UNSETTLED by Steven E. Koonin is meant to be an
apolitical look at climate change, focusing on “What Climate Science Tells Us,
What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters.” However, this new book has met with
several challenges, perhaps most notably in a Scientific
American article. The business media, including Forbes and The
Wall Street Journal, have instead tended to support his position. Koonin,
a physicist, has an impressive list of credentials, including academic ties to
CalTech and New York University, amongst others. He splits this book into two
parts: The Science and The Response. Initially, he discusses aspects like heat
waves, hurricanes, Greenland’s ice sheet, and economic impact of climate
change, and then devotes a couple of chapters to “why the science has been communicated
so poorly” and what improvements might be made.
At a time when two-thirds
of Americans think government should do more, Koonin offers a
confusing (or overly nuanced?) summary since he agrees that the planet is
warming and appears to acknowledge that human-caused emissions are a major
factor. Why such reluctance to embrace more proactive policy action then?
Advocating that we make only “low-risk changes,” Koonin merely suggests
that “climate science would also be improved by deliberate efforts to involve
scientists from other fields in studying climate … [and] we need to … help
non-experts become more critical consumers of media coverage of climate.” While
those are laudable goals, it seems that with all of his knowledge and
experience, Koonin could press for more. He acknowledges this weakness, saying,
“I have deliberately written this book in a descriptive manner rather than a prescriptive
one.” His detractors might better ponder how to highlight those areas of
scientific agreement, further informing the public so they, having come to a
reasoned conclusion, are motivated to push for appropriate speed and scale of government
response.
Added 8/21- New United Nations Sixth Assessment Report on Climate Change
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