservation of the People’s Townhomes.
2. Divest from fossil fuels.
3. Pay PILOTS.

Fossil Free Penn points out that Penn is only one of two ivy league universities who have not divested from fossil fuels, and is the only school of the great eight to not pay PILOTS. The student activists that make up Fossil Free Penn have been actively protesting and aiming, as they see it, to hold Penn accountable since 2014. To gain more of their perspective, I spoke to two Penn undergraduates involved with Fossil Free Penn: junior Katie Francis and freshman Eliana Atienza. We discussed how the Fossil Free Penn movement benefits from social media and the community of these individuals who truly believe Penn can be better and a leader in climate and community justice.

Both Katie and Eliana became involved with Fossil Free Penn thanks to their friends. For Katie it was a friend inviting her to the encampment in Spring 2022 that was her initial introduction to the movement. Similarly, Eliana was invited to a Fossil Free Penn training the same night she was invited to become involved with the recent encampment that ended on October 22. Both students feel that social media is an important resource for the movement in sharing news and ways to get involved, but it is the in-person actions that help the movement gain traction, and it’s the community of people that allow this movement to keep its momentum.

“Number one priority is people’s safety [when it comes to social media]. [Fossil Free Penn] hasn’t used social media as a tactic to get attention from Penn. The actions themselves are what puts pressure on Penn and that’s what gets the media coverage… which puts a lot of pressure on Penn.” – Katie Francis

“Social media can be very empowering and finding a community online that believes in what you are investing your time and effort and energy into is inspiring beyond words. But apps like sidechat [show] it can get really disheartening… there are two very contrasting parts to what it [social media] can do and what it has been doing.” – Eliana Atienza

Fossil Free Penn focuses its energy on not letting the backlash show on social media, but it’s clear that it exists. In addition to the potential administrative discipline students face for getting involved, the online vitriol and reactions from non-actors at protests remain a reality for these student protestors. Whether you search Fossil Free Penn on Instagram, Twitter, or Tiktok, you will see a mix of support and opposition for the movement. There’s a striking video on TikTok of the Homecoming football protest where a Yale parent is ripping a banner away from Fossil Free Penn protestors despite being asked by security to stop. In the same beat, you can see videos on others sharing the work the protestors are doing and why one might want to support their movement. Penn alumni from a variety of class years have also reached out to Fossil Free Penn to make sure they know they have support from past Quakers.

Despite the heated debate that Fossil Free Penn can spark both in-person and online, one thing that must be noted is the unrelenting optimism of these student protestors. Although Katie and Eliana don’t speak for all students involved with Fossil Free Penn, but it is clear that this community has a common belief: that Penn can do better, and they believe that Penn can really be a leader in the community and beyond.

“We have hope that Penn can be a force for good and we’re working to do that. I would encourage everyone else to find that hope that the world can get better and to get involved in any capacity.” – Katie Francis

“People ask ‘why do you protest Penn, you’re a student?’ People who protest don’t do it out of hate for the institution, it’s out of a motivation to see Penn properly embody their goals. Penn can be a leader in climate justice and community justice. They have the brains and the funds to do so muich good for the community… they can set the precedent for so much positive change.” – Eliana Atienza

One thing is clear, social media is a key component of communication and education in activism. Instagram is an app that started out as a photo sharing app and after 13 years has evolved into more with users being able to post videos, reels, go on live video streaming, and shop. Instagram’s format allows users to share posts and information efficiently and makes it easy for activists to share meeting information, recruit volunteers, and raise awareness – as Fossil Free Penn has been able to do. TikTok may be one of the younger social media apps at six years old; and it may be contributing to our ever-shortening attention spans, but with over 1 billion active users its power cannot be denied. What started as a dancing and trend app for Gen-Z has grown into something more. With the help of the isolation brought on by the pandemic which forced TikTok to welcome millions of new users on the app, TikTok seems to be dominating in the arena of a place for the everyperson to share their message and educate the masses. Whether it’s bullying oil executives or sharing real-time protests to the app, it looks like TikTok is a force to be reckoned with for science communication and people should pay attention.

A revealing interview on the climate crisis and more with the former Prime Minister of Australia

Malcom Turnbull knows how to manage his time. Seeing as he’s a former Prime Minister of Australia, this should come as no surprise. For the Penn Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media’s (PCSSM) inaugural event on September 13, Turnbull visited the Perry World House to have a conversation with Michael Mann, and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, the Directors of the PCSSM and the Annenberg Public Policy Center, respectively.

