Good afternoon and welcome to the fifth seminar in the NASA Administrator series of discussions about our future in space Our subject today is sustaining life on the earth and our speakers are dr. Diana liverman from Penn State University and dr. Robert Cates an independent scholar The first question that we might want to ask of our speakers is what does sustainability mean? It might mean different things to ecologists for whom the emphasis is on biodiversity environmental quality and climate protection and To economists for whom the emphasis might be on the improvement of human living standards The different perspectives on sustainability May cause confusion in communicating its relevance to people and in deciding on appropriate responses to the challenges it contains Is there a good measure for sustainability? It's not the gross national product as Robert Kennedy pointed out some three decades ago He said the gross national product includes air pollution and Advertising for cigarettes and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage It includes the destruction of redwoods and the death of lake superior It grows with the production of napalm and missiles and nuclear warheads And he went on to say and if the GNP includes all this there is much that it doesn't comprehend The health of our families the quality of their education The decency of our factories and the safety of our streets It measures everything except that which makes life worthwhile Beyond the ambiguity of what sustainability means or maybe because of it There's a disagreement about the prospects for achieving sustainability Are we winning or losing the battle? What's the evidence? Some scholars question whether sustainability is even a significant issue Pointing out that humankind consistently has managed in the past to avoid the global specter of Malthusian scarcity through resource substitution and technical ingenuity Others believe however that the scale of human pressure on natural systems already is well past a sustainable level They point to Rwanda, Somalia and other poverty stricken areas As early signals of a pending decline of society's standards of living Our speakers are interdisciplinary scholars who are engaged in defining a practical trajectory That will provide a long-term vision for sustainable future Sustainability requires much broader participation than the natural sciences alone The present one of our speakers dr. Kates has written represents an exciting time for social and behavioral Scientists to join with natural scientists to understand the interactions of nature and society and Technology in developing the method and the theoretical models to address the profound questions of society and its sustainability Dr. Kates has pointed out that we need to consider the entire Panopoly of global changes now underway and not simply equate global change with environmental change The problem of Achieving sustainability is a great one that can be met with international understanding evolving technologies and individual commitment Dr. Kates is our first speaker He prefers the title of independent scholar, but he also happens to be a professor emeritus at Brown University He is a world geographer a distinguished scientist and a widely published author He is past president of the Association of American Geographers Executive editor of Environment magazine and co-chair of overcoming hunger for the 1990s His research and professional interests include world hunger population Dynamics sustainability of the biosphere climate impact assessment and the theory of human environment He is a recipient of numerous distinctions among them the National Medal of Science That award was given to him for quote his fundamental contributions to the understanding of natural and man-made hazards Global environmental change and the prevalence and persistence of world hunger He's one of the very few social behavioral scientists to win this very extinguished or distinguished award He's also a recipient of the MacArthur Prize Fellowship He's a member of the National Academy of Sciences in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a fellow of the triple a yes Now I welcome dr. Robert Kates Last year I was asked by scientific American To address the question Can life be sustained on earth? My answer was typically academic Yes, no, maybe I Wrote if life on earth is the sum of living things Organic matter capable of reproducing itself then the answer is almost assuredly yes For life on earth is over the eons of time survive repeated catastrophes that include essential atmospheric change Continental creation and separation and asteroid collision Life will almost surely go on at least until the final dimming of the light in a cooling Sun But if life on earth is life as we know it the mix of living things that fill the places We are familiar with then the answer is almost assuredly no for human-induced change in the landscape in the environment and in the great biogeochemical and hydrological cycles Now rivals that of nature More than a half of all such human-induced change over the last 10,000 years Has occurred in our lifetimes and is still increasing And if by life we mean us Our species and the life that supports us then the answer is perhaps For human life has never really been simply onward and upward from the cave Human numbers have grown by fits and starts human civilizations have declined and fallen and even the human physique Has fluctuated over time But in the hundred and fifty years of scientific Americans existence Human numbers have quadrupled and human consumption and technology have transformed the earth The coming half century will be a critical period for human life and the life that sustains us If we can manage the transition to a warmer more crowded more connected But more diverse world then there may be a promise of a sustainable future It is that transition that I call this sustainable transition and that's what I want to talk about today We are of course living in an age of transition The health transition from early death by infectious diseases to late death by cancer heart attack and stroke the transitional economies Moving from state to market control The civil society transition moving from single-party military or state-run institutions to multi-party politics and a rich rich mix of non-governmental institutions But transitions enter our rhetoric with the demographic transition of which Europe was perhaps the earliest and the best study the Swedish transition for example took over a hundred and fifty years to complete with a steady decline in death rates Followed by a decline in birth rates that begin 75 years later in that interim population numbers surge and indeed an enormous Malthusian crisis begins around 1830 and prompts the large emigrations to North America For much of the rest of the world is exemplified by Mexico The transition is incomplete and we are still in the midst of the population surge phase Yet even while populations surge births decline in 1950 the global average of children born per woman was five More than twice the two point one births required to achieve eventual zero population growth current births averaged three point two today More than halfway there in the transition to a stable population The death transition has been more rapid of course and life expectancy currently at 65 years Having grown to about two-thirds of the transition between a life expectancy at birth of 40 years to one of 75 years It is that difference of course between the more rapid decline in deaths and the slower decline in births That adds about 88 million people each year to our numbers but sometime in 1964 The growth rate of world population peaked at an estimated two point one percent and it is likely That never before and never again will the population of the world grow so rapidly If we must choose a time To date the subtle shift in the perception of crisis the tilt in the constant tension between Optimism and pessimism in the assessment of great problems, and that might have been such a moment What weighed in the balance was the assurance that the end of the population explosion was in sight Not merely in the theoretical models of the demographers, but in the bottom line of the summation of life and death Though there seems to be little question that the global demographic transition continues much depends on its pace What concerns us is not simply the impact of human numbers on the natural systems that support life But the rapidity of such changes a rapidity that is already evident over the last 50 years There is a history of efforts to take stock of human impacts on earth It has been a specialty of the scientific tradition of geography in which Diana and I share It begins in 1864 when George Perkins Marsh published his assessment as Physical geography or the earth is modified by human action a remarkable study that would serve as The basis for modern concerns with conservation resources and environment 92 years later a fresh assessment Entitled man's role in changing the face of the earth was undertaken and now the most recent stock taking was organized in 1888 The international collaborative effort published as the earth is transformed by human action Took stock of the magnitude of human induced change over the last 300 years But place these changes in the context of the last 10,000 years It differed from the previous efforts in that it sought to estimate human impacts on the great flows of energy and Materials as well as the stocks of land water and biota that the previous efforts had assessed a Sampling of the earth transform findings show that since the dawn of agriculture 10,000 years ago an area the size of the continental us has been deforested by human effort Today half of the ecosystems of the ice-free lands of the earth have been modified Managed or utilized by people the flow of materials and energy that are removed from their natural settings or synthesize now rival the flows of such materials within nature itself and Water in an amount greater than the contents of Lake your own is withdrawn each year for human use All told the earth transform project was able to reconstruct human induced changes in 13 worldwide measures of chemical flow carbon carbon tetrachloride lead nitrogen phosphorus and sulfur and Measures of land and