The Human Dimension of Climate Change

A New York Times Magazine article raises an issue I've been thinking a lot about lately.

If you are, as I am, a scientist concerned about global climate change, you may find yourself asking, "What kind of research could I be doing to best contribute to a solution?"

According to some, it may not be to study the climate itself. We may not know enough to predict exactly what will happen when, but we do know that drastic changes are coming whose magnitude will be determined by the actions we take now. It may not even be to study technologies such as alternative energy or policies such as cap-and-trade that can help combat global warming. Because while these policies and technologies are surely necessary, global warming is a problem created by human behavior, and our behavior will need to change if we are to make the individual and group decisions necessary to mitigate it, including the implementation of these policies and technologies. It may therefore be that the most important scientific questions in the fight against global warming are questions about humans, human behavior, and what we can do to change it.

The climate change puzzle presents a number of interesting questions about human behavior. The global environment is the ultimate "commons" game: We have a shared resource, and we can individually decide how much effort to put into preserving it. Only, we don't see the fruit of our individual efforts directly; only the sum total of everyone's efforts determines how well the resource is preserved. In the case of climate change, there are further complications: the effects of our actions now may not be seen for another fifty years, and some argue that the entire problem was fabricated by misguided scientists. Combining these factors, it is not hard to understand why many people feel little incentive to take action against global warming.

The article focuses on Columbia's Center for Research on Environmental Decisions, which performs experiments on people's decision-making processes. One finding jumped out at me as interesting and perhaps counter-intuitive: we tend to make better decisions as groups rather than as individuals. For example, one researcher studied decisions made by farmers in Southern Uganda as they listened to rainy-season radio broadcasts. If they listened to it in groups, they would typically discuss it afterwards and come to consensus on the best planting strategy in response to the weather. They ended up more satisfied with their yields than other farmers who listened to the broadcasts individually.

Our response to climate change will obviously involve a great variety of individual and group decisions, but it may be that if we can force more of the critical decisions to be made in group settings, where participants have not made up their minds beforehand (research shows this is crucial) we may find ourselves more able to put aside the parts of our human nature that would impede progress, and make the decisions that are in all of our best interests.

Freeman Dyson on Climate Change

The New York Times has an article on eminent physicist Freeman Dyson's skepticism of climate change arguments. Several passages struck me in particular:

Dyson agrees with the prevailing view that there are rapidly rising carbon-dioxide levels in the atmosphere caused by human activity. To the planet, he suggests, the rising carbon may well be a MacGuffin, a striking yet ultimately benign occurrence in what Dyson says is still “a relatively cool period in the earth’s history.” The warming, he says, is not global but local, “making cold places warmer rather than making hot places hotter.” Far from expecting any drastic harmful consequences from these increased temperatures, he says the carbon may well be salubrious — a sign that “the climate is actually improving rather than getting worse,” because carbon acts as an ideal fertilizer promoting forest growth and crop yields. “Most of the evolution of life occurred on a planet substantially warmer than it is now,” he contends, “and substantially richer in carbon dioxide.” Dyson calls ocean acidification, which many scientists say is destroying the saltwater food chain, a genuine but probably exaggerated problem. Sea levels, he says, are rising steadily, but why this is and what dangers it might portend “cannot be predicted until we know much more about its causes.”

and

Beyond the specific points of factual dispute, Dyson has said that it all boils down to “a deeper disagreement about values” between those who think “nature knows best” and that “any gross human disruption of the natural environment is evil,” and “humanists,” like himself, who contend that protecting the existing biosphere is not as important as fighting more repugnant evils like war, poverty and unemployment.

His basic argument seems to be that, yes, human activity is causing global temperatures to rise, but this may not be a bad thing. Life, and humanity, will adjust to life in the new climate through adaptation and evolution, and may even emerge richer and stronger.