Promptly at 5:15pm, in the middle of the concluding announcements of the event, Turnbull walked off stage, gracefully apologizing that he had another meeting starting then. Some might take this as rude or inconsiderate. I found it admirable because it exhibited a certain bluntness, a certain disregard for formalities that I share, which is a trait rare among politicians. I’m not the first to observe these characteristics in Turnbull. According to a don at Oxford University, where Turnbull studied as a Rhodes Scholar, Turnbull was “always going to enter life’s rooms without knocking.” I suppose that goes for his exits as well.

Much like his time management, his answers to my questions exhibited a certain bluntness. We spoke about his many careers prior to becoming a politician as well as his views on Australian party politics, helping developing countries respond to climate change and holding the media accountable when they promote falsehoods. His exit from our conversation, like his exit from the stage, was quick and yet courteous. The interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

You’ve had a lot of different careers. You were a lawyer, an investment banker, a journalist. I’m curious to know why none of those careers stuck.

I started off as a journalist when I was at the University of Sydney. When I was at law school, I had had a full-time job as a journalist covering the state parliament for a few outlets, for a television station, a radio station and a weekly newspaper. Then when I went to study in the UK at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, I had a job at The Sunday Times. I was the sort of student that professors despair of because I was always skiving off to do a story. When I was working at The Sunday Times, the editor was the late Harold Evans. Harry was a legend in those days. This is back in 1978. I remember him trying to persuade me not to continue my legal studies and instead focus on journalism. He said, if you continue studying law, you could end up becoming a lawyer, or worse still, a judge, or even worse – a politician. At least I didn’t become a judge. I enjoyed my journalistic days.

Did you always know you wanted to get into politics?

Yes, it was always an interest of mine. Indeed, shortly after I got back from Oxford in the early 1980s, there was a Liberal Party preselection for a seat in Wentworth, the district in Australia where we lived. I ran just for the hell of it and nearly won it. I was very relieved when I didn’t. I always stayed interested in politics, but I didn’t run again for federal Parliament until 2004.

You’re a member of the Liberal Party in Australia, which is actually center right. But you take what many would consider quite left leaning positions on issues such as same-sex marriage, abortion and climate change. To an American, this might seem strange. Why have you decided to call this party home?

It’s true that the center of American political gravity is very much to the right of where it sits in Australia. Having said that, the Liberal Party has moved very much to the right more recently. My leadership was brought down twice by the right wing of the party who always found me too progressive, especially too interested in taking action on global warming.

The Liberal Party was founded after the Second World War by Robert Menzies, who was Prime Minister for a very long time in Australia, from 1949 to 1966. He called it the Liberal Party deliberately because he didn’t want it to be seen as solely a conservative party. So, there’s always been this tension in the Liberal Party between what you could call conservative elements and small-L liberal elements. I was definitely from the small-L liberal side of the congregation.

Ultimately, I joined the Liberal Party because I was very much a classical, small-L liberal. I guess I’m just naturally inclined towards the free enterprise, liberal view of the world. But look, if I was 25 years of age today and I was picking a party to join, I don’t know that I would join the Liberal Party, unless I wanted to change it, because it has swung too far to the right. And that’s why so many of its hitherto safest electorates have recently been won by small-L liberal independents, who are all women, all progressive on social issues and all strongly in favor of taking action on global warming.

Speaking of global warming, during the event at the Perry World House, you made a point about emissions from developing countries. You mentioned that developing countries shouldn’t be able to continue using fossil fuels, despite the fact that developed countries have historically benefited from doing so. The climate problem is too dire, you said. But some – in particular, developing countries themselves – might argue this isn’t fair. Is there a way around this moral problem?

Let’s start with a fundamental point: If India, for example, were to reach the same level of emissions per capita as the United States or Australia, the planet will be doomed. So, what we need to do is to make sure the rich world is providing the technology to enable the clean energy transition to occur across the globe. The good news is that generating electricity with wind and solar competes with the price of burning coal.

If you think about it, with renewables you don’t need a gigantic national grid. You can have a solar farm and batteries in a rural community, and that community can be energy independent. They can use that solar power to connect themselves to the internet and satellites. So, there’s a lot of liberating aspects to the distributed nature of renewables. Mitigation-wise then, the moral problem is solved by sharing technology, particularly with poorer countries, by providing funding to support the transition to clean energy.