water deforested area sediment flows soil area loss and water withdrawal and measures of biotic diversity floral marine mammals terrestrial vertebrates We found that most of the change in these 13 indicators has been extraordinarily recent for 10 of the 13 measures Half of all the change over the last 10,000 years took place within our lifetimes So much for the immediate past what now holds for the future for almost two decades now United nations the world bank and individual demographers that make 50 to 150 year forward population Forecasts have projected a world population of between 10 to 12 billion That stabilizes sometime within the next century Such agreement needs to be taken with many proverbial grains of salt Since all the forecasters seem to use similar methods and assumptions And upward creep is more likely than downward error Upward creek creep is already evident in the latest projections But even a doubling of population May be too much Doubling a population of africans chinese or indians with their current consumption may be manageable But doubling a population of americans europeans and australians and their consumption is not In 1989 an international institute of applied systems analysis summer study Found that current trends or quote business as usual projections for a doubling of population Requires a quadrupling of agriculture a sex tupling of energy an octupling of the economy If varied and nutritious diets Industrial products and regular jobs are to be in reach for most of the 10 billion people Now many find this two four six eight scenario Unbelievable and certainly unsustainable because of the extraordinary increases in production and consumption required By just the doubling of population Such increases they think could not be accommodated by current technology and practice In a human environment that has already seen substantial transformation Of its atmosphere soils ground water and biota But most of us on reflection Recognize the unique situation that we are in For an extraordinary short period of time A matter of decades Human society will need to feed house nurture Educate and employ At least as many more people as already live on earth It is in if in such a warmer more crowded world Environmental catastrophe is to be postponed It can only be done by either maintaining great inequities in human welfare Or by adopting very different trajectories for technology and development How likely are we to have such different trajectories? For technology and development How might such a transition to a sustainable world take place? Currently there are three Current contrasting and archetypal visions of such a transition And while we like to boast about how new everything is These are rooted in the great 18th and 19th century figures Robert Malfus Adam Smith And john steward mill But they are also as current as today's books and magazine racks Malfus thought there were three checks to population Moral restraint which included late marriage and abstinence and which he advocated But was skeptical of its wide acceptance Vice which included contraception and abortion Which he could not accept And misery Which he described as follows and I quote All the causes which tend in any way prematurely To shorten the duration of human life Such as unwholesome occupations Severe labor and exposure to the seasons Bad and insufficient food and clothing Arising from poverty The bad nursing of children Excesses of all kinds Great towns and manufacturers The whole train of common diseases and epidemics Wars in fantasy plague and famine Now contrast Malfus's dismal sketch With the recent one on the future drawn by Robert Kaplan And described on the cover of the Atlantic monthly as the coming anarchy Nations break up under the tidal flow of refugees from environmental and social disaster As borders crumble Another type of boundary is erected a wall of disease Wars afford over scarce resources especially water And war itself becomes continuous with crime His armed bands of stateless marauders clash With the private security forces of the elites A preview of the first decades of the 21st century Thus the first of the visions of the sustainable transition Is the miserable vision Population numbers and consumption Are checked by the four horsemen of the apocalypse Mill would write in 1848 And the Meadows, Dennis and Denela and Jorgen Randers Would quote in their recent book from John Stuart Mill I cannot regard the stationary state of capital and wealth With the unaffected aversion So generally manifested toward it By the political economists of the old school I am inclined to believe that it would be on the whole A very considerable improvement in our present condition I confess that I am not charmed with the ideal of life Held out by those who think that the normal state of human beings Is that of struggling to get on That the trampling, crashing, elbowing And treading on each other's heels Are the most desirable lot of humankind It is scarcely necessary to remark That a stationary condition of capital and population Implies no stationary state of human improvement There would be as much scope as ever For all kinds of mental culture And moral and social progress As much room for improving the art of living And much more likelihood of it being improved They then update their earlier work That's the Meadows and Randers Which was the limits to growth And describe in beyond the limits A sustainability transition Using their world model They simulate a sustainable world With deliberate constraints on growth The model world, and I quote from them Decides on an average family size of two children Beginning in 1995 Has perfect birth control effectiveness And has decided to aim for an average consumer goods Per capita of 1968 $350 per person per year About the equivalent of that in South Korea Or about twice that the level of Brazil in 1990 Furthermore, starting in 1995 It begins to employ technologies That increase the efficiency of resource use Decrease pollution emissions Per unit of industrial output Control land erosion And increased land yields until food per capita Reaches its desired level The resulting society Can sustain 7.7 billion people At a comfortable standard of living With high life expectancy And declining pollution Until at least a year, 2100 Such a sustainable society Does not necessarily mean the population And economy are static or stagnant They stay roughly constant The way a river is roughly constant Though new water is always running through it In an equilibrium society People are being born While others are dying New factories, roads, building machines Are being built a while Old ones are being demolished and recycled Technologies are improving And the steady flow of material output per person Would almost certainly be changing And diversifying in content As a river may have ups and downs Around some average flow So could an equilibrium society vary Either by deliberate human choice Or by unforeseen opportunities or disasters Thus, for the meadows A sustainable transition Is a transition to an equilibrium society Where there are constraints On the growth of population And material output But not on development A final vision of the sustainability transition Is of a continuous transition One guided by an invisible hand In its most extreme form It is described by Simon as, and I quote The standard of living has risen Along with the size of the world's population Since the beginning of recorded time And with increases in income and population Have come less severe shortages Lower costs and an increase Availability of resources Including a cleaner environment And greater access to natural recreation areas And there is no convincing economic reason Why these trends towards a better life And towards lower prices for raw materials Should not continue indefinitely There is no physical or economic reason Why human resourcefulness And enterprise cannot forever Continue to respond to impending shortages And existing problems with new expedience That after an adjustment period Leave us better off than before the problem arose Adding more people will cause us more problems But at the same time There will be more people to solve these problems And leave us with a bonus of lower costs And less scarcity in the long run The bonus applies to such desirable resources As better health, more wilderness, cheaper energy And a cleaner environment Now Simon's faith in the forever is extreme For many economists and technologists Share in his vision That the invisible hand of rising prices Will curb consumption And encourage materials and energy Substitution and invention They are confident That human creativity can overcome all limits I am not much of a purist in anything And find it difficult to accept the solitary likelihood Of any of the archetypal transitions While much in love with great ideas And great ideals Be they Smith, Malthus, or Mills I fear the actual pathway of a successful transition Indeed, if we can succeed We'll probably follow that path of decision And action that Lindblum called muddling through Or more appropriately lurching through And to do so, it will surely embody some elements Of all three visions Let me restate the unique and enormous challenge Of the next five decades In this extraordinary short period of time Human society will need to feed, house, nurture, educate, and employ At least as many more people as already live on earth Even or especially to lurch through Will require profound change in our institutions Technologies and belief systems And more than a smattering of good fortune Fortunately, new institutions, new technologies, and new ideas are already in place Suggestive of the different trajectory of technology and development That a sustainable transition might follow There are even a few signs of fortune Three sets of important transnational institutions are emerging The best known are those created by governments A set of international organizations, treaties, and activities Currently addressing the environment There are some 170 international treaties in force And there are new international institutions Such as the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development That is to oversee the accords of the Earth Summit in Rio Of the global environmental facility That combines the talents and