[00:00:05] >> And I'm really excited to welcome you all today to another lecture sponsored by the Global Change Program here at Georgia Tech a little bit about the program before a introduce Dr Shepherd the program is about one year old and it's really focused on climate change and some of those other global scale challenges that we hope to bring our students with all of your passion your creativity your potential your brilliance we hope to engage you in these problems and inspire you to work on your careers here in Georgia Tech and beyond in helping us solve some of them frankly So that's our great hope for the program in the meantime we're really interested in building little pockets of research that might drive those solutions forward that Georgia Tech can bring to the table as well so if you have interest in those get in touch we have a newsletter or web page global change psychotic idea where you can find all kinds of things as special shout out to Danielle Estrada for her hard work in putting this lovely event together as well as. [00:01:10] Teen People from E S. And my class who's here to high class people who are nice to welcome you today so without further ado let me introduce Dr Shepherd We are so honored to have him here today down the street from Athens close by his profile is of international and national stature so it's a real treat to welcome him to campus today for this talk he received his B.S. and mess in Ph D. in physical Meteorology from Florida State University and he was the 1st African-American to receive a Ph D. from Florida State meteorology and the nation's oldest respected schools in that area he's also the 2nd African-American to preside over the American Neurological society as president several years ago he coauthored a children's book on whether and whether instruments called Dr Fred whether watch it kids have it they really like it. [00:02:04] She get it he is also the co-founder of the alcove elementary weather science chat that exposes K. through 12 students to scientists and he's from Canton Georgia as many of us are from George as well Dr Marshall Shepherd is a leading international expert in weathering climate as the George Athletic Association distinguished professor of geography and Atmospheric Sciences at U.G.A. he serves as the director of the university's Atmospheric Sciences Program and her full professor department geography He's also the associate department head moving on behind his academic accolades leaves a whole nother page of this introduction Unfortunately 3 you. [00:02:43] To have him he's also the host of The Weather Channel's award winning Sunday talk show weather geeks I had the honor to appear on with my show and now that has turned into a podcast series that you can find on the various outlets that have podcast very lovely and diverse programming there he's the 2018 recipient of the M.S. helm hoodwinks bird award for something. [00:03:10] Or all his work in urban climate and in 2017 he was honored with the M.S. Brooks award a high honor in meteorology as we all know he's frequently sought expert and all the channels and all the world concerning all issues of weather climate science communication and also is the chair of the NASA Earth Sciences Advisory Committee and a past committer committee member of its earth science subcommittee and he is obviously also called to testify before Congress and in policy leaders around the country on issues of weather and climate in your Elegy so that further do you welcome Dr Sheppard and we're so happy to hear from you today thanks for coming thank you for having me. [00:04:00] Scroll all star can you all hear me OK or you can remove the mike up. So I'll start off standing here but I move around so I'll warn you now I like to move around it's really an honor to be here at Georgia Tech and happy that you invited Georgia Bulldog over if you notice carefully one of the young ladies working up there in the coffee shop is where the Georgia Bulldogs jacket so we have infiltrated you so it's a nod to be headed actually have a lot of good friends and colleagues in the audience professor Professor Brown and my colleague yogi who we actually are working together on Proposal in mechanical engineering back there so we all do work together at Ga Ga Tech and many others in the room too that I know and have known and got to meet today so thank you I gave one talk today in the over in our science is on some of my research this is a more publicly facing talk but I think you'll enjoy it. [00:04:52] And I promise you by the end of the talk you'll have figured out why in the world and how in the world I got zombies into this town because the talk is zombies coal and sports implications for communicating weather and climate now how many of you have been the type be Island by show of hands before well that's the road to Tybee Island from Savannah and that was during a king tide a couple of years ago and residents had talked about that they never really seen anything like that before in that really is an indication of what we're experiencing in terms of sea level rise and some of the implications of climate change. [00:05:29] Kim Cobb actually has some activities going on down on the coast with some sea level rise and this should haves in measurement so quite a bit of synergy but what I want to talk to you about today. Is the challenge of communicating weather and climate given the lens that we live in in society today so here all of my coordinates that is not