In terms of adaptation, you’ve got some gigantic issues. It is perfectly reasonable for a country like Bangladesh, let alone the Pacific Islands, to say we want the rich world – the people who put all the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere – to support us as we adapt to the consequences. Now, that might mean for coral atolls that will be submerged that we provide resettlement opportunities. It might mean that they move to New Zealand or Australia. In a place like Bangladesh, the challenges are just gigantic. Clearly, there are areas where people are going to have to retreat from, and we need to provide support for that.

The bottom line is, we in the rich world have got to recognize the mistakes that have been made, some of them in a negligent fashion, some of them because people didn’t know any better. We’re all in the same boat. We’re all on the same planet, and we have to act that way.

I also wanted to ask you about your response to a question during the event by a member of the audience, Michael Weisberg, who’s a professor at Penn and on the internal advisory board for the PCSSM. I should also mention he’s my PhD advisor, which is probably why I liked his question. He asked you about how we should respond when members of the media promote falsehoods, pointing specifically to the Rupert Murdoch media empire, which includes Fox News. You said that we should hold the media accountable, but you simultaneously said you’re no fan of censorship. Can we hold the media accountable without censoring them at all? It seems like there’s a tension there. 

The difficulty with censorship is that defining the right parameters for what speech you do not allow is very hard. If outlets are publishing information that is encouraging people to commit acts of violence or self-harm or giving them demonstrably false information about drugs, for example, I think most societies would feel restrictions on that are legitimate. Otherwise, people will generally say it should be left to the defamation laws.

Just putting the algorithm problem of social media to one side, the challenging thing we’ve got at the moment is that the so-called ‘mainstream media’ see themselves as operating partisan political platforms in which they seem to take no responsibility for peddling falsehoods – Fox News being the classic case. One example is the big lie that the 2020 U.S. election was stolen. That lie had real consequences. This is where you’ve got to ask yourself – is there something wrong if mainstream media platforms are actually disinformation operations that are sowing discord and division and spreading lies to undermine trust in the legitimacy of government?

To be clear, I don’t think we should censor this kind of speech. But we need the shareholders of the cable companies that broadcast news services that tell lies to take action. Advertisers should take action, too. We’ve had some successful advertiser boycotts of really maliciously misogynistic, destructive broadcasters – shock jocks, as we call them in Australia. People have got to take them on. It’s one thing to say the government’s no good or the president is hopeless or Congress is full of lazy people –express all of those opinions. But peddling lies has done enormous damage to the United States. So, business has got to be prepared to stand up and be counted.

So you think holding the media accountable shouldn’t involve censorship, especially from the government, but we need to use economic tools to stifle media organizations that promote falsehoods?

That’s exactly right. That’s exactly what I’m saying.

But the algorithm problem in social media and the problem with the mainstream media are connected in a way – misinformation sells. So, that makes me wonder whether the economic tools you speak of are enough to solve this problem. Many scholars, including Victor Pickard in Penn’s Annenberg School of Communication, are worried about deeper problems with profit-driven journalism. His solution is greater government funding for journalism. What’s your take on public funding for the media?

I don’t agree that ‘for profit’ media is inconsistent with integrity in reporting. And government funding does not necessarily drive independent journalism – in fact, quite the reverse. The BBC and ABC are the exceptions. It’s a complex problem. Clearly, in licensed media the government can impose a fairness doctrine as used to be the case in the U.S. But so little media nowadays uses or needs to use licensed spectrum. So, I still think the answers include holding publishers to account by calling them out and pressuring business not to advertise with publishers who publish disinformation.

I’d like to ask you specifically about Rupert Murdoch. During the event and elsewhere, you said Murdoch, as a single individual, has done more damage to American politics than any other individual. That is a bold claim. Why Murdoch?

I challenge you – which individual has contributed more to distrust of the government in America than Murdoch? Who has done more? Which outlet has done more damage to America than Fox? I can’t think of one.

If you’re talking about one person, left leaning individuals might say Donald Trump and right leaning people might say Barack Obama. What about them?

Everyone’s got their favorite villain, but I think the point about Murdoch is he uses Fox News as a platform with utter recklessness. I don’t think Murdoch for one second believed the election was stolen. I’ve known Rupert Murdoch for nearly 50 years and the fanaticist, he is not. Not that it would make it any better if he believed it, but it suited his political and commercial purposes to amplify and promote those falsehoods. I should mention that he is being held to account for them in the voting machine companies’ defamation litigation. But apart from that, he’s not really been held to account at all.

One last question: You were the head of Australia’s Office of Water Resources and the Minister for the Environment and Water in the 2000s, during the Millennium drought. That was one of the worst droughts on record in Australia?

