A.S. Byatt’s Biological Reason

2020 ◽  
pp. 56-86
Author(s):  
Clare Hanson
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Genetic Determinism ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Scientific Methodology ◽  
Noam Chomsky ◽  
Second Wave Feminism ◽  
Second Wave ◽  
Alternative Theories ◽  
Point Of Reference ◽  
John Maynard Smith

Chapter 2 places A.S. Byatt’s four-volume novel sequence the Quartet in the context of Michel Foucault’s The Order of Things, a frequent point of reference for her fiction. It traces her engagement with the question of genetic determinism, which she reads through the lens of a debate between Noam Chomsky and Jean Piaget, and her exploration of alternative theories of ‘soft inheritance’. It notes her interest in neo-Darwinian theories of sex (especially those of John Maynard Smith) and her awareness of the problematic imbrication of these theories with current social assumptions, especially in a period just on the cusp of second-wave feminism. It also considers her reflections on changes in scientific methodology, from the origins of botany in the taxonomy of Linnaeus to present-day awareness of anthropogenic climate change.

The Curious Twist

Runaway ◽  
2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anthony Chaney
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Identity Politics ◽  
Allen Ginsberg ◽  
Gregory Bateson ◽  
Second Wave Feminism ◽  
Ecology Of Mind ◽  
Irish Myth ◽  
Dialectics Of Liberation ◽  
Second Wave ◽  
Radical Movement

This chapter is set at the 1967 Congress for the Dialectics of Liberation, held over ten days in July in London. Drawing on transcripts and film of the event, the chapter presents a radical movement roiled by budding radicalisms: identity politics, second wave feminism, and an increasing commitment to militancy–all demonstrated in Stokely Carmichael’s divisive Congress appearances, both alone and on a panel with R. D. Laing, Emmett Grogan, and Allen Ginsberg. Amid this agitation, Gregory Bateson offered his synthesis of systems theory, cybernetics, and the ecology of mind. His speech is carefully explicated and annotated with Bateson's recent readings of T. H. White, Philip Wylie's The Magic Animal, and Irish myth. Bateson aligned with radical opinion in its critique of modernization, but it took that critique beyond the enduring problems of human aggression, political oppression, and psychic alienation, and into a more fundamental analysis of the instrumentalism at the heart of the modern worldview. Challenged by audience members over systems thinking as quietist and reactionary, Bateson defended his approach by explaining the greenhouse effect and the prospect of global warming/climate change. This was perhaps the first exposure of such concepts to a lay audience.

Political Preferences, Personality Traits, and Environmentalism

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alistair Soutter ◽  
René Mõttus
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Personality Traits ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Environmental Attitudes ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Political Orientation ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Political Preferences ◽  
Party Voting

Although the scientific evidence of anthropogenic climate change continues to grow, public discourse still reflects a high level of scepticism and political polarisation towards anthropogenic climate change. In this study (N = 499) we attempted to replicate and expand upon an earlier finding that environmental terminology (“climate change” versus “global warming”) could partly explain political polarisation in environmental scepticism (Schuldt, Konrath, & Schwarz, 2011). Participants completed a series of online questionnaires assessing personality traits, political preferences, belief in environmental phenomenon, and various pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours. Those with a Conservative political orientation and/or party voting believed less in both climate change and global warming compared to those with a Liberal orientation and/or party voting. Furthermore, there was an interaction between continuously measured political orientation, but not party voting, and question wording on beliefs in environmental phenomena. Personality traits did not confound these effects. Furthermore, continuously measured political orientation was associated with pro-environmental attitudes, after controlling for personality traits, age, gender, area lived in, income, and education. The personality domains of Openness, and Conscientiousness, were consistently associated with pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours, whereas Agreeableness was associated with pro-environmental attitudes but not with behaviours. This study highlights the importance of examining personality traits and political preferences together and suggests ways in which policy interventions can best be optimised to account for these individual differences.

scholarly journals Economic damages from Hurricane Sandy attributable to sea level rise caused by anthropogenic climate change

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin H. Strauss ◽  
Philip M. Orton ◽  
Klaus Bittermann ◽  
Maya K. Buchanan ◽  
Daniel M. Gilford ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Sea Level Rise ◽  
Sea Level ◽  
East Coast ◽  
The United States ◽  
Hurricane Sandy ◽  
Water Levels ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Economic Damage ◽  
Sea Levels

