Making Science Public

Category: Climate Politics

  • What does climate sensitivity mean? Peace for our time…or the wrong battle?

    What does climate sensitivity mean? Peace for our time…or the wrong battle?

    A very quick post on this week’s big news in the climate blogosphere: a new report on climate sensitivity, Oversensitive, written by Nicholas Lewis and Marcel Crok published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF). The GWPF’s role is discussed in a new Klimazwiebel post by my colleague, Reiner Grundmann, while Ed Hawkins’s Climate Lab Book…

  • Making science public: The science and silence conundrum

    Making science public: The science and silence conundrum

    The issue of science and advocacy is a complex topic and has led to heated discussions amongst scientists, science communicators and commentators of different persuasions, especially this year it seems. There was first a flurry of debate provoked, in July this year, by an article written by Tamsin Edwards who argued that climate scientists should…

  • Climate change targetism: scientific numbers, managerial policy

    Climate change targetism: scientific numbers, managerial policy

    It is five years since the Climate Change Act was given Royal Assent. This groundbreaking piece of legislation provided a huge boost to environmental campaigners who had long campaigned for government to make such a move. It also denoted a key stage in David Cameron’s ‘detoxification’ strategy of the Conservative Party while in opposition, as…

  • Global science, local perspectives – how does climate change fit into policy priorities?

    Global science, local perspectives – how does climate change fit into policy priorities?

    I present here a  synopsis of a lecture I gave yesterday for year 3 undergraduates on our Climate, Science and Society module at University of Nottingham. The session was two hours long, which is rather a long time to listen to one person. So to ensure an engaged audience, I gave around an hour and…

  • Just one number: has the IPCC changed its supply of evidence?

    Just one number: has the IPCC changed its supply of evidence?

    As I have researched online climate scepticism over the last year, its become clear that climate sensitivity has been one of the biggest topics for discussion. This is perhaps one of the easier parts of climate science to understand. Put simply, sensitivity measures the amount by which the Earth’s temperature increases when atmospheric carbon dioxide…

  • Consensus on climate change: Tracing the contours of a debate

    Consensus on climate change: Tracing the contours of a debate

    Soon the new IPCC report on climate change will be published (a leaked version is already circulating). This will probably generate a lot of talk about what one may call the four Cs: Consensus, certainty, confidence and credibility (let alone the other two Cs: climate and change). The discussion about consensus is already in full…

  • What’s behind the battle of received wisdoms?

    What’s behind the battle of received wisdoms?

    This is a guest essay by Ben Pile, a writer for Spiked Online and his own blog Climate Resistance. There is a response by Dana Nuccitelli from the Guardian’s Climate Consensus blog here. Andrew Neil’s interview with Ed Davey on the Sunday Politics show last week caused an eruption of comment. For sceptics, it was a refreshing…

  • Public understanding of climate change: The deficit fallacy

    Public understanding of climate change: The deficit fallacy

    At the end of February the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee launched an inquiry into public understanding of climate change and its implications for policy. The STSC asks for written submissions on various questions, such as: What is the current state of public understanding of what is meant by climate change? How…