Per Espen Stoknes, a Norwegian sociologist, writer, and politician, posed the question, “Have you ever seen the climate?” at the Nobel Prize Teacher Summit in Stockholm last year. The summit is an annual conference that brings together teachers from around the world, organized by the Nobel Museum. Stoknes is the author of “What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming,” which was also the focus of his talk at the conference. Stoknes highlighted that the human brain struggles with abstract concepts such as climate and carbon dioxide, making it challenging to comprehend climate change. Stoknes believes that if carbon dioxide was visible and collected at the earth’s surface, it would be easier to conceptualize.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its sixth and final summary on Monday, which is a crucial document, following its first summary in 1990. The IPCC has seen a progression of increasingly urgent conclusions, with the latest stating that human influence has unequivocally warmed the atmosphere, sea and land. Despite the increasing awareness of the severity of climate change, we have a hard time taking the necessary steps to stop emissions. Stoknes emphasizes the need to understand how our brains function and how we can better comprehend abstract concepts such as climate change. Fear, guilt, and doom and gloom emotions do not motivate action, and instead, we should focus on the other positive benefits, such as improved personal health, that come when changing our lifestyles to reduce emissions.
“Have you ever seen the climate?” The question was asked by the Norwegian sociologist, writer and politician Per Espen Stoknes at the Münchenbryggeriet in Stockholm last fall at the “Nobel Prize Teacher Summit” – an annual conference, organized by the Nobel Museum, which brings together hundreds of teachers from all over the world.
Per Espen Stoknes has written the book “What We Think About When We Try Not To Think About Global Warming” – what we think about when we try not to think about global warming. It was also the theme when he spoke there at the Münchenbryggeriet: Why is it so difficult to take in and think about what is happening to the climate?
One reason is that they are such abstract concepts that our human brain does not really grasp. Climate, parts per thousand in the atmosphere, curves of global average temperatures and sea level rises in centimeters per decade. And carbon dioxide, which is an invisible gas that we can’t see either.
If carbon dioxide was brown and only collected in the air closest to the earth’s surface, everything would be much more tangible to us, Stoknes believes. Then we would all be walking around in a brown, almost five meter thick fog – which before was only about three meters high. Then we could easily see that our emissions have almost doubled the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Why is it so difficult to take in what is happening to the climate?
Almost ten years ago, in September 2013, the climate panel IPCC sat on the same stage in the Munich brewery and presented the first part of its fifth report on the state of the climate. “The most important document in the world in six years”, Karin Bojs called it in DN. Tomorrow, Monday, the IPCC will come out with a new report that is even more important: the final and summary part of the sixth summary.
With each IPCC report, the situation has only become more certain, gloomier and more urgent. From “unequivocal evidence for an enhanced greenhouse effect from observations is unlikely to arrive for a decade or more” in the first summary from 1990, the conclusions have been reached to “it is extremely likely that human influence has been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid- 20th century” in the fifth, and “it is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, sea and land” in the sixth, which is coming now.
But why do we have such a hard time doing what needs to be done to stop the emissions?
Photo: Roger Turesson
According to Per Espen Stoknes we need to get better at understanding how our brain works. The climate is an abstract concept in many different ways. It seems too far away in time. What happens in 2050 or at the end of the century is not something we write down in our almanacs now. It is also far away in the world for some of us – like melting sea ice in the Arctic or hurricanes in Florida. Besides, we ourselves have so little influence. What I can do, or what our country can do, doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things, does it? And for those of us who are responsible for the biggest emissions, the effects are also socially distant, because they mainly affect poor people in other parts of the world, not me or my family.
Emotions like fear and guilt and doom and gloom only make us more passive. One should not belittle the urgent threat to us all from a hotter climate, but also point to all the other other gains that come in the bargain if we change our lifestyle a little. If I take the bicycle instead of the car, I avoid the traffic jam and also feel better. And the air becomes cleaner. If I cut back on meat, it not only benefits the climate, but also my own health. And if I install solar cells just like the neighbor just did, I might even be able to get a slightly lower electricity bill.
Read more: UN climate report: We have the tools to stop warming