AbstractIn 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast of the United States, creating widespread coastal flooding and over $60 billion in reported economic damage. The potential influence of climate change on the storm itself has been debated, but sea level rise driven by anthropogenic climate change more clearly contributed to damages. To quantify this effect, here we simulate water levels and damage both as they occurred and as they would have occurred across a range of lower sea levels corresponding to different estimates of attributable sea level rise. We find that approximately $8.1B ($4.7B–$14.0B, 5th–95th percentiles) of Sandy’s damages are attributable to climate-mediated anthropogenic sea level rise, as is extension of the flood area to affect 71 (40–131) thousand additional people. The same general approach demonstrated here may be applied to impact assessments for other past and future coastal storms.

scholarly journals Anthropogenic climate change has changed frequency of past flood during 2010-2013

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yukiko Hirabayashi ◽  
Haireti Alifu ◽  
Dai Yamazaki ◽  
Yukiko Imada ◽  
Hideo Shiogama ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
South America ◽  
Radiative Forcing ◽  
Water Cycle ◽  
Flood Frequency ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Climate Change Signal ◽  
Northern Eurasia ◽  
Large Ensemble ◽  
The Impact

AbstractThe ongoing increases in anthropogenic radiative forcing have changed the global water cycle and are expected to lead to more intense precipitation extremes and associated floods. However, given the limitations of observations and model simulations, evidence of the impact of anthropogenic climate change on past extreme river discharge is scarce. Here, a large ensemble numerical simulation revealed that 64% (14 of 22 events) of floods analyzed during 2010-2013 were affected by anthropogenic climate change. Four flood events in Asia, Europe, and South America were enhanced within the 90% likelihood range. Of eight snow-induced floods analyzed, three were enhanced and four events were suppressed, indicating that the effects of climate change are more likely to be seen in the snow-induced floods. A global-scale analysis of flood frequency revealed that anthropogenic climate change enhanced the occurrence of floods during 2010-2013 in wide area of northern Eurasia, part of northwestern India, and central Africa, while suppressing the occurrence of floods in part of northeastern Eurasia, southern Africa, central to eastern North America and South America. Since the changes in the occurrence of flooding are the results of several hydrological processes, such as snow melt and changes in seasonal and extreme precipitation, and because a climate change signal is often not detectable from limited observation records, large ensemble discharge simulation provides insights into anthropogenic effects on past fluvial floods.

scholarly journals Revisiting the Scopes Trial: Young-Earth Creationism, Creation Science, and the Evangelical Denial of Climate Change

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 133
Author(s):  
K. L. Marshall
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Crisis ◽  
Biblical Authority ◽  
Scopes Trial ◽  
Creation Science ◽  
Imminent Threat ◽  
Young Earth Creationism ◽  
American Evangelicalism

In the century since the Scopes Trial, one of the most influential dogmas to shape American evangelicalism has been that of young-earth creationism. This article explains why, with its arm of “creation science,” young-earth creationism is a significant factor in evangelicals’ widespread denial of anthropogenic climate change. Young-earth creationism has become closely intertwined with doctrines such as the Bible’s divine authority and the Imago Dei, as well as with social issues such as abortion and euthanasia. Addressing this aspect of the environmental crisis among evangelicals will require a re-orientation of biblical authority so as to approach social issues through a hermeneutic that is able to acknowledge the reality and imminent threat of climate change.

scholarly journals Declarations of Dependence: On the Constitution of the Anthropocene

2020 ◽  
pp. 026327642097828
Author(s):  
Henrik Enroth
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Hannah Arendt ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Bruno Latour ◽  
The Public

As the gravity of anthropogenic climate change is dawning on humanity, essential political aspects of the climatic situation remain unexplored. This article argues that our entering the Anthropocene amounts to a constitutive moment: a moment in which new principles of coexistence are being declared. Drawing on, as well as critically engaging with, the work of Bruno Latour and Hannah Arendt, I introduce and explicate the metaphor declarations of dependence to make sense of what scientists, activists, academics and journalists are doing, in political terms, when they announce the Anthropocene. Theoretically as well as practically, this metaphor opens for a more helpful understanding of the fraught relationship between science and the public on the issue of anthropogenic climate change. I end by considering the possibility that this metaphor, literally construed, can help us make today the first day in the rest of our lives in the Anthropocene.

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