How to Moderate a Discussion of Global Warming?

There's a RealClimate post from two days ago about a paper that was on the cover of Nature and has received a lot of attention from the media and from the blogosphere. It might be good to know what's being discussed this week.

(That's besides the paper on irreversible climate change that's discussed on the Sb homepage.)

As for a connection to climate change - have you read Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars books? When I think of SF dealing with climate change, they're the first books that I think of. But I haven't read them since the 90's, and don't know whether the plot fits with current science research. For SF, you might frame the discussion around how active research on climate change affects how people read and write near-future SF.

You might like to take a look at this very recent post by Jeff Masters (co-founder of Weather Underground) on opinion polls on climate change, which also discusses a recent survey of scientists on the subject.
http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1184

Bottom line - 97% of climatologists who have published scientific papers on various aspects of climate change think that AGW is real.

I hope this is not a discussion if AGW is true or not, because that is just not a question any more. It is happening, and the denialists do not need yet another podium. But I don't know the opinions of the participants. Maybe you should mention the survey as mentioned by chezjake in comment #2.

Talk about the solutions to global warming (renewable energies, sequestration and so on). And some geoengineering solutions do sound a lot like SF.

I'm tempted to say that the answer is that you don't. But I'd spend a reasonably amount of time perusing realclimate to prepare.

A problem with discussions on controversial topics is that some people just throw out any information regardless of whether it is true or not. I don't know how you can keep this in check without stultifying the discussion. A connection to the internet perhaps? Meantime, make sure you know the basic physics and the difference between weather and climate.

Some of the geoengineering proposals might be interesting to science fiction fans. Putting reflective things in the atmosphere is a terrible, terrible idea which could quickly cool the planet but wouldn't ameliorate most of the problems. More intriguing are things like this, attempting to actively combat acidification of the ocean and accelerate natural weathering processes. For something more lighthearted, there's this [PDF file] by Raymond Pierrehumbert on "Science Fiction Atmospheres" and their problems.

I just try and ask (up front) that commenters support their arguments (using citations and appropriate academic references, if necessary). That is, hold them to academic standards of discussion, albeit as politely as possible.

Collapse, from Jared Diamond, is a great book describing the conjunction of factors which can send civilizations to oblivion. Needless to say, environmental destruction figures prominently on the list, and in this respect Diamond agrees that we are in a terrible situation.

However he also argues that this is not the only factor, and that our being in the information era and a global market could probably change the deal.

So perhaps as a moderator you could ask participants whether they agree with Diamond, and why.

Also as you surely know, the 2006 Hugo award went to an ecologically oriented science fiction novel, Spin, (beware, spoiler) from Robert Charles Wilson.

Here the dissemination of the human species is mentioned, and I guess you could ask the participants if they think that sustainable colonies could be envisionned any time soon, whether this would solve the problem in the long term and why !

Anyone want to place a bet on how long before the vicious trolls from the other scienceblogs that focus on global warming start rolling in?

Well, you could probably do a lot worse than opening up the discussion by stating your points 2, 3, and 4 above. And then, if somebody insists on dwelling on "We're All Gonna Dieeee!" and can't be diverted from it, just hold up your pre-prepared sign that says something like, "Cyanide Capsules For All! Get one *NOW*!"

As for a connection to climate change - have you read Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars books? When I think of SF dealing with climate change, they're the first books that I think of.

Robinson has written a more recent trilogy which is even more directly related to the topic. I have only read the middle book, titled something like Fifty Degrees Below Zero (not sure if that's the exact title; the book is at home and I am in my office). It may give you some idea how to respond to the "it's &*)(#$% cold, therefore global warming is a hoax" canard: [spoiler alert] the title of the book refers to a cold snap that hits Washington, DC, in a changing (mostly warming) climate.

(At the time I bought the book, I didn't know it was part of a trilogy. I had read the Mars books as well as The Years of Rice and Salt and Antarctica, and thought it would be a good read. I didn't find the writing as compelling as Robinson's earlier books, though perhaps coming into the middle of a trilogy had something to do with that.)

