Are the usages of the phrases 'tipping points' and 'hothouse earth' useful and justified in our communication about climate change?

The OCCR's "Philosophy of science perspectives on the climate challenge" group hosts the online talk "Are the usages of the phrases 'tipping points' and 'hothouse earth' useful and justified in our communication about climate change?" on 26 March 2021.

Description

Michel Crucifix from the Université catholique de Louvain, Belgium, will give the above presentation from 16:15-18:00 CET (15:15-17:00 UTC).

Abstract

The dialogue between the expert and the policy-maker follows a slippery path. A same word can evoke very different realities or actions in the minds of one or the other. In this respect, the subject of climate is perhaps particularly perilous because the scientific and societal context is conducive to the emergence of new expressions: climate breakdown, tipping points or hothouse Earth. Even though these expressions happen to be used by the experts themselves, they are too young to be considered as reflecting well established, stable technical concepts with broad scientific consensus. Rather, they are value-loaded metaphors that the experts use to express the dangerousness of ongoing climate change, and thus awaken our sense of responsibility towards future generations. Morally, the approach is justified and is in line with the ethics endorsed by the philosopher Hans Jonas, who appealed to the heuristics of fear.

However, perhaps in part because they are not well formalised, these expressions can feed into representations that are rather removed from the experts' judgement. For example, the experts do not believe that there is a threshold of global warming that could be crossed in the foreseeable future, which would be "runaway" and make any form of intervention ineffective. Yet, this idea can be sustained by metaphors such as "hothouse earth" or "tipping point". Thus, the heuristics of fear may contravene another principle, according to which political action can only be responsible if it is accurately informed of the consequences of policy decisions.

This talk by a climate scientist in front of an audience of philosophers ambitions to clarify these metaphors in an open dialog in order to address the dilemmas generated by climate change expertise. To this end, we will dwell on the physical and mathematical rationale of "tipping points" and "anthropocene trajectories", and suggest a critique of their usage in the technical context.

How to join

All are welcome!

Please send an email to vincent.lamphilo.unibe.ch (vincent[dot]lam[at]philo[dot]unibe[dot]ch) if you are interested in participating.

Further information

Access the full list of speakers, dates and topics in this series: https://philoclimate.ch/seminars/spring-2021-research