wealth of the World Bank And the United Nations Development Program And the environment programs Equally well known, but not for its pro-environmental dimension Is the transnational corporation The activities of such corporations are responsible For much of the human-induced change taking place around the globe But increasingly, they are also disseminators of common approaches Technical skills and standards for addressing environmental problems And finally least studied, but in many ways most important Is the veritable explosion of transnational, non-governmental, and private voluntary Environment and development organizations And their local counterparts in developing countries And estimated 200,000 groups increasingly linked together in international networks Despite the current mood in Congress Some favorable results of these institutional changes are already apparent In the Earth Transform Project We found that the rates of increase For five of the 13 transformations studied have now turned downward Vertebrate and marine mammalian extinctions And releases of lead, sulfur, and carbon tetrachloride All of these have been subject to strenuous regulation By the wealthier countries But increasingly in developing countries as well Spurred on by all three of the new institutions There are also discernible long-term trends in some technologies Doing more with less Since the mid-1800s, the amount of carbon used in producing a unit of production Has been decreasing by 1.3% per year By a combination of using less carbon-rich fuels to produce energy And using less energy overall per unit of production Nonetheless, this has not been sufficient to offset the growth of the economy per year Leading to a global increase in CO2 emissions In each year There is also a similar but more complicated trend towards dematerialization Using less materials overall per unit of production Perhaps like using smaller and smarter satellites Thus we are clearly using less steel and cement but more aluminum and chemicals Although these have peaked and are beginning to lessen And while despite the computer and television revolutions The use of paper remains constant In a more crowded and more consuming world One mode of coping is to use a smaller throughput Of the basic ingredients of energy, materials, and information That sustain life and meet the enlarged needs and wants of human society As shown by the long-term trends There has already been a reduction of energy and materials required Per unit of economic output But there is great potential to accelerate such trends Simple interventions include the recent competition To build a low-energy consuming non-nose-owned depleting refrigerator in the U.S. Or to move immediately to next-generation refrigeration in India Longer term, there is an emerging field of study An action known as industrial ecology That seeks to use the mechanisms of market, competition, and efficiency To minimize the throughput of energy and materials And the output of waste from industrial processes Several major corporations have really adopted as a goal Total recycling and internal circulation Still longer term, there is great opportunity to increase human sustenance Without increasing environmental burdens Through the science and engineering of biological processes New energy sources and transmission New materials and the substitution of information for energy and materials And most promising in the long run Is work on the molecular and submolecular technologies Microelectronics, biotechnology, and nanotechnology materials Potentially more important than institutions or technology Are the emergent ideas Sustaining human life on Earth Requires at least three important sets of ideas That cohabitation with the natural world is necessary That there are limits to human activity And that the benefits of human activity needs to be more widely shared Last winter, I attended a concert of 500 school children voices My grandchildren included What was most striking to me Was the relative absence of the patriotic hymns of my childhood And their replacement by a new set of environmental hymns and anthems And I came away wondering how 25 years of Earth days Has changed the formative ethos of young Americans But this was main, and what about the rest of the world? A recent study undertaken by Riley Dunlop and the Gallup Organization Compared opinion in 12 industrialized and 12 developing nations Including Eastern Europe And found surprisingly little difference in the attitudes found in those nations Indeed, even the attribution of the cause of environmental problems Whether it was overpopulation Or consumption of the world's resources by industrialized countries They were seen contributing equally Both by residents of rich and poor countries And along with this widespread But sometimes fluctuating evidence of environmental concern More profound and fundamental ideas are emerging These are found in the burgeoning of ideas and movements That include fundamental challenges to anthropocentrism As well as more modest efforts to resolve the conflicting needs Between ecosystems and economies Or the conflicting claims of equity between species Places, peoples, livelihoods, and generations My hope for good fortune rests in part on the good news, bad news biases That seem to affect even the best of scientific research For more than 150 years scientific research Seemed to ignore or downplay the negative effects of emerging technologies It was a period that ended with Rachel Carson Today I detect an apparent bias in research To identify the harmful effects and the mechanisms that amplify the impacts Of people, places, and things And only later to discover the negative feedbacks Or compensatory adjustments that modify the harmful impacts It is a subtle rather than an overt bias Science is too honest to deny such feedbacks or adjustments But it is not as active in searching for them as for the harmful effects An example of such belated recognition is the recent documentation That forest biomass in Europe is not only surviving But probably increasing despite enormous burdens of pollutants and acid rain This may be occurring because of the fertilization effects Of the very same chemical pollutants Which as aerosols also seem to provide a counter greenhouse warming effect I might note that remote sensing has been most important in documenting the increase in biomass in Europe As has been the work supported by NASA on estimating realistically the pace of deforestation in the amazon Which other estimates have tended to exaggerate Such cautionary tales serve to remind us That we often do not understand the impacts of human induced changes on natural systems Sufficient to know to what degree important life support systems are threatened Or what replaces such systems when they are degraded Nature may be more robust than popular rhetoric is willing to concede And our belated recognition of that condition may constitute good fortune But there is more to good fortune than favorable surprises 15 years ago Lionel Tiger suggested that there was a biology of hope An evolutionary human tilt towards optimism That compensates in part for our variability to ask questions to have a seminar such as this To ask can human life on earth be sustained While I'm unpersuaded by a somewhat tenuous change of argument I share his inclination Not because I have great confidence in the invisible hand of the marketplace Or of technological change Or of even Love Lock's Gaia principle In which life itself seems to create the conditions for its own survival Nor is it just the important and rapid acceptance of sustainability As a basic goal for human society Rather it is because hope is simply a necessity If we humans, now conscious of the extraordinary challenge that we face in the coming years Are to negotiate the sustainability transition Thank you Dr. Cates for giving us the moral dimension of this problem Our second speaker Dr. Diana Lieberman is an associate professor of geography and an associate director of the earth system science center at the Pennsylvania State University Her research interests include the interaction between climate and society and global environmental issues She has covered a lot of geography in getting her degrees She started with a BA from University College London Then received her MA from the University of Toronto And ever westward got her PhD in geography from UCLA Her research interests are in climate and society Mexico in the impacts of drought and climate change And agriculture and land use there And the human dimensions of global change I had the great pleasure of interacting with Diana in a previous life when I was at Penn State University A couple of years ago, she asked me to address a large group of her Geographer colleagues on the subject of the sustainability of black holes and neutron stars and increase in driven binary systems Today I have the pleasure of introducing her to speak on the sustainability of a more local environment One which is accreting more than just gas Diana It's always the visionary has identified a great challenge to sustaining life on earth the growth of the human population He also hints at some optimistic trends in institutions ideas and technology That he hopes will help us find ways to a more sustainable future I'm going to try and ground and calibrate his vision and our future by looking at one country, Mexico Which provides a dynamic and dramatic case of the human dimensions of global environmental change I will examine the role of population growth in the transformation of the mexican environment And in increasing mexico's vulnerability to global change I will also try to find some reasons for optimism about the future of mexico and similar regions When appropriate i'm going to try and illustrate my remarks with specific examples of research Which links the social and natural sciences and combines physical and social data To better understand the social causes and consequences of environmental change in mexico Mexico's rapid industrialization and population growth are placing tremendous stresses on the resource base of water soils and biodiversity Mexico is a significant producer of greenhouse gases and a globally important reservoir of biodiversity Another reason for focusing on mexico is that the mexican government has often positioned