There was a book and a TV show called "The World Without Us" IIRC. I haven't read/seen either so far, but I keep seeing reviews, and they're kind of fascinating to me. Basically what would happen to the planet if we disappeared tomorrow. Flooding subways, crumbling highways, forests re-asserting themselves. It's got a science-fictional feel to it that appeals to me a lot, and it's also a way to put into context just how much damage we've done. Would the carbon start getting sequestered again? How long would it take? Would the same ecosystems that we've destroyed re-develop, or would it be something new? I think this could be a great topic for a panel, although maybe I should just read the book...

When you moderate a discussion the important thing is to watch time and make sure that only each person talks at a given time. Don't hesitate to cut a speaker mid sentence if he/she is inconsiderate, pompous or rude to others.

The same person who made fun of the Least Grammatical Lyrics wrote the following sentence:

"What should I make sure to talk about in a panel on global warming facts and myths?"

Is that ironic or just hilarious?

Here are a few ideas for very relevant, but seemingly not widely discussed facets of the global climate disruption due to anthropogenic global warming (AGW) discussion:

1) AGW as a risk management issue. The world already spends about 3.5% of global GDP on various forms of insurance. If we agree that there even is a very small possibility of massive and essentially irreversible human and environmental damage from AGW, why doesn't it make sense to discuss mitigation as management of that risk akin to insurance? (In the same way we carry fire insurance on our homes - despite the fact that the odds of our particular house burning down are small, the cost of such an event is way too big to ignore.) Though the videos are a little hokey, there are a lot of good points raised in a whole set of popular videos posted on YouTube by an Oregon H.S. physics teacher discussing the risk management arguments in the "How it all ends" video series. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mF_anaVcCXg

2) In a related vein, Andy Revkin's NYT DotEarth blog has a Jan. 28 post regarding John Sterman at MIT, and Sterman's systems view of AGW decision-making and risk perception. Sterman argues that the general public has a very inadequate grasp of the risks actually presented by AGW (i.e., many view it akin to prior quickly resolvable environmental problems such as acid rain, rather than as a very long lasting problem similar to pouring water into a bathtub with a partially clogged drain). Hence, Sterman's work on how you show people how to properly weigh the risks. In Andy's blog post there's a great embedded video of a presentation by Sterman expanding on this topic.

3) In connection with the argument that we're not "all going to diiiieeee", you might Google "rob socolow stabilization wedge". Socolow is at Princeton and argues that the only realistic approach to meaningful mitigation is through implementing a combination of "wedges" in varous sectors of the economy to achieve the required cumulative result (for example, wedges of efficiency and solar and wind and biomass and plugin hybrids, etc. etc.). Though a bit outspoken for some, Joe Romm at the Climate Progress blog has blogged extensively about Socolow's wedges, e.g., http://climateprogress.org/2008/04/22/is-450-ppm-or-less-politically-po…
Also, there's a nice graphic of the wedges in an article by Romm in Nature online http://www.nature.com/climate/2008/0807/full/climate.2008.59.html
In a related vein, the international consultancy McKinsey & Co. is up with Ver. 2 of their well-known mitigation curve graph showing how much CO2 mitigation potential exists in an array of economic sectors. See http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/ccsi/pathways_low_carbon_economy… to request a copy of the full report or the executive summary.

Hope some of these ideas help for some "not run of the mill" discussion questions. Best regards.

Re #11 - Eric, I have to agree with you, Robinson's climate change trilogy (40 Days of Rain, etc), is Robinson at his worse, and a real let-down after 'Years of Rice and Salt'. The central character is a real jerk, and much of the book is filled up with cod-Tibetan philosophy. As to the actual geo-engineering - its kind of interesting, but needing to restart the Gulf Stream is looking less likely than it once was.

However, the idea of having to survive with extreme climate change (living through a winter in Washington where it reaches 50 below, plus massive flooding) is interesting, and should bring home to all of us what might happen if we fail to act now. And the talk of geo-engineering misses that very point.
By in effect assuming that the battle is already lost (even though that is much we can do right now), and feeding the notion (so very attractive to politicians) that only a massively expensive, high-tech 'super' solution will do, geo-engineering helps to kill current efforts.

lgcarey has some great links from his post regarding Socolow and the need for 'wedges', rather than the geo-engineers fantasies. Next time someone brings up space mirrors or something similar, ask them how it will cost, how long it will take, and why they couldn't just spend the money now on making poor peoples houses more energy efficient. If they can't answer, then tell them that is exactly what President Obama wants to do. He gets it, they don't.

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