In a long-term sense, he is completely right. Life on earth has survived much greater shocks in the past and will likely continue to adapt and evolve as long as the sun is shining. We humans are a particularly adaptable bunch; we don't need to wait for genetic evolution to change our behaviors. We have devised ingenious solutions to our problems in the past, and we could probably think of something to carry us through whatever changes may come.

But the problem with this argument is the short-term. Humanity and life in general may be infinitely adaptable, but the fact is that, for the moment, we have adapted to life on the planet the way it is. We depend on certain plants and animals for food. These plants and animals in turn depend on other plants and animals, as well as certain chemicals and climate conditions. Every step in this chain is, for the moment, perfectly adapted to the climate of the present. Nature has even devised its own mechanisms to keep the current climate in place: for example, ocean bacteria help regulate the earth's temperature and atmosphere. We are, at present, in a state of equilibrium.

Massive increases in carbon dioxide, leading to rapid temerature growth, would push us out of equilibrium. Nature's homeostatic (equilibrium-maintaining) mechanisms would be insufficient to maintain our current climate, and large changes would occur. Food chains would have to be restructured as intermediate links go extinct. Some species would win and some would lose in the scramble to adjust to the new status quo.

Ecologists know that an ecosystem pushed out of equilibrium will eventually reach some new equilibrium state. But the details of this new state are impossible to predict ahead of time. Which species will dominate? What new food chains will form? This is the big question of climate change; no one can really say.

As far as we humans are concerned, the odds that this new state will be better for us are pretty low. Consider, for example, that the typical American diet is built from a relatively small variety of fruits, vegetables, grains, and animals. And the genetic variety within these crops is decreasing as breeds become standardized within the agriculture industry. It's unlikely that the specific plants and animals we depend on will be winners in the new equilibrium, since they, like us, are adapted to what we have now. We will have to scramble to change how we eat, as well as where we live, thanks to sea level changes. Millions of lives will be disrupted in this change. We have to ask ourselves, as a society, if we this disruption is an acceptable tradeoff to maintain our current energy habits a little longer.

As mathematician and ecologist Simon Levin said, “Nature is not fragile... what is fragile are the ecosystems services on which humans depend."

Is Global Complexity Worth It?

I had a wide-ranging lunch conversation with my friend Seth
a week ago. We touched on many things, but kept circling back to the above question. More specifically, I was wondering if our current level of global complexity could ever be sustainable, even with the best international governance and planning.

Let's define what we're talking about. In today's world, actions you take have consequences around the globe. For example, if you buy a computer, it likely was not made in a workshop down the road. The parts that go into your computer come from many different countries. These parts had to cross vast distances to come together, burning oil from other countries in the process. These parts were assembled in yet other countries, shipped several more times, and finally delivered to you. The money that you paid for the computer feeds back into all these various countries and processes, strengthening and perhaps changing them.

The effects of this global entanglement have been amazing. Without it, we wouldn't have computers, cellphones, airplanes, plastics, television, cars, or curry powder in the supermarket. None of these products can be made in any one local community; they all require cooperation on a continental, if not global, scale.

But I'm worried by globalization, on both a theoretical and practical level. It's clear that as humans, we aren't living within our means--I won't go into the details of that argument here. What concerns now is whether the very structure of our global society may be preventing us from ever living within our means.

First, feedback loops are getting too complex. Suppose we lived in a simple, hundred person community, and someone was stealing from his neighbors, dumping trash in the public square, or doing other undesirable actions. These actions would become apparent to everyone in short order, and the community could punish the perpetrator in various ways; economically, socially, even physically.

In theory, we have a legal system now to provide these kinds of punishments. But the more complex our society becomes, the harder it is to identify those who are screwing things up. Furthermore, laws and enforcement vary wildly across countries. Multinational corporations can get away with dumping trash in the ocean, toppling Central American democracies, intentionally creating blackouts in California, or supporting sweatshops in China because a) the actions might be legal in whatever location they're operating out of, b) they can obscure their practices behind a wall of complexity that regulators can't penetrate, and c) the consumers usually have no idea what the company is doing and therefore can't exercise moral judgment in their purchases. It could be decades before any consequences (legal, economic, or environmental) catch up with the perpetrator. And decades is too long to be an effective deterrent.