itself as a leader amongst developing nations In environmental policy and negotiations The first to sign the montreal ozone protocol Mexico has eagerly sought technology transfer for greenhouse gas reduction and international support for forest conservation As our southern neighbor mexico is of is of enormous strategic importance to the united states Our third most important trading partner Financial and market integration is growing with the implementation of the north american free trade agreement nafta People water and pollution flow across the shared border The rapidity and volatility of recent political and economic change in mexico including de zapatis the rebellion last year assassinations and the collapse of the peso have raised significant concerns about the relationship between economic and environmental policy the sustainability of agriculture And the environmental basis of migration and conflict To what extent can mexico's contributions to global changes in climate and biodiversity be attributed to population growth? Carbon emissions as you can see in this graph have grown steeply over the last 20 or so years The activities responsible for these emissions include fossil fuel and cement production and deforestation Methane trends are similarly moving upward as a result of livestock and gas production renewed attention to emissions data as a result of the intergovernmental panel on climate change process and an epa recent epa coordinated country study Suggest the population growth is only partly responsible for these trends greenhouse gas emission increases in mexico are also correlated with some of the Factors that i show on this graphic including tremendous growth in exports of cattle and oil And increased per capita consumption of energy and materials And you can see this because the slowing of emissions in the late 1980s is associated with drops in consumption per capita consumption during economic crises Rather than any temporary slowdown in population growth Estimates of emissions are also emerging as highly uncertain For example, the preliminary results of the country study Indicate that methane emissions are probably much lower than previously thought Because of discrepancies in the livestock census and much lower per capita animal emissions from poorly fed tropical animals The uncertainty in carbon dioxide emission estimates in mexico is partly associated with a great divergence in estimates of mexico's deforestation rate, which in the country study ranges from 300 000 hectares to 800 000 hectares a year Depending on whether census or satellite imagery is used and by whom Forecasts of future forest cover important in estimating emissions Assessing joint implementation, which is the process by which northern countries can count reductions in carbon emissions If they contribute to reforestation efforts in other parts of the world So these forecasts of future forest cover are very important in estimating emissions looking at the effectiveness of joint implementation Protecting biodiversity and understanding regional hydrology These forecasts of future forest cover are difficult because we lack information about the social forces driving land use transformations In order to project forest cover into the future, we need to understand the human activities that are lying behind these forces In the state of Chiapas in southern mexico We have tried to resolve the uncertainties about the rate and causes of deforestation with support from the national science foundation and nasa agricultural census and archival data Suggested significant conversion from forest to pasture and cropland as indicated in this graph Analysis of tm and mss scenes made available through the north american land cover pathfinder project Allowed us to document land cover changes over the last 20 years Compare it to what we could see in the census and identify key areas for field investigation We're using the data set on forest cover and land use change to ask several questions of relevance to global change research We have examined meteorological station records in forested and deforesting regions to see if there's any evidence that land cover Change is altering the regional climate in southern mexico We're also linking the land cover data to socio economic information within a geographical information system In order to assess the relationship between deforestation and variables such as population growth migration and poverty In this analysis, we plan to use a georeference demographic data set available through season Other researchers are using the data set Other researchers are using the data set in ecological studies of forest fragmentation and species habitat One of the species that is Being severely affected by deforestation in the region is this stunningly beautiful bird the scarlet macaw in all studies We are trying to undertake cross-scale analysis and validation by for example Conducting local-scale microclimatic transects from forest to clearing And by interviewing local people about their perceptions and explanations of land cover change We are hoping to expand and link our analysis to the recently approved iGBP hdp core project on land use and land cover change This international and comparative project of the international geosphere biosphere program and the human dimensions program both international initiative This project sets out to document and model the dynamics and patterns of global land transformation and the underlying social driving forces It seeks to provide improved information to scientific assessments of changing albedo biogeochemical cycles greenhouse gas emissions and hydrology as well as to local level decisions about land use management We also hope to link to a project global change in local places of the association of american geographers Which sets out to uncover the local scale causes and trends in greenhouse gas emissions In Chiapas it is clear that the causes of land cover change are highly complex The statistical studies that we've undertaken as well as some of these images that i will show you here Show that there are numerous factors Including population growth that are contributing to the deforestation of the region They include timber extraction for domestic construction and tropical hardwood export The expansion of commercial ranching and coffee production also often for export oil exploration And in migration of settlers from Conflict written areas of Guatemala and other regions of Mexico Other factors include highly unequal distribution of land and income And as bob kates might expect the highest population growth rates in all of mexico In addition to explaining environmental degradation and greenhouse gas emissions These factors that i've talked about On the inequality in land and income the Expansion of export crop production these types of factors also lie behind the zapatista rebellion that occurred in the region last year And in a sense link this process of environmental change to some process of social unrest and conflict Within the developing world Any grounds for optimism concerning deforestation in mexico? Perhaps Much of the remaining forest in Chiapas is protected by the montez as ules biosphere reserve The mexican government has also started to provide more resources to the region to alleviate poverty and provide alternative employment in the region Mexican and international scientists are working to monitor the environment of the region and identify More sustainable ways of using the land There is some rate evidence that rates of population growth are slowing in this region And there are also large numbers of reforestation projects some with international assistance that are taking place within the region Another source of optimism that bob kates also referred to is growing awareness of the need for environmental protection On the on behalf of the population in mexico and specifically the children who in this slide are visiting the ecological reserve adjacent to the forest in chiapas Now from an examination of the social causes of global change in mexico And from the southern region of mexico To the central and northern regions I'd now like to move from looking at the social causes to looking at some aspects of the consequences of global and climate change in mexico I'd like to discuss how population growth and economic development are changing vulnerability to climatic change and variation in mexico Whilst the bulk of global change research has focused on monitoring and modeling the biophysical aspects of the earth system There has been relatively little attention paid To how changes in social and economic systems are altering the conditions under which society experiences climate change and variability Many regions of the world are becoming more vulnerable to warmer drier conditions and to extreme events Because there are more people more industries demanding more water and occupying more hazard prone land In many places where climate models cannot agree about whether rainfall will increase or decrease as a result of global warming Social scientists can be pretty certain that by the time carbon dioxide doubles There will be twice as many people hoping to consume twice as much water per capita This has been modeled for the colorado river basin and for the basin in which mexico city lies We are also fairly confident that trends in urbanization coastal development and agricultural intensification Are putting larger amounts and percentages of people and productive activities at risk from the droughts floods and hurricanes associated with inter annual climate variability I believe that social science research on vulnerability and ways to reduce it is important not only to national policy makers But also to regional resource managers local communities and industries such as insurance commodity utility and transportation sectors Again, let me illustrate my points with some examples from mexico This year northern mexico has experienced the worst drought in more than 50 years And temperatures well above the long term normal Many reservoirs in northern mexico are at less than 20 percent of their capacity Hundreds of cattle have died and thousands of hectares of land have not been planted The drought has also been linked to increased number of migrants trying to cross the border into the u.s