Don't Even Think About It (39 page)

I avoided discussion of the science itself, but, for my money, Mark Lynas’s book
Six Degrees
(National Geographic, 2008) has still to be bested as a highly readable summary of future impacts. My main sources were the somewhat more opaque World Bank report *
Turn Down the Heat: Why a 4°C Warmer World Must Be Avoided
and the online papers from the 2009 *“Four Degrees and Beyond” conference.

There are numerous books criticizing climate science, usually very dull, but the most entertaining attack on climate change as a belief system is James Delingpole’s
Watermelons: How Environmentalists Are Killing the Planet
. Delingpole has no interest in science or evidence, so this is just pure narrative-driven bile.

Public Opinion

Matthew Nisbet and Teresa Myers conducted an exhaustive overview of polling from 1987–2007, charting the rise and falls in *“Twenty Years of Public Opinion about Global Warming.” More recent research can be found in the regular publications of the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication, especially its American Mind project. Models for segmenting public attitudes can be found in the regular research of Yale’s *Six Americas project and the *
American Climate Attitudes
reports by the Social Capital Project.

Climate Communications

On the general communication of climate change, the *
Climate Crossroads
guide by Climate Access is a good introduction. There are a good range of online materials at www.talkingclimate.org and www.climatenexus.org. *
From Hot Air to Happy Endings
by Green Alliance is a collection of essays from leading theorists.

In writing this book I was especially intrigued by Judith Williamson’s masterful analysis of the semiotics of climate change in her lecture *“Unfreezing the Truth: Knowledge and Denial in Climate Change Imagery” and Gill Eraut’s examination of climate change narratives in *
Warm Words: How Are We Telling the Climate Story?

Other Works by George Marshall and COIN

My first book,
Carbon Detox
(2007, Octopus), presents some of my ideas in this book in a digestible self-help format. The themes are further explored in technical reports by my organization, the Climate Outreach Information Network. Our website, www.talkingclimate.org, includes briefings on social norms and networks, behavior change, and science communication. Recent reports include *
Climate Silence (and How to Break It)
and *
After the Floods: Communicating Climate Change around Extreme Weather
. Regular reports are posted at www.climateoutreach.org.uk/resources/.

Acknowledgments

Firstly I would like to thank everyone who gave up their time to be interviewed and so freely shared their insights and experience with me. You all influenced this book even if I have not been able to quote all of you directly. I hope that I have reflected or reported your views accurately and fairly:

Abie Philbin-Bowman, Adam Hochschild, Alya Haq, Andrew Simms, Annie Leonard, Anthony Leiserowitz, Ara Norenzayan, Atossa Soltani, Betsy Taylor, Bill Blakemore, Bill McKibben, Bob Buzzanco, Bob Inglis, Bruce Dobkowski, Bryan George, Cara Pike, Chris Rapley, Clive Hamilton, Courtney St. John, Cyndi Wright, Dan Gilbert, Dan Kahan, Daniel Kahneman, David Buckland, David Hone, David Reiner, Debra Medina and the members of the Texan Tea Party, Deyan Sudjic, Dina Long, Eamon Ryan, Erin Biviano, Erin Taylor, Eviatar Zerubavel, Frank Bain, Frank Maisano, Frederic Luskin, Gavin Schmidt, George Loewenstein, Gill Ereaut, Ginny Pickering, James Hansen, Jennifer Morgan, Jennifer Walker, Jeremy Leggett, Jim Riccio, Joanna Macy, Joe Romm, Joel Hunter, John Adams, John Ashton, John Charmley, Juliet Schor, Kalee Kreider, Kert Davies, Kevin Anderson, Kevin Wall, Keya Chatterjee, Kirk Johnson, Laura Storm, Marc Morano, Martin Bursik, Matthew Nisbet, Michael Brune, Michael Dobkowski, Michael Mann, Michael Marx, Michael Salvato, Myron Ebell, Oliver Bernstein, Oliver Tickell, Patrick Reinsborough, Paul Slovic, Peter Kuper, Renee Lertzman, Richard Mueller, Ross Gelbspan, Sabine Marx, Sally Bingham, Sam Kazman, Sandy Dunlop, Stephen Lea, Steve Kretzmann, Ted Nordhaus, Thomas Schelling, Tim Nicholson, Tom Athanasiou, Vinay Gupta, Wendy Escobar.

I am immensely grateful for the support of so many others in the course of this project and my travels—people who have advised me on contacts and contracts, shared ideas and insights, put me up, and put up with me! Thank you again for your generosity.

