Andrew Revkin of the New York Times is in Asheville this weekend for the Headwaters Gathering at Warren Wilson College. He writes Dot Earth, and here’s a tidbit:
A pair of papers published in 2008 and this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences have tried to narrow the definition of various “tipping elements” and clarify whether they are poised to tip. In the end, the authors acknowledged that the uncertainties surrounding the various putative tipping points led back to a broader notion of the overall risk. “Basically, it looks like a continuum of increasing likelihood and severity as temperature increases, rather than threshold,” said Jim W. Hall, an author on both papers.
Some physical scientists and biologists who are deeply immersed in climate studies, and convinced that big risks attend an unabated buildup of human-generated greenhouse gases, are pushing back against the use of this loaded term in defining climate risks. And a variety of social scientists and policy specialists warn that such terminology is very likely to backfire.
At the Headwaters Gathering, an environmental conference at Warren Wilson College in Asheville, N.C., Herman Daly, whose focus is “ ecological economics,” spoke through a video hookup Saturday and said that seeking or implying certainty in pursuing climate solutions ignores the reality of the problem — which requires acting in the face of uncertainty. “When you jump out of an airplane, you need a crude parachute more than you need an accurate altimeter,” he said. “Do not wait for exact empirical evidence.”