Unfortunately, the drought has coincided with a serious economic crisis in mexico Prices for agricultural inputs Seeds and fertilizers have been steadily increasing for a number of years Public credit and subsidies for agricultural inputs and to purchase guaranteed prices for crops Have also been declining as shown here as the mexican government reduces public sector spending and moves to privatization and free markets In january the value of the peso fell precipitously and interest rates soared This year farmers cannot afford to buy seeds and fertilizer And many of the poor cannot afford to buy purchase enough food Reports based on satellite and field observations Suggest that less than 60 percent of the usual crop area had been planted by may 20th Farm livelihoods the nutritional status of the poor and mexican food security are extremely vulnerable to this combination of economic and climatic crisis We have analyzed such intersections of inter-annual climate variability and socioeconomic vulnerability in several other regions of mexico With some support from the national science foundation In the valley of oaxaca, for example, synoptic climatology and station data show a strong correlation with crop yields in the valley Especially in el nino years like 82 83 86 87 and the recent years But changes in the socioeconomic system have been much more important in influencing drought vulnerability of several groups in the valley Particularly through influencing their access to groundwater for irrigation Deforestation of the hills around the valley has caused a severe drop in the water table of up to 10 meters in some places And the tourist related expansion of the city of oaxaca has increased urban demand for limited water supplies Further drawing down the groundwater levels The growth of urban and export markets for cheese and vegetables have altered crop practices on the private land The farmers who can afford mechanical pumps have shifted to growing water thirsty alfalfa for dairy cows Which produce milk for cheese Other farmers are shifting to water consumptive vegetables for export The mechanical pumps draw down the water table to levels where poorer maize producers can no longer take advantage of near surface water They used to be able to pull the water up by hand Years of low rainfall now intersect With increased competition and demand for water to create political conflict and subsistence crises within the valley Which again incidentally has become a major source for migration to the border and to mexico city Changes in the type of crops grown have also increased water demand and vulnerability to drought in the irrigation districts of sonora in northwestern mexico This map shows the irrigation district of san louis rio colorado just south of yuma, arizona Where there has been a major shift from growing basic grains like wheat and maize to crops such as alfalfa fruit and vegetables This is some historical data that we developed from the reports of the irrigation district that shows Significant shifts out of growing basic grains into growing these crops like alfalfa and fruit and vegetables Very much for export These shifts are forecast to continue and accelerate as a result of the north american free trade agreement Because the withdrawal of subsidies for grain production in mexico will probably make mexico and grain production Uncompetitive with that of the u.s. And will increase mexico's comparative advantage in growing fruit and vegetables Well, you may be wondering what this has to do With climate. Oh, this is just to show that not everybody in the region is happy with nafta This says no to the free trade agreement People are very worried about the withdrawal of agricultural subsidies Although this is balanced by large numbers of people who were very optimistic About nafta in mexico Well, you may be wondering about what all this has to do with drought vulnerability The problem is that alfalfa fruit and vegetables have a much higher consumptive use of water than grain And therefore increased demand for water in this arid climate Urban and industrial development are also increasing water demand and hence Drought vulnerability in the border region Some parts of the irrigation districts have been abandoned because of the lack of good quality irrigation water We have also used The output of several general circulation models to examine how global warming might affect mexican agriculture And how global warming might interact with changes in population and vulnerability Of course our ability to project changes in the physical aspects of the mexican hydrological cycle Is severely limited by the uncertainty and resolution of the current climate models Given all of the caveats of using climate model output A study funded by epa and conducted in collaboration with nasa gis Suggest that mexican grain yields could decline significantly By declined to perhaps 50 percent of current yields With a doubling of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere even when we take carbon dioxide Fertilization impacts on crop production into account. This work was done using crop models Where you can adjust the climate adjust the levels of carbon dioxide to investigate what the possible impacts of global warming might be Now what we found in the study Is that the vulnerability to such a climate change Drying and lower precipitation In parts of mexico vulnerability to such a climate change could be reduced if farmers could adapt to climate change by using Irrigation fertilizer and improved seeds as shown in the top bar on this slide However, as I have discussed population growth agricultural intensification and economic conditions are even now Limiting access to water and inputs in mexico Unless conditions change the potential for adapting to climate change may be somewhat limited Let me try to recover some of bob's optimism in noting some ways in which vulnerability to climate variation and change Might be reduced in mexico and other regions Improved modeling monitoring and forecasting of seasonal conditions such as those related to el nino Could very much help in water and agricultural planning in places like mexico The use of seasonal forecasts is already showing great benefits in northeast brazil and southern africa Initiatives such as eos show promise for improved understanding Monitoring and management of the hydrological cycle in relation to crop lands range lands river flows and reservoirs I would also like to point out that mexican scientists are eager to participate in this scientific activities and acknowledge The help of many mexican collaborators in the research that i've been discussing There are also moves to improve the efficiency of water use in mexico cities and irrigation districts through infrastructural improvements Price adjustments new institutions information dissemination and wastewater treatment Plant breeders are developing improved varieties of crops that are less dependent on expensive inputs and more drought resistant There is some acknowledgement that the recent changes in economic and political structure in mexico For example in land tenure and agricultural subsidies may have been too sudden And need to be more carefully and scientifically adjusted to regional economic social and environmental conditions In closing i'd like to show this side to acknowledge the many contributions of the students that have worked on the studies that i have described This is our field team in oaxaca mexico And i would also hope that um i've tried to give you some insights into the risks and opportunities in sustaining life in mexico As a regional case study of the larger challenges facing planet earth and its inhabitants If i have disagreed in any way with bob kates It's to argue the population is just one of the many social factors that we must consider in global change research I've tried to show the ways in which social and physical factors and data Can and must be combined in order to understand the past and plan for the future In doing so i've also attempted to show some of the ways in which information and support from nasa and other global change program agencies Has been helpful in my research and i believe potentially to resource managers and decision makers here and in mexico Thank you and i look forward to our discussion Thank you very much dr. Liverman now we're going to start our discussion i'd like to invite dr. Kates to join us and also dr. Kennell Charles kennel is the associate administrator for mission to planet earth here at nasa We'll start off with a couple of questions ourselves up here and then open it to all of you There are two microphones on the side and so after a few minutes you can start to line up And then when we we see the the line for me, then we'll stop and ask you for your questions I think i'll i'll take the prerogative here and uh and start with the first question Diana you mentioned in your talk a couple of ways in which the Space agency or space programs in general can really help out with the problems in mexico in particular You mentioned the hydrology Studies and modeling and also el nino and i was wondering dr. Kates if you could comment on If there are other ways in which uh space can be used towards this challenge of sustainability I'm supposed to say i'm glad you asked that question I think i think that that If you go to what what i think of as the critical bits the in effect the argument that there are Critical changes and belief systems institutions and technologies That have to take place It seems to me that space-based science and engineering Work such as nasa does Probably has contributions in all of those The obvious ones are in the obviously within the technologies And i'm sure as i talk to you especially about the long-term development Of technologies and and so on there was resonance throughout the Room with some things people are trying to do Whether it's to breed better crystals or to use less materials Or to um or to understand the nature of the earth There's also the the The systematic Provision of of what i consider progress reports The sustainability which is the only thing that will sustain us if you'd like in making the transition For which uh space-based Technology has really no replacement For but the interesting thing is to look at the institutions and to look at the belief