Alastair McIntosh, Amara Levy-Moore, Andy Croft, Andy Revkin, Annie Leonard, Beth Conover, Bill Day, Brian Tokar, Bruce Rich, Bruce Stanley, Caroline Crumpacker and Roberto Rossi, Caspar Henderson, Chris Shaw, Claire Roberts, Clare Ellis, Cliff Jordan, Daphne Wysham, David Partner, David Rothenberg, Edward C. Chang, Erik Fyfe, Eve Levy, Fred Pearce, the Garrison Institute, Garson O’Toole, Geri and the staff of the Great Oak Café, Graham Lawton, Heart Phoenix, James Marriott, Jennifer Callahan, Jenny Hok, Jo Hamilton, Joanna Kempner, John Fousek, John Passacantando, John Seed, Jonathan Bunt, Jonathan Spottiswoode, Karen Hadden, Kari Norgaard, Katherine Hayhoe, Kathy Geraghty-Acosta, Lafcadio Cortesi, Lawrence Culver, Lisa Orr and Matt Harris, Lorraine Whitmarsh, Louisa Terrell, Lynn Englum, Mark and Jan Scott, Mark Haddon, Mark Levene, Mark Lynas, Matthew Jacobson, Michael Corballis, Mick West, Mike Roselle, Nick Lunch, Nick Pidgeon, Nicola Baird and Pete May, Olga Roberts, Paddy McCully, Pam Wellner and Eugene Dickey, Peter Lipman, Peter Winters, Rebecca Henderson, Randy Hayes, Richard Cizik, Richard Harris, Richard Hering, Robert Wilkinson, Ryan Rittenhouse, Saffron O’Neill, Sally Weintrobe, Sara Smith, Sarah Woods, Scott Parkin, John Houghton, Stephan Lewandowsky, Stuart Capstick, Susanne Breitkopf, Ted Glicke, The Authors Guild, Tom Crompton, Tom “Smitty” Smith, Tzeporah Berman, Zoe Broughton, Zoe Leviston.        

My greatest thanks are due to the friends who peer-reviewed my rambling drafts and corrected my mistakes: George Monbiot, Hugh Warwick, Patrick Anderson, Paul Chatterton, Roman Krznaric, Vivienne Simon, and my colleagues at COIN, especially Adam Corner, Olga Roberts, and Jamie Clarke. Above all, though, my thanks are due to Dan Miller and Jay Griffiths, who provided meticulous line-by-line comments and proposed detailed changes. If this book is enjoyable to read it is a credit to their skills and knowledge.

Finally a big thank you to Nancy Miller at Bloomsbury who took a chance on an unknown English writer to write a book for the U.S. market on a subject that no one wants to read about: now that’s brave publishing. And, always, my thanks and love to my ever supportive wife, Annie, and my children, Elsa and Ned, with my apologies for being a stressed and grumpy father.

Endnotes

* Yes, climate is always changing, but here I am following the international legal definition as being “attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods.”

† In this book I refer to those who, for ideological reasons, actively reject or undermine climate science, as
deniers
. I call those who legitimately raise scientific challenges,
skeptics
. And I recognize a third group of people who are simply not sure as the
unconvinced
. These are different kinds of people, with different motivations, and merit different titles.

‡ I discuss some of the implications of a four-degree temperature increase in the final chapter of this book.

A Note on The Author

George Marshall is the co-founder of the Climate Outreach and Information Network, the first British nonprofit organization to specialize in public communication around climate change. COIN’s international reputation is built on its commitment to reaching new audiences, including its pioneering communications work with trade unions, human rights organizations, and political conservatives.

Over the past twenty-five years George has worked at all levels of environmental and social rights campaigning: from direct action protests to governmental policy consultancies, with senior positions at Greenpeace USA and the Rainforest Foundation in between.

He is also the author of
Carbon Detox
(www.carbondetox.org), a slow-selling book offering “fresh ways to think about personal action to climate change,” and he blogs every so often at www.climatedenial.org. He lives in mid-Wales with his family and several thousand comic books.

Copyright © 2014 by George Marshall

All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce, or otherwise make

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unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil

claims for damages. For information address Bloomsbury USA, 1385 Broadway,

New York, NY 10018.

Published by Bloomsbury USA, New York

Bloomsbury is a trademark of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA HAS BEEN APPLIED FOR

eISBN 978-1-62040-134-7

First U.S. edition 2014

This electronic edition published in August 2014

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