by Yesterday I attended The Royal Society’s conference entitled “Geoengineering – Taking Control of Our Planet’s Climate.” The Royal Society is 350-year-old group of elite scientists that “encourages public debate on key issues involving science.” I confess that the only member of the Society’s board whom I recognized was HRH William, the Prince of Wales, whose photograph confirms that he is the spitting image of his mother, the late Princess Diana. The conference was a celebrity gathering of a different sort, featuring leaders in geoengineering and climate change research from the UK, the US, and Canada.
Geoengineering – sometimes called climate engineering – refers to proposals to intentionally manipulate the earth’s climate in order to counteract the effects of global warming. The proposals that the experts described in today’s conference included the release of particles into the atmosphere to reduce the solar radiation that reaches the earth, sucking carbon out of the atmosphere with giant filters, expanding the presence of peat bogs, and changing the pH of the ocean’s surface. Other, more exotic suggestions include shooting giant solar shields into outerspace. The premise supporting each idea is that purposeful human engineering of the climate is capable of undoing the effects of centuries of unintentional human pollution of the atmosphere.
That premise raises numerous ethical and legal questions. Is it appropriate for us modify the climate? Do we have the right to do so? Who sets the knob on the earth’s thermostat? What if a low-lying coastal nation prefers a reduction in the earth’s warming, while Russia would allow somewhat higher temperatures to facilitate a longer growing season in Siberia? What legal regimes – national or international – should and do exist with jurisdiction over geoengineering decisions? If geoengineering is a realistic option, then why do we need to worry about current greenhouse gas emissions?
The afternoon panel considered several such questions of “geoengineering governance.” (That phrase, by the way, is the title of the leading legal article on the topic, written by Albert Lin at UC Davis and available on SSRN). Nick Pidgeon, a professor of environmental psychology at the University of Cardiff, gave a fascinating presentation on public perceptions of geoengineering. He reported that people’s response to the idea of geoengineering ranged from curiosity to terror, with frequent references to its sci fi aspects or concerns about messing with nature. As one survey respondent put it, “ I don’t think you should mess around with the climate . . . I think that’s very dodgy to be honest.” The science is hard to explain, yet Pidgeon compared the public role in evaluating the wisdom of using such technologies to asking people on a jury whether an accused criminal is guilty or not.
The final two speakers addressed what I regard as the most important issues in debates about climate change today: trust and humility. Robert Watson, who served as chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) from 1997 to 2002 and who now is a science advisor for the British government, said that we will not make progress in addressing climate change unless we develop trust. But, he added, there is a widespread and systematic lack of trust in society today. The speakers expressed differing opinions on the trustworthiness of scientists, politicians, and corporate interests, with Pidgeon explaining that psychological research shows that we are most likely to trust experts, people who are concerned for us, and those who hold shared values.
Jonathan Porritt, a prominent British environmentalist and author, proclaimed, “We need massive humility as the dominant term in all of this debate.” He encouraged us to consider the subtitle of the conference – “taking control of our planet’s climate” – which betrays a lack of humility and makes people worry that geoengineering contrary to the goal of environmental sustainability. Porritt’s remarks made me question the nature of human capabilities. Theodore Roosevelt famously said that it is better to try to do great things and fail than to not try at all. But does that hold true for efforts to reengineering the entire Earth?
Humility is also at the center of the work of Mike Hulme, a British evangelical who is a climate change expert at the University of East Anglia. Hulme was not at the conference – in fact, I think he just returned from Colorado – but his chapter in the book “Real Scientists, Real Faith” contains a wonderful comparison of the humility demanded both of scientists and of Christians. “All scientific knowledge in the end is provisional,” Hulme explains, “some more so than others. And all truly religious people – Christians or those of other faiths – understand they are grasping knowledge of God only tentatively.” Humility, he adds, is “an appreciation that though we believe, we wrestle with our belief and find that faith grows through being exercised.” That process of wrestling and growing was much in evidence in the thoughtful speakers who addressed the challenges and opportunities of geoengineering at The Royal Society.
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