systems um already Space space technology has had probably a profound effect on the belief system that blue dot That we've show and show reshow and play out has penetrated to every part of the world And the if if we will make the sustainable transition And while i tried to be optimistic i tried not to be too optimistic Because i still think it's very much in doubt it will be because That from the tremendous Particularism that rinds through the world we begin to evolve to a much greater universal set of values And there that sense of the earth as a whole is incredibly important and finally on the institutional sense I think I think it What what is very clear is that official institutions are not as important as the network of institutional Relationships that develop in every sphere commerce Science cooperation It seems to me that that there are tremendous opportunities As as space-based science moves ahead as it becomes truly international rather than emerges from its competitive phase to provide Many many links that we'll need to uh to back channels ways of contacting ways of tying ourselves together And did you want to add anything to that? That's a wonderful vision and I think I agree with what bob is talking about But I do think that Social scientists have not fully learned to take advantage of the products and the insights that are gained by nasa and I think that we have A way to go to learn how to work together how to integrate the social and natural data though At the level that bob is talking about I think that the vision of the planet the vision of A planet that is linked and must work together is is very important For all all of us in science and it really helps our ability to work with for example For me to work with scientists in mexico to understand some of the problems um I I see Countries and agencies in within single countries like ours taking on this challenge, but but the place where a lot of social change Can and should happen is of course among our young people and I'm thinking of our our research and and other universities now And you're you're still on a university campus. You were on one recently Why why is it that um on our campuses that we're still produced still um Going along in our disciplinary ways and not not making those kind of you know embracing Liaisons that that might give an extra Ampetus to this. I mean I would think of all places that that should be Where this whole kind of vision take hold takes hold and without it We're just you know not going to be able to to charge up the whole public about it Well at one level within the university I think the problem lies with both the faculty and the students unwillingness to take risks Students will take their required general education courses Which sometimes are interdisciplinary and then they get channeled into majors because they're quite rightfully concerned about careers And in a way, I think students don't have visions of interdisciplinary careers at this point And that that perhaps is something That we need to work on to give them a sense that probably some of the most challenging jobs in society today are ones where you need insights from more than one discipline faculty of course We've been socialized into our disciplines and into the criteria of our disciplines the tenure process Judges your performance in your discipline and whereas some universities have tried to create interdisciplinary Institutes it's still an effort and a risk and almost sometimes twice the work to try to be interdisciplinary But I think that we are moving in that direction And I see that those kind of institutes that are created a lot of times have struggled getting the the prestige that That the the straight disciplines have and that that's uh, that's an impediment too Did you have any the students are way ahead of the faculty? Simple as that The demand for environmental studies the demand for interdisciplinary work At brown university. There are 83 majors and only 39 departments And so all the other majors are basically interdisciplinary concentrations Faculty come from a different generation a different world view and They belong to these ethnic tribes of intellectual ethnic tribes that we call disciplines and That will change disciplines are only a hundred years old They they kind of came to america in the late 1870s 80s And in the 2070s and 80s will have something quite different But I would point out one of the most popular courses at penn state now is the course on the earth system that's taught By interdisciplinary faculty. It's probably putting a thousand students a year and it makes heavy use of interactive computer technology remote sensing Output from global change research and the students are really inspired by that sort of course I think we need to work towards having more courses like that To be serious just to follow up The model that we'll take we'll have to take place will be some model of recombination We need to train and new generations of students who will be able to change Their their foeside in their lifetimes who will be able to adjust to different risks and different opportunities If we're going to make this to make this system and the model of how you recombine Kind of recombinant intellectual DNA That will have to become we don't know how to do it yet You're probably struggling internally here some extent on how to do that Everybody will be struggling on how to do that But but but that's what the nature of our future is and I and actually my grandchildren will be much more flexible than I was Charlie actually both of you have answered most of the questions that I had. Oh, let's go before I go So I'm really I but I do have one more and I'll start Diana You gave us a quite an interesting vision of amongst other things of the complex potential Interactions between climate change and mexican society And how it might adapt and all the factors that are involved in this issue And I've seen a few in my new job here. I've seen a few other things like that And I understand the enormous proliferation of Of the knowledge that you need to have to make intelligent decisions and we at nasa have we just have a certain proprietary interest in the earth and We've been working for about 10 or so years on a program that has focused on climate change And but to get to it we had to focus on the elements of the earth system that were parts of the climate And from that we had to vote and we did that because we know the elements of that earth system Those elements were important to human beings And the question is Are we on the right track? Do we need to do more would you at this stage knowing what you know now about the global change program and If you could start ab initio, would you tweak our Approach a bit would you add something would you ask us to reach out? What would what would you have us do in the next 10 years either one? That's an easy not easy question or an easy question. I'll give you two Um From what I know I might focus a little bit more on inter annual climate variability and extreme events Focus on understanding that as much on getting the long-term possible trends in global temperature This is a comment more on global change research in general And the reason for moving Perhaps a little bit more towards inter annual climate variability is that is what society is experiencing right now Um, and in fact global change will be experienced as climate variability and extreme events I think that we know that so that's one one shift The other shift that concerns me a little bit is the way To some extent the global change programs focused on unmanaged ecosystems on the parts of the earth that are still perceived of as wild And whereas in fact most of humanity is living in the managed ecosystems And that's where a lot of the greenhouse gases are being emitted and where the vulnerability is occurring So I also think it's important to keep That balance between managed and unmanaged ecosystems in any global change program And then of course as a social scientist I should say that we need to be making a greater effort to have The human dimensions of global change become an integral part of the human the global change program And not something that's out there separately because I think the links are really integral And that we can work together On those issues You mentioned in your talk that you wished basically that the climate models were somewhat better because you could Make a better evaluation of the impact But to what extent is it the case that if we did the things you suggested that we'd make the climate models better I think there's a possibility that that's a That Well, yes, I mean in terms of being able to get Better parameterizations of land use change and understandings of regional hydrology. Yes. I think that we can contribute by giving More accurate and perhaps dynamic assessments of how land cover is changing and will change in the future and that's the The initiative that lies behind this new land use land cover change program that we all hope to be participating in with regard to I mean, I've been working this area for almost 20 years and I keep Hoping for better information out of the climate models and it is getting better I mean some of the things that excite me are the ways in which we may be able to use circulation Information out of the climate models rather than I'm getting rather technical here. You know the grid squared temperature and rainfall results Ways in which we might be able to those of us who are interested in impacts on society Could use mesoscale climate models nested in general circulation models and And also a wider range of variables It used to be that we only used to get the temperature and rainfall results now We're getting solar radiation humidity soil moisture all of those are much more useful in the work that I'm doing So we're moving in the right direction But I think the other point I want to make is that we can say quite a lot Without having to wait until the climate models provide us with perfect results Well, I think the Probably I would first of all get rid of the notion as a beginning point that More research will reduce uncertainty Which is how we sold our Cells over and over again the not nasa but the national jesphere biosphere program has a glossy brochure says reducing the uncertainties And the fact is we