Yes it was bad, really bad. But it varied throughout the country. Australia is a giant country. Where our farms are in the upper Hunter Valley, the more recent drought from 2017 to 2019 was worse than the Millennium drought, but there’d be other parts where the reverse was the case.

I imagine that you were introduced to climate change before the 2000s?

I was, definitely. Hey, Vanessa I’m going to have to jump because I’ve got a hard stop at 10:30. What I recommend is you check out my recent memoir. There’s a whole chapter on water resources. It’s been great chatting, and I’m sorry I’ve got to jump. Good luck with your PhD.

No problem! Thank you so much. Bye.

Photo Credit: Eddy Marenco

An Interview with Climate Scientist Michael Mann, Director of the PCSSM

Michael Mann is an adherent of the notion that out of crisis can come opportunity. When his research on global warming led to death threats, he saw it as a chance to push back against deniers and improve the public debate surrounding human-caused climate change. But Mann, the Director of the new Penn Center for Science, Sustainability and the Media (PCSSM), rejects doomism just as much as he spurns denialism. There is still a path forward, he says, where we can avoid catastrophic climate change and create a more equitable and just world in the process.

I first met Mann while vetting the claims of U.S. politicians as the science writer for FactCheck.org, a nonpartisan nonprofit based at the Annenberg Public Policy Center. For my very first article for the outlet, Mann walked me through why climate change is not a pseudoscientific theory, contrary to senator Ted Cruz’s claim that it could “never…be disproven.” My background in philosophy helped me catch the falsehood. Still, I was surprised to find allusions to the ideas of Karl Popper in the speech of a politician. But it was familiar terrain for Mann, who had seen the full spectrum of denialist tactics in his career.

That was back in 2016, then the hottest year on record, which is now tied with 2020. More recently, I sat down with Mann, who is also a Presidential Distinguished Professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Science with a secondary appointment in the Annenberg School for Communication, to talk about the PCSSM, the future of climate policy, a new book he’s writing and how he got into climate communication in the first place. The interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

How did you get interested in climate communication?

I was sort of thrown into the lion’s den. Back in the late 1990s, my coauthors and I published the now iconic hockey stick curve, a graph that covers a thousand years of global temperature change and links rising temperatures over the 20^th century to human activity. It became a very potent symbol and was attacked by climate change deniers. I found myself at the center of personal attacks that were aimed at discrediting me, as the lead author of those studies.

And even death threats, right?

Death threats and demands for me to be fired. Threats against my family even. An envelope of white powder was sent to me at Penn State, where I was a professor before coming to Penn. It was a very uncomfortable position to be in as a scientist. Nothing in your training prepares you to deal with bad faith attacks. It’s one thing to deal with scientific criticism – that’s part of the self-correcting machinery of science. But personal attacks intended to silence you have no legitimate place in science. As I found out, they are part of the ground rules of modern politics. So, I had to decide: Was I going to withdraw into my laboratory? Or was I going to fight back? I chose the latter and it set me on a journey that would ultimately lead me to greater engagement in the public discourse surrounding human-caused climate change.

In another interview you mentioned that you were initially “reluctant” to leave the laboratory for the public space. Why?

It’s just not what I signed up for. It’s not why I pursued degrees in applied math, physics and geology. Spending time replying to attacks takes away from your time to do science. But the attacks opened my eyes to the fact that malevolent forces are working to discredit the science that informs policy. Over time I’ve grown to embrace this role. I feel privileged to be in a position to inform this fundamentally important conversation, though it is miles away from where I started and what I thought I was going to be doing with my life.

The philosopher in me has to ask – was any part of your reluctance back then motivated by the trope of the scientist as value-free, and, therefore, as needing to stay out of the fray of politics, a value-laden world?

There is this trope, as you say, that the scientist should be impartial and that somehow also means we shouldn’t express our views about the implications of our work. This idea that we leave our citizenship at the laboratory door, it’s a crazy idea.

But would you say that, perhaps in part because of the climate issue, this trope of scientists has dissipated? Many scientists now seem to think they can stand up for science in the politics arena, but also aim for objectivity in their research. They’re not incompatible actions.

Yes, it’s been a long battle. I would say this is possible because so many before me created the space that I was able to move in to. In turn, myself and other climate scientist communicators of my generation have hopefully created even more space for the next generation.

Let’s talk about the PCSSM. The center’s main goal is to improve the public conversation surrounding issues of sustainability and climate. What does improvement look like to you?