a new water ride at 6 Flags that's actually flooding from the 2009 floods that we experienced here in Atlanta 500 year flood event I was talking about that way and certainly some really bad flooding in that part of the metropolitan Atlanta area so they're all my coordinates if you want to tweet talk or some aspects of the talk I'm at Dr Shepherd 2013 on Twitter and these are all the various things that I do to prevent me from getting a lot of sleep no actually I get quite a bit of sleep actually is very important have good work life balance so those of you that follow me in social media know that I'm very adamant about participating in my kids' activities and getting sleep. [00:06:32] Let's start here and we'll go various places so what. I wrote an article in Forbes Just this week because it was 2018 was the 4th warmest year on record so what. That actually. I'm actually being a little bit playful but I actually I'm very bothered by the notion that we spend a lot of time focusing on the record temperatures that's very important scientifically but what's so when we have to communicate so what why is it so warm and why does that matter here are 2 things that matter this is in the National Climate Assessment Report was just released by the U.S. government this is a change or decrease in work hours percentage wise because it's going to be too hot in these places people in summer time so if you work outside or if your child plays football or other outdoor sports there are going to be significant changes over the next 25 to 75 years that we're going to have to deal with how many of us like seafood or fish a lot of people in this audience that graphic on the top right shows us the change in maximum catch potential as a function of warming temperatures and oceans that's directly out of the National Climate Assessment Report are there is the so what from a climate perspective. [00:07:59] How many of you drive on Atlanta Expressway we all do we notice that a lot more urban flooding particularly on some of the roadways around Here's a recent flooding event in one of the interstates here in downtown Atlanta so was the so what is we actually as meteorologists predicted several days in advance we're going to have flooding rains in Atlanta but one of the policy implications what are the changes that the city made or the state made that day to prepare for that and to avoid that situation there's enough weather information now that even though people will say Dr Shepherd you're meteorologist It must be nice to be in a profession where you're wrong all of the time. [00:08:42] In fact that statement is a myth this is the golden age of forecasts if you are my talk this morning you saw this particular figure because I really like it this is the 2017 hurricane season so you're going to see some of the hurricanes here shortly this is actually a NASA model they ran after the 27000 season so you're seeing smoke from wildfires you're seeing dust intrusions from the African continent and pretty soon you're going to see the 2 in the parade of hurricanes and 2017 The point I'm making here is none of those hurricanes in 2017 caught us off guard they were very well forecast most weather events are very well forecasted even though we're typically the brunt of jokes about being wrong all the time well there's an event recently here in Atlanta right I was preparing for snow Super Bowl was here government offices were shut down. [00:09:38] Reality is the forecast wasn't necessarily as bad as we thought but it really got kind of blown up because the Super Bowl was in play if you were following my social media I was tweeting and posting the whole time the most is no was going to northwest Georgia Gwinnett County schools I don't think you need to cancel schools so when my kids go to school they did. [00:09:59] What they did they have digital learning days my point is there is a perception when there is a rare event like that that doesn't go as planned there is a perception that the forecast is always wrong but the problem is people tend to remember the wrong days and not all of the right days right Georgia Tech's kicker makes every field goal all year long but he misses one in the bowl game that cost you the national championship What are people to be talking about that field will he's a rotten kicker that darn kicker is actually a pretty good kicker he just missed one that had an impact that we remember and that's how weather forecasting is so I always like to sort of shatter this myth that meteorologists are guessing or they're always wrong or right most of the time but I've written articles that say were right about 9597 percent of the time. [00:10:52] Their myths about climate change and Kim and Marilyn and others in the room that deal in climate have heard them I mean I could be like hanging out in Taco Bell right and someone finds out that I'm a weather climate scientists and the come up to me and say it out of shape or dumped all know that the climate changes naturally What is talking about climate don't you know the climate changes naturally and I said I certainly hope I know that because I have a meteorology. [00:11:21] But here's the evidence that that person Taco Bell is not wrong look at the natural variability there are those of the interglacial in Glacial Periods glacial periods meaning ice ages and we see that there is a natural cycle but we see that after 850 terms of C O 2 there is a lot more of it now outside of the naturally varying cycle over