Bishop Hill Royal Society book prize
Nov 11, 2011 Books Climate: WG2 The Royal Society has shortlisted Jon Turney's Rough Guide to the Future for its annual book prize.
There is a report in the Guardian, which includes this:
The most powerful chapters of Turney's meticulously researched book deal not with far-off scenarios...but the remorseless statistical trends pointing towards a short-term future of rampant population growth, climate crunch, water and food supplies under increasing pressure and dwindling biodiversity.
In 2009, for example, the UK Meteorological Office predicted average warming of 4C if current carbon emission trends continue unchecked. According to the report this will almost certainly happen by the end of the century, but possibly as soon as 2060. The average rise conceals increases of up to 15C in the Arctic, and up to 10C in western and southern Africa, meaning 20% less rainfall in these regions. That rain will fall elsewhere. India will see 20% more rainfall and an increased risk of flooding.
It's interesting to compare this take on the future with Richard Betts' comments here a couple of days back.
Reader Comments (53)
Bish: You'd better tell GWPF, as their cross-post still has the original header.
Actually there are quite a few things that we should worry about - not in the sense of panicking but in the sense of anticipating possible dangers and thinking about what we can do about them. Some examples include:
1. pollution
2. soil erosion
3. evolution of "new" deadly diseases just as in recent decades ebola and AIDS emerged
4. the growing ineffectiveness of existing antibiotics as old diseases develop resistance to them
That list is certainly not exhaustive, nor is it in any particular order. Pollution and soil erosion are things that we can tackle now and to some extent are tackling. However that does not mean we can be complacent about them.
I have no idea what we can do about the threat of new diseases but I hope that there are people in the World Health Organisation who do have some ideas. However, as far as I know, actions to tackle the problem of resistance to antibiotics do not seem to be very effective and there does do seem to be much progress in developing new antibiotics and other means of treating bacterial infections, e.g. the use of bacteriophages that are viruses which infect bacteria.
Climate change is important because we are all dependent on agriculture but scaremongering regarding that topic risks making is blind to other problems.
Footnote to this post
The prize went to Gavin Pretor-Pinney for The Wavewatcher’s Companion.
Nigel Calder has a post up about it
http://calderup.wordpress.com/2011/11/18/royal-society-winton-book-prize/