Author | Tim Flannery |
---|---|
Country | Australia |
Language | English |
Subject | Climate change |
Published | 2005 (Text Publishing) |
Media type | |
ISBN | 1-920885-84-6 |
The Weather Makers: The History and Future Impact of Climate Change is a 2005 book by Australian scientist Tim Flannery. It discusses climate change, its scientific basis and effects, and potential solutions.
The book received critical acclaim. It won the major prize at the 2006 New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards, [1] and was short-listed for the 2010 Jan Michalski Prize for Literature. [2] [3] Flannery reflected in 2015 on its impact, after it was read by several high-profile decision makers.
The book includes 36 short essays predicting the consequences of global warming and has been translated into over twenty languages. [4] The book reviews evidence of historical climate change and attempts to compare this with the current era. The book argues that if atmospheric carbon dioxide levels continue to increase at current rates, the resulting climate change will cause mass species extinctions. The book also asserts that global temperatures have already risen enough to cause the annual monsoon rains in the Sahel region of Africa to diminish, causing droughts and desertification. This in turn, according to Flannery, has contributed to the conflict in the Darfur region through competition for disappearing resources. Further consequences, argued in the book, include increasing hurricane intensity, and decline in the health of coral reefs.
The final third of the book discusses proposed solutions. Flannery advocates individual action as well as international and governmental actions. He argues that a few industries such as the coal industry, currently responsible for 40% of the energy consumed in the U.S., remain opponents of needed action. The book retraces the evidence that the American administration [ citation needed ], motivated by coal-industry donations to the Republican party, undermines political action by omitting mention of climate change from government documents. The book cites evidence against the argument that conservation is bad for economies. [5]
In the introduction of Atmosphere of Hope: Solutions to the Climate Crisis (2015), Tim Flannery mention some people who were influenced by reading The Weather Makers (2005) [6] He wrote that the book "alerted" Richard Branson, who recommended it to Arnold Schwarzenegger (Governor of California, who signed the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006) and established the Virgin Earth Challenge as well as the Carbon War Room. [6] Gordon Campbell, Premier of British Columbia, said that he introduced a carbon tax in British Columbia after reading The Weather Makers. [6] The book also alerted Zhou Ji, president of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, "to the extent of the climate problem". [6]
The book was cited as contributing to Flannery being named Australian of the Year in 2007 for his clear and accessible communication of climate change science and its likely consequences for a fragile planet. [4]
The global warming controversy concerns the public debate over whether global warming is occurring, how much has occurred in modern times, what has caused it, what its effects will be, whether any action can or should be taken to curb it, and if so what that action should be. In the scientific literature, there is a strong consensus that global surface temperatures have increased in recent decades and that the trend is caused by human-induced emissions of greenhouse gases. No scientific body of national or international standing disagrees with this view, though a few organizations with members in extractive industries hold non-committal positions, and some have tried to persuade the public that climate change is not happening, or if the climate is changing it is not because of human influence, attempting to sow doubt in the scientific consensus.
There is a strong scientific consensus that the Earth is warming and that this warming is mainly caused by human activities. This consensus is supported by various studies of scientists' opinions and by position statements of scientific organizations, many of which explicitly agree with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) synthesis reports.
Timothy Fridtjof Flannery is an Australian mammalogist, palaeontologist, environmentalist, conservationist, explorer, author, science communicator, activist and public scientist. He was awarded Australian of the Year in 2007 for his work and advocacy on environmental issues.
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References to climate change in popular culture have existed since the late 20th century and increased in the 21st century. Climate change, its impacts, and related human-environment interactions have been featured in nonfiction books and documentaries, but also literature, film, music, television shows and video games.
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This is a list of climate change topics.
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Requiem for a Species: Why We Resist the Truth about Climate Change is a 2010 non-fiction book by Australian academic Clive Hamilton which explores climate change denial and its implications. It argues that climate change will bring about large-scale, harmful consequences for habitability for life on Earth including humans, which it is too late to prevent. Hamilton explores why politicians, corporations and the public deny or refuse to act on this reality. He invokes a variety of explanations, including wishful thinking, ideology, consumer culture and active lobbying by the fossil fuel industry. The book builds on the author's fifteen-year prior history of writing about these subjects, with previous books including Growth Fetish and Scorcher: The Dirty Politics of Climate Change.
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