know that that's absolutely untrue More research will increase the uncertainties in the short run. That's what's been happening continuously with us And so that that I would begin with that But then why should society support us? We have to have some other Arguments, I think there are there are two critical things here. I think the desire to see short run Of outputs to see things that can be useful in the short run is also comes about from expanding Making global change really global change And if you don't define global change as simply global environmental change And you don't define global environmental change as simply global climate change Then you have all kinds of other opportunities. The fact is that even major global Climate change may not hurt most people Unless it's also a company and in the ethos of other of the other enormous Global changes that are occurring of all sorts some of which I alluded to We have massive restructuring taking place at every range Throughout the throughout the world and it's only the coexistence as we heard so well in the mexico case Of the simultaneous occurrence of a drought of a change in the economy of rapid population growth That the real threat for mexico lies and not simply in the in the sole existence of the drought So we have to work that into our Amararian and then I think finally the probably the most important thing is communicating with our With our publics. I think one of the big steps When the when the whole effort started of global change Um, you'd listen to the scientific community and they thought somebody was writing them a blank check For the next 20 years of deciphering the earth system And and and people said oh well, we'll get this up and that and about 15 years We'll be able to tell you which way the currents actually flow in the ocean And so and meanwhile the world is busily rising and falling and and blipping If you want to address I might note parenthetically We should all pray for a long hot summer if we want to continue funding in this area But but quite it'll have more significance in almost any event, but but quite putting that quite aside the There's a constant need to communicate the society what we're finding out and we're finding out things of value At every step of the game NASA has joined with several other agencies to put out a little brochure Come out four times a year. It's a journal. It's called consequences. It takes three problems And synthesizes and language that anyone can understand What's happening about some major concerns population climate land use and so on The first issue is out and already it's gotten tremendous coverage because it contains Tom carls work Documenting how we may actually be seeing some greenhouse signals In the united states climate record and whether it's jessica matthews in the post of the times and so on and so That's exactly what we need to do to communicate each year Continuously what we're finding and not simply ask society to give us this blank check for some pie in the sky in some future time On that subject i've read some articles which talk about how in the very beginning of People's awareness about About the environment and it's in a relationship with these other factors We use simple words in our lexicon like like poison for example and and now is uh our scientific Understanding has become more sophisticated We use words like polychlorinated biphenyl and the public is is becoming more distant From from what it is. We're really talking about and that Complex issues are made even more complex by having a lexicon, which is not not very friendly So do you think the publications of this sort do they they address that question or is there some way to You know to get back at kind of the the roots that were that were much more You know public and hands-on uh 10 20 30 years ago than they are now Well, I don't think there's anything that I know that I can't explain to anybody if they're willing to take the time to listen to me And now I can explain in language that's uh, that's because i'm obviously a soft scientist My one of my fellow editors of environment magazine is sitting out there We at the level of of a graduate From from college at the level of a student college It seems to me there's nothing that we do that we can't communicate to a significant question Is can we go beyond that and significant and communicate with the larger communities? I think we can although it's it's very hard. We're reduced to 20 minute 20 second sound bites We're in this cacophony of of voices all clamoring and at that level I don't know which is more scary poisons Yeah, well you mentioned the long hot summer and the impact of just some something kind of simple like that There's also I I've been impressed. There's there's really the impact of imagery because most you know people who are not You know natural scientists and social scientists understand images and it communicates with them in a way that You know the graphs and and and ones and zeros and magnetic tapes and things don't Is do you think that this is sort of essential in the communication that that we that the kinds of Imagery that we're we're capable of showing a connection with this whole problem that we could develop that to well The I think a lot about that because When I when I worked on hunger I I'd said if I could only capture what Rachel Carson did I can only capture this wonderful imagery of a silent spring which never occurred But which this this these magnificent metaphors How much more helpful Would be but let me so but rather before you Call on the local pr person or catch the logo designers Let me make a big distinction between two classes of injury the big divide between imagery of the future Is whether we we talk hope would despair And and it's it's a it's a constant battle. Do we emphasize the doom the ecological dangers? Or do we or do we offer some sort of of of sensible Path reason to hope I I believe that in the short run There's lots of social science evidence by the way on this in the short run you catch people's attention with pictures of doom catastrophes asteroid collisions and the like There is no evidence at all that that sustains attention There's no evidence at all that that can motivate people for such a long-term trajectory So yes, we need good we need images, but I think with the basic choices to choose and choose consistently Whether we want images for the long run that will sustain people Or we want images just to catch them in a very short cycle of attention I I think that that The need for optimistic images is very important Because just reflecting on my own the reaction of my own students Um to to teaching about global change They often tell me that they feel Too pessimistic at the end of the class that they feel and they also feel disempowered And they also don't really understand what it means for their lives in specific places And this is part of the problem Getting back to the question of what climate models can tell us It's actually very hard to tell people about what this means for you in a particular region What we've learned from all the research is that global change is going to be manifested in very complex ways And I think we need to work to try to give people regional images of what it and local images of what their Responsibility is for this change what it might mean for them and most importantly what they can do to To help the situation to create a more sustainable future And I think that that's one of the the greatest Challenges is that when we're dealing with global questions often local people don't feel very empowered to do anything about them Some of the most passionate global scientists i've met are our astronauts They don't come from a formal background in the human dimensions of global change But and they come from technical and military backgrounds and all over But they've all shared in the experience of seeing the earth and And seeing it in a way that nobody else actually has and so they When you talk to them they have this sense of the unity of the earth that that picture Communicated, but they also see and watch with pain Sometimes some of the changes that human beings are making And but they they are able because they have seen it to communicate In ways that you and I with our fancy language cannot They are able to communicate better than the rest of us about the beauty of the earth and And some of its vulnerability Do we have any questions from the audience? Yes If you have any thoughts about this problem that the religious side of life is not being brought in for the Well, that that's a really interesting point and and There's some good news to report on that and it comes from two ends We were just diana and i were just in durham for the at duke for the first open forum Which presented Results from around the world on human dimensions of global change research And one of the pieces was a interesting piece on the On if you like The ethnography of concern with global warming and global issues and The and this was done by an anthropologist and not the usual survey data with lots of in-depth things And somewhat to his surprise although i didn't know why he should have been surprised He found first of all what we find is the same universality that i described in the in the From the gallant polls that right across the spectrum. They they interviewed people who are in earth first Which is a deep ecology group and they interviewed Lumberjacks that had lost their jobs in orga as part of the set and then sierra club and a variety of other public groups and so on It almost universal acceptance of environmental values and where he was surprised at is he found that in the most religious Of people who who for whom religion was most Prominent in their lives had some of the strongest and deepest environmental values a concern with with God had created this wonderful splendid world And and to respect god's word was to was to try to deal with the World as gently and as reasonably and within god's instruction to summarize his point So that very often we feel that people in the who are often Fundamentalists or so on in the to and fro of of current politics. We tend to put them into sets There's a deep set of views Of of stewardship that permeates and stewardship for the earth that permeates all religious knowledge Now on the on the top