Rather Suspect

How do you put an elephant on a diet?

In 2015, a hundred and ninety-six countries signed The Paris Agreement, whose goal is to limit the rise in global mean temperature to well below 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, and preferably below 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit, compared to pre-industrial levels.

Last week, federal scientists from several agencies, including the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration and NASA, forecast that sea levels will rise by about a foot by 2050.

On Monday, during an American Geophysical Union Meeting, scientists warned that a key Antarctic glacier could shatter within the next five years and increase the glacier’s contribution to global sea level rise to 25%.

My response to each of these statistics is: so what?

Now, to be clear, I am not a climate change denier. My issue with the above data has nothing to do with the underlying science itself. It’s that, as reported, each of these numbers feels inconsequential and meaningless.

Let’s start with the Paris Agreement goal of limiting the increase in the global temperature to less than 3.6 degrees. How should I interpret that information?

I’ll tell you how I think about it. When I look at my phone right now, it says the temperature outside is 65 degrees. That said, were you to blindfold me, lead me outside, and, after a minute, ask me to guess the temperature — I very likely could guess correctly within about 4 degrees or so. I might say 67, or 65, or perhaps 63 — but I would most certainly say “it’s in the 60s.”

Why is this important? Because whether it’s 67 degrees or 63 degrees, it makes almost no difference to my life. I don’t dress differently if it’s one or the other. I don’t spend more time preparing myself before I step outside. I don’t warm up the car for longer if I go for a drive. I quite literally do nothing differently in either case.

Now, that’s all well and good when it’s in the 60s. But what if it were instead, say, in the 20s? I grew up in Minnesota and I can tell you if outside it were, say, 27 degrees instead of 23? I would also do nothing differently.

Now, of course — intellectually — I know that the mean temperature everywhere rising 3.6 degrees is extremely significant. But I don’t live everywhere. Nobody lives everywhere. We live in San Francisco, or Minneapolis, or Miami, or Mexico City. If you asked anyone, in any of those places, what they would do differently if today turned out to be 4 degrees warmer than they thought it might have been when they left the house in the morning — do you think any of them would change their behavior in any meaningful way?

If the answer is no, then why would we think that eight billion people will react to those goals, as stated? Scientists can describe (through models, scientific papers, and essays) why these numbers are very, very bad. But in terms of a felt sense, they just don’t feel very bad.

But perhaps temperature isn’t the number to key on. So, instead, let’s talk about that sea level rise: sea levels will rise a foot by 2050. How do we react to that number?

I hate to say it but, in terms of a “felt” sense? My response is, again: a foot? Over thirty years? That’s it?

Now, why should I be so dismissive about this number? Because I know — in fact, I’ve experienced, hundreds of times, in person — the Pacific Ocean rising and falling, from high tide to low tide, perhaps seven or eight feet every day. When I’m on the beach and the sea rises a foot, I don’t call that a crisis. I call that sitting by the water on a Tuesday afternoon.

But let’s talk to the last item: a major glacier fracturing in the Antarctic. That glacier’s contribution to sea level rise will increase from 4% to 25%. Now, that seems like a lot — but, in this case, I have no context to determine if that is, in fact, significant. I know so little about Antarctica, about how frequently glaciers do or do not crack, about how much they contribute to sea level rise — in fact, I have no idea where to place this information.

Now, of course, the initial response to all the above might be: well, you need to educate yourself! Do the research. Read the scientific papers, spend the time realising that a 3.6 degree rise in temperature will likely have disastrous consequences! Understand that a one-foot sea level rise maps to entire communities getting submerged, to hundreds of millions of people getting displaced! And read up on the ice shelf, and understand just how significant these changes are!

To which my response is: yes, that is absolutely correct. In fact, I can and should read the research. I should go deep on those scientific papers. I should spend the time educating myself on what very well may be the most significant event of the century. I’m not disagreeing with that. But, I do have to ask: if our goal is to inspire and motivate eight billion people to change their behavior — does it seem effective that every person on the planet needs to do the same?

It’s not that we’re getting the science wrong. It’s that we’re presenting the math wrong.

Edward Tufte, statistician and professor emeritus at Yale University once wrote that the first question one must ask when presented with any number is: compared to what? To that I would add a second qualification: compared to what other number that I already have a felt sense about?

Politicians of course are legendary at communicating data in such a way that they mean nothing to an average citizen. If one voter were presented with, say, a state bond measure that was estimated to cost $9 billion, and another that was estimated to cost $12 billion, how would a voter possibly make a decision between the two? With the exception of perhaps a few hundred of the wealthiest people on the planet, nobody really knows what a difference of three billion dollars feels like.

So, what’s the answer? In the bond measure above, one potential answer is easy: divide the cost of the project by the total number of taxpayers. Rather than say “this measure will cost $9 billion and this alternative measure will cost $12 billion” say “this measure will cost the average taxpayer $450 each, whereas this second one will cost $600 each.” Many of us know how an extra $150 feels. We can place that number not just in the context of other government programs which we might be asked to vote upon, we can understand how that impacts our lives. We know — without the need to do any research — how much gas, or how many groceries, or how many pairs of socks $150 can buy. We can “fit” this number into our lives, and then make informed decisions around it.

In other words: we don’t just know what that number means intellectually, we know how that number feels — in a very personal sense.

So I propose we need to treat the numbers we use when speaking about climate change in a similar way. If we are going to try to accomplish a goal whose success will be achieved by a specific, numerical, global goal — holding the planet’s mean temperature rise to less than 3.6 degrees — we need to break that number down into other numbers that are local, meaningful, and personal.