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 Giving Absurdity Form: The Place of Contemporary Art in the Environmental Crisis

Arts ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 81
Author(s):  
Anne Elizabeth Douglas
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Contemporary Art ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Crisis ◽  
Illusion Of Control ◽  
The Earth ◽  
The World

Absurdity in art creates bizarre juxtapositions that expose, and question conflicted, even dangerous, aspects of life which have become normalized. Absurd art appears in troubled times, subverting moments of extreme contradiction in which it appears impossible to think differently. For example, Dada (1917–1923) used nonsense to reflect the nonsensical brutality of WW1. The power to unsettle in this form of art rests in disrupting the world of the viewer and positioning them as interlocutors in a new framing. Absurdity in art reveals the absurdity that is inherent in life and its institutions, breaking the illusion of control. It can help us to comprehend the ‘incomprehensible’ in other species and spheres of life. In the challenge of anthropogenic climate change, how might the absurd capture the strangeness of current times in which a gap is widening between the earth we live ‘in’ and the earth we live ‘from’? This article explores qualities of the absurd in art as a possible way in which to grasp and reimagine ourselves beyond the anthropocentric, focusing on the work of the artists John Newling (b. 1952, UK) and Helen Mayer (1927–2018, US) and Newton Harrison (b. 1932, US), known as ‘The Harrisons’.

scholarly journals Ecological Destruction and Consumerism

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 28-46
Author(s):  
Clarisa Novello
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Anthropogenic Climate Change ◽  
Environmental Crisis ◽  
The Political ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Public Agency ◽  
Current State ◽  
Human World ◽  
State Of Affairs

Literature that engages with the theme of anthropogenic climate change carries the potential of awakening the reader’s curiosity by creating a dimension in which the effects and impacts of the crisis are tangible. The urgency and unpredictability of climate change are articulated through reflections that combine societal, cultural and political issues associated to the phenomenon, hence encouraging a deeper understanding of the environmental crisis in today’s society. The article examines the novel EistTau by Ilija Trojanow to navigate the political and economic aspects of anthropogenic climate change. I reflect on the employment of fiction in finding ways to develop attentiveness to nature, whilst exposing how EisTau questions the power relations between culture, politics and economy, in a bid to influence the current state of affairs.  I argue that the depiction of the effects of climate change and the melting of glaciers enable public agency, whilst encouraging the rethinking of the environmental crisis and the acknowledgment of its connection to capitalism and to the constant accumulation of goods.  I observe how the exposure of the interconnectedness of climate change and capitalism encourages behavioural changes that lead to the adoption of alternative lifestyles that can halt the disastrous effects of climate change and prompts readers to develop a sense of care for the non-human world.

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 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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