end of that there has been in the last two years Several major gatherings of the world religious leaders. They have signed a collective statement about the if you like about the sanctity of the earth and and I had a chance to meet the pope for example and along with many other people and and Discuss some of these issues With him and so I think there's a growing effort And and the effort is initiated By of all groups the union of concerned scientists Has initiated one of the major efforts to bring together the world's religious efforts That's fascinating Are there any other questions? Yes, bob In terms of the the geographer's Perspective on where the most critical areas are that should be of concern Do not only to environmental problems, but the confluence of Problems that relate to environment business Ethnic concerns. So what regions of the world should should we really be watching most closely? Wow Well our focus Has tended to be If I think of the places we talk about global environmental change It's tended to be on the amazon and on the sar hel those are the The areas where people seem to have focused on as areas of crisis But if you actually Look at what's going on now. I think that One area that it's extremely important to focus on Because of the dramatic political and economic changes that are taking place there is of course eastern europe and the former soviet union I think that That perhaps for me some of the most important places are these places where there is rapid economic development for example in parts of asia I also feel that there are two other areas that we need to focus on one is on Uh, sort of in a sense ecological margins where there are also people at risk So that where we're looking at Um, the boundaries between areas of different land covers where things are changing quite rapidly And I also think national boundaries are important because One of the things that brings environmental change To the attention of people is when there is conflict across a national boundary where there's a need for negotiation across a national boundary So I think that uh looking at the world's Frontiers, um is important not just to identify potential conflict but also to build cooperation because in my own work Some of the strongest Cooperation and hope that I've seen is the way in which institutions are working across the us mexican border And that people are working In a very very constructive way to resolve environmental problems at the level of the border Whereas at other levels it may not seem quite so positive Take a longer term view over the the I think that's a great shorter term prescription over the longer term I would think there are probably Three areas I would be both. I think the future of the world's climate is dependent on china and india And and so that so the great populist economies, which will also be the greatest economies in the world There'll be the greatest economies in absolute amounts Within our life The the mega cities The 50 cities will have over 10 million people In that doubled world of mine Um, and then and then africa. I would I would be the three long-term places But I would also put some emphasis on processes um If I look at the understudy Processes that are going on global change processes that aren't the connected form of global climate change But are cumulative where stuff is happening in lots of different places, but adding up Um understudy is groundwater contamination massive groundwater contamination taking place everywhere Uh understudied is is heavy metal accumulation in soils Uh understudied Our uh, salinization And what's happening with the salts from it from irrigation all the world. So those would be some of the shift in emphasis would argue for A note that between you you've listed most of the regions of the world We are interested in global change But i'm also reminded of the uh, that why the question of why americans should be interested in all of this Goes back to the line of john done Asked not for whom the bell tolls It tolls for thee We have a question here, you know, maybe we could uh, ask a question that stretches our at least my imagination a little bit It's been ahead 150 years and maybe we've gone to mars and we figured out how to do a little planet engineering And we've got some experience with it and also assume that energy Has been captured so that it's relatively inexpensive and not eight times the cost that we need now for expanding population Can the sociological and the political systems on the globe in your mind? Figure out how to apply maybe some of those type of Solutions to what we see as kind of short-term problems the way we're talking about today You could probably is that there's enough water on the earth It's a question of what its state of contamination is or its state of use Could we adopt with some knowledge in your view how to apply some of that type of technology? To establish a correction for what you see as some of the problems today I'll take a crack at that one It seems to me that The social scientists who will have to offer some insight into how The water that is available becomes available to all the people that need it um and that the potential for Moving out and living on other planets how we resolve that one group who really needs to address that is the political scientist because part of the barrier towards Transform transferring water between regions is the nation state Part of the question of who will get to live on the new planets will have to do with which nation states Reach those planets and the extent to which we can create new forms of government Whether they're planetary or interplanetary that decide who Who gets what and how we resolve use of resources and so I think that one group that really needs to think in a visionary way if you're looking out 150 years is the political scientists um, I think geographers Are less bound by some of those nation state Issues and I must say that I in my introductory classes When the students get too pessimistic I give them some science fiction to try to take them out 150 years and to give them some optimistic Visions of how we might break through the sustainability transitions And I think we need to have people be Be more optimistic and take more risks in thinking how we can get to 150 years from from now 150 years is even too much for me and it's because because my own my own I've been affected by having seen a metaphor or having seen it. I saw a graph 30 years ago by an ecologist ed dv that shows that that Uh, essentially Uh, a series of logistic curves Of population. There have been three great revolutions in humankind and the first was the tool making revolution When we came down on to the savannahs and we chipped things and And the second was the agriculture revolution. The third is the current one. They're going in each of those revolutions opened up new technological possibilities Population rapidly rose to fill that niche and then leveled off after a long period of time And what I've been describing is the challenge of making this Extraordinary bit of change in the next 50 years That will be needed to create that sustainable world that will carry us to this 10 12 billion population what you're describing is the next one With with potentials that I can't even imagine Whether it's interplanetary Expansion or something of what may well be the next surge of of human populations so on But I have trouble getting beyond my next 50 years It's probably an age thing too my I just delivered from one of my grandchildren his his paper on on going to mars Hope you get a chance to read it I guess Um Dr. Case you've you've moved away from the mega cities You're living in a little place in maine in Where you have a different kind of perspective about all this and you said you bought a couple of hectares Which are studying in depth instead of looking at the breadth of the whole earth You're really studying that in depth and see how it connects to this overall Question. Well, can you offer us anything from that experience so far? The the most immediate thing that that comes to mind is I have a little stream that runs I live in a town called treten main and it's it's It's the last bit of mainland before you cross over to mount desert island and to bar harbor in akadia national park And three million people in summer pass by within a half mile of my house and and no one in winter And um But we have a small airport that is has been busily expanding itself because apparently there's an industry that expands all airports Every 20 years In order to slow down the process. Um, I wrote a letter to the to official them and I said, do you know that I have a um I have this what seems to be like an indian shell mound On my property and that apparently there's a whole set of criteria that that triggered and And instantly I received registered letters after which I have to go to the post office to pick up Registered letters informing me that indian shell mounds are protected items And if if indeed it would increase the runoff And cut into my indian shell mound next thing I know two archaeologists Show up to investigate my indian shell mound and actually they're friends I'm glad that they'd gotten some work and And they came and they dug these test holes And I discovered that my indian shell mound was a historic garbage dump And so there's a moral in there I lost my mythology I didn't hold up the project um And I'm not sure of its relevance, but that's what the immediate Thought came The larger thought is is how my sense of the passages of the seasons I I I just find myself Overwhelmed by the different Senses of Of of time Of you know, I find myself so sensitive. We have essentially in most of our lives Tried to minimize our sensitivity To the changes in the natural world into changes in time And having to be closer and having more time to reflect I pick my head up over the computer and I look at the I have two tides a day I think that's Maybe that gives me the perspective to look longer and harder. I'm not sure Okay Well, if there are no more questions, then I'd like to thank the audience for their participation And I'd like to thank the speakers very much for a very Wonderful talks and engaging discussion and for giving us all really something to to think about Thank you


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