Second, we are increasingly interdependent. Witness how the mortgage crisis spread throughout American economic sectors and is now spreading through the world. Infectious diseases like avian flu have the potential to go global due to the volume of international travel. Even our environmental problems have globalized--we worry about global warming now, whereas the environmental agenda in the past was more about local pollution issues.

I see this as a problem because it means we have only one chance to screw up. The inhabitants of Easter Island destroyed their ecosystem and suffered for it, but the damage was contained to the island. In our current connected world, one disaster could ruin things for all humanity.

Can we do anything about global complexity and interdependence? I've been thinking about ways we can promote some simplicity in our economy, like buying local food or supporting local independent retailers over mega-chains. I'm not advocating we go back to preindustrial tribal society, but a little extra simplicity seems like a good thing.

How Can We Change Behavior?

This one's been bugging me recently. Our current lifestyle is unsustainible (by "our" I mean the collective inhabitants of this planet.) Scientists know it, I know it, and I think most people I know would agree. We can't sustain our current way of life for more than about fifty years before environmental catastrophes force us into a very bad place.

Now, I believe people are inherently good. If a deity visited someone and said "you can personally save the entire planet, but you'll have to make some major lifestyle changes," I think anyone I know would say yes. Despite our differences, we all want the best for all of us.

However, it's not that simple. Even if anyone would sacrifice to individually save the world, that doesn't mean everyone will sacrifice to collectively save the world. Why not? Here are a few reasons:

1. We don't know what to do. We know we should consume less, but does this mean we should bury ourselves and fertilize the soil? What does a sustainible lifestyle look like? We don't really know (though some have thought about it!)
   
   
2. Culture. It's impossible not to at least partially assimilate the attitudes and lifestyles of those around you. Our imaginations are limited, so we're most likely to act similarly to those around us.
   
   
3. Disconnect between action and consequence. This is a big one, in my opinion. Suppose that every time we drove a car, ate meat, or left a light switch on, we could see the environment deteriorate around us. Or conversely, suppose every time we recycled or biked to work, we could feel the earth gain vitality. If either of these things were true, I'm sure our problems would be gone in no time. But because environmental consequences occur over such large timespans and spatial scales, it's hard to see the effect of anything we do. Positive and negative feedback can change behavior, but only if that feedback is immediate and visible. It's much harder to worry about an incremental change fifty years from now.
   
   
4. Many other reasons: hopelessness, inertia, not wanting to admit the scale of the problem, not wanting to clean a mess someone else created, etc.

I highlight the first three reasons because they are inherently complex systems issues. Because the physical and social issues around global warming are so complex, the best course of action is not clear (though some actions are clearly better than others.) Because we live in a complex system, our actions are influenced by those around us. And also because the physics of the environment is complex, the consequences of our actions are far removed from the actual action.

So what's to be done? Standard complex systems theory tells us that a complex system cannot be coerced. You cannot force everyone to live sustainibly unless you first convert the world into a totalitarian state, which is a terrible solution. To change the behavior of a complex system you must somehow change the rules of the game, creating incentives and disincentives that promote responsible action. This is essentially the theory behind the Kyoto protocol: don't force nations to change, but give them incentives to live cleaner.

Unfortunately, the carrots and sticks provided by the Kyoto protocol apply only at the nation level. Collective rewards and punishments are not very effective at changing behavior; feedback works best on the individual scale. Eventually we must find a way to trickle these carrots and sticks down to the state, local, and ultimately individual level, so that people are tangibly rewarded for living sustainibly and tangibly punished for not.

Is this possible? It may not be, but I think it's our only hope.