Typically scientists who come into this think the problem is that we just haven’t explained the science clearly enough. If we can just get better at explaining, then of course the politicians will hear us. I learned the hard way that that’s not how it works. Yes, understanding the science is critical – we have to be able to inform people accurately about the risks that are involved and we can only do that with a fundamental understanding of the climate. But we have so much to learn from communication experts, psychologists and sociologists. We have to work together with these experts to improve discourse about science-related issues. One of the things that drew me to Penn, and this joint appointment with the Annenberg School of Communication, was the opportunity to work with people like Kathleen Hall Jamieson, who has been at the vanguard of research on science communication. It’s a dream come true.

Experts in the ‘science of science communication,’ like Jamieson, argue that science communication is an ‘environment’ that involves interchange among various actors, not just the top-down transmission of information from experts and journalists to the public. The name of the center includes the term ‘the media.’ Will the center concentrate only on journalistic communication?

I’m glad you asked that. Think of ‘media’ as interpreted very broadly, including social media, including the arts – everybody who’s involved in science communication in some way, so definitely broader than journalism. Journalism is a big part of it, but it’s definitely the larger ecosystem of science communication that we’re concerned with.

What about the term ‘sustainability’ in the title of the center? The ad for the post doc positions affiliated with the center mentioned that you’re looking for people who are interested in climate communication, but with links to other areas of science denialism, including vaccines and Covid-19. How do these issues get folded into concerns about sustainability?

You’ll notice that the term ‘climate’ isn’t actually in the title of the center. That tells you something. Yes, a lot of what we’re concerning ourselves with is going to be climate-related because that’s arguably the defining sustainability challenge of our time. But one can interpret sustainability quite broadly – in fact, more broadly than purely environmental sustainability, including societal stability and issues of justice and equality. I was pretty careful in choosing a name for this center that isn’t exclusionary and allows for all of these broader conversations.

Recently, there have been some major changes in the climate policy arena, but it’s still not enough. The next ten years are crucial. Where do you think we’ll be when it comes to combating climate change ten years from now?

I’m optimistic. We’re in this really interesting historical moment, where the United States and Australia have recently signed into law major climate legislation. Because we’re making real progress now, we’ll look back and see this as a turning point, I think. So, ten years from now, there will still be challenges left, but we’ll have a tailwind at our back. By the way, this is going to create an interesting conversation with Malcom Turnbull, the former Prime Minister of Australia, who will be our inaugural speaker at the center on September 13.

I heard you’re writing a new book. What’s it about? 

The title of the book will be The Benevolent Moment and it’s about the lessons we can learn from past climates to help us with the current climate crisis. It was an opportunity, frankly, to get back to the science. I had written a couple books that were about the politics of climate change, and I wanted to get back to my scientific roots.

I think one of the most interesting things that I wrote about when I was at FactCheck.org was that the climatic period that we’re in right now, the Holocene, is unusually stable when it comes to geological history — so stable that it permitted civilization to develop as it has.

That’s right, and yet at the same time, while global temperatures haven’t changed much since the end of the last ice age, there have been some regional changes, like the Middle East became drier and drier. It was actually aridification in Mesopotamia that drove the development of irrigation. So, climatic changes have also, to some extent, forced us to develop some of the infrastructure of modern civilization.

A silver lining of sorts? That makes me think to ask, is there an anti-doomism message in the book? You’ve spoken elsewhere that climate doomists are just as wrong-headed as deniers.

Fundamentally, anything that threatens to take global temperature outside of the range of the past ten thousand years is a threat. But looking at some of the distant past periods does end up pushing back against doomism. Take the PETM [Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum], a period 55 to 56 million years ago when there was a sudden warming event. There’s been speculation that it was caused by a massive release of methane, but if you study the science closely, it tells us that this is not the case. So, when some of the doomists say it’s too late, the methane is leaking out of the arctic permafrost and we should just enjoy the planet while it’s still livable, that’s based on an erroneous interpretation of the paleoclimate record. This means that we can prevent catastrophic consequences through concerted climate action, but at the same time, if we do nothing, if we continue with business as usual and burn every fossil fuel that we can get ahold of, then the record tells us pretty soon you do start to run up against fundamental threats to the stability of civilization. So, the truth is in between the extremes, the doomists and the deniers.

The truth always is somewhere in the middle, isn’t it?

Yes, it is. As the late climate scientist Steve Schneider once said, when it comes to climate change, the ‘end of the world’ and ‘good for us’ are the two least likely outcomes.