Book contents
- Drought, Flood, Fire
- Drought, Flood, Fire
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Climate Extremes, Climate Attribution, Extreme Event Attribution
- 2 Welcome to an Awesome Planet
- 3 The Earth Is a Negentropic System, or “the Bright Side of Empty”
- 4 Do-It-Yourself Climate Change Science
- 5 Temperature Extremes – Impacts and Attribution
- 6 Precipitation Extremes
- 7 Hurricanes, Cyclones, and Typhoons
- 8 Conceptual Models of Climate Change and Prediction, and How They Relate to Floods and Fires
- 9 Climate Change Made the 2015–2016 El Niño More Extreme
- 10 Bigger La Niñas and the East African Climate Paradox
- 11 Fire and Drought in the Western United States
- 12 Fire and Australia’s Black Summer
- 13 Driving toward +4°C on a Dixie® Cup Planet
- 14 We Can Afford to Wear a White Hat
- Appendix A Few Resources for Further Reading and Research
- Index
14 - We Can Afford to Wear a White Hat
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 June 2021
- Drought, Flood, Fire
- Drought, Flood, Fire
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Climate Extremes, Climate Attribution, Extreme Event Attribution
- 2 Welcome to an Awesome Planet
- 3 The Earth Is a Negentropic System, or “the Bright Side of Empty”
- 4 Do-It-Yourself Climate Change Science
- 5 Temperature Extremes – Impacts and Attribution
- 6 Precipitation Extremes
- 7 Hurricanes, Cyclones, and Typhoons
- 8 Conceptual Models of Climate Change and Prediction, and How They Relate to Floods and Fires
- 9 Climate Change Made the 2015–2016 El Niño More Extreme
- 10 Bigger La Niñas and the East African Climate Paradox
- 11 Fire and Drought in the Western United States
- 12 Fire and Australia’s Black Summer
- 13 Driving toward +4°C on a Dixie® Cup Planet
- 14 We Can Afford to Wear a White Hat
- Appendix A Few Resources for Further Reading and Research
- Index
Summary
The stories that we tell ourselves shape our lives, express our values, and guide our body politic. Drought, Flood, Fire has made a compelling case that climate change is hurting people now and contributing to expensive catastrophes. But there are also a lot good things going on in the world. Infant deaths are declining. More kids are going to school. We are becoming much wealthier, more productive, and inventive. Countries like Germany and states like California make it clear that we can grow economically while reducing our emissions. We can afford to be like a good cowboy and wear the White Hat. Rising greenhouse gas emissions are also symptomatic of beneficial growth. Education, technology, and rapid economic expansion have lifted billions from poverty. Between 1961 and 2050, we will carry out humanity's greatest experiment in parallel processing, as billions of individuals grow, think, discover, and consume. We are living in the midst of a potentially positive time bomb. Never have so many seen so much, known so much, or done so much – or had such a profound capacity to affect the world for good or ill. We can avoid a global climate catastrophe. But we need to believe in science, believe in each other, and do what is right.
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- Information
- Drought, Flood, FireHow Climate Change Contributes to Catastrophes, pp. 287 - 304Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2021