the last 800000 years so we get the zombie theories old zombies There we go the armies of appeared Here's a nice little zombie almost Why. [00:11:53] I call zombie theories those theories that we as scientists have long refuted or killed off but they live on in blogs and social media and certain media outlets and radio stations and T.V. channels Dr Shepherd it's the sun that's why we're seeing warming because the sun is changing that's a zombie theory you know others obviously or you hear them but we know in fact that the solar changes and variability don't describe the changes that we're seeing in our FLATOW If the earth's orbit market cycles again the orbital changes don't explain the temperature changes it's volcanoes Shepherd actually volcanoes do if they're pretty significant enough an object enough. [00:12:43] Aerosols into the atmosphere will cool the climate for year or 2 sometimes but it's temporary It's all 3 of those things combined Look none of those things combined still add up to the changes that we see in our climate system no it's greenhouse gases I have a colleague at Colorado State named Scott Denning Professor Scott Denning and he said something at a meeting that I was attending at the end at the National Academy of Sciences that just rang true to me and it's so great he said the reason that we know that we have a greenhouse effect is that we survive every night. [00:13:24] Think about what I just that we survive every night because the greenhouse effect is our friend you know we need it. But it's just a little out of whack now because of the actual greenhouse and what he's meant what he means by that is because we have greenhouse gases the earth's average temperature is palatable for us to live on we don't get to cold at night and freeze to death so we survive think greenhouse gases the problem is when we put too many greenhouse gases and we change the landscape the system's out of balance and then we have problems but the ultimate message is it's not either or it's and so when someone comes up to me and says Dr Shepherd the climate changes naturally I said yeah. [00:14:11] Grass grows naturally too but if we put fertilizer on the soil doesn't it grow differently so we can intervene on natural processes and that's why we have a home run hitters could hit home runs naturally but when they used steroids in Major League Baseball they get longer ones and more of them so there's nothing to suggest that a natural process cannot be intervened on by human activity and that's what we're living All right so the goal today are very simple in Maryland you get that put a back up. [00:14:43] I'm all about audience interaction so I try to pay attention to what's going on. So the goals today. Our to highlight several challenges with communicating weather and climate after that preamble to challenge our own perceptions and biases and if you don't get enough of this today I actually have a TED talk this out there on challenging perceptions and biases that was just featured on the TED website and then maybe off a solution so listen listen listen up the context here's some data from the AAA S. that shows the difference in what scientists think about certain topics versus what the public thinks so the more blue that you see that's the difference between what the public thinks and what scientists think how did we get here how did we get here where experts in their science believe or understand certain things about topics but the public just doesn't believe them I mean if a plumber comes out and looks at my disposal in my sink I tend to sort of trust the plumber. [00:15:55] And meteorology It's Did you get it Laurie OK in meteorology. It's even worse this notion of expertise because everybody knows the weather climate right we live whether it's one of the few sciences of all the sciences on Georgia Tech's campus or all the engineering disciplines. If there's a nuclear engineer here at Georgia Tech I guarantee you at the Wal-Mart nobody's coming up and offering advice on fuel rods just doesn't happen but when I'm there I'm a meteorologist common as I get all kinds of opinions on the ground hog and almanacs in the snowstorm and climate change and solar variability because everybody thinks they understand climate change how many hurt is going to rain tomorrow. [00:16:46] There's actually some truth in that when lives are not our joints are somewhat sensory Jane is an air pressure so let's go challenge is the 1st challenge overcoming perceptions in psychology. That's the 1st challenge I want to deal with today and let's go to Houston to deal with this is Houston after Hurricane Harvey. [00:17:09] Now 6 days before Hurricane Harvey made landfall I wrote an article in Forbes saying that. It's not that I'm sort of psychic or anything I'm just a mere office saying that there are going to be 40 to 50 inches of rainfall most media all just knew it. But after Harvey happened there were all kinds of people interviewed on the news or somehow we didn't realize it was going to be this bad we had no idea it was going to be this bad and I'm like we told you it's going to be this bad but what I had to dig deeper so I contacted my friend Susan Jasc go and see the communication expert at California versus Pennsylvania and she said Marshall it's the we know about this it's this notion that people when you tell them something is going to be bad they're like yeah whatever but then it's that bad they're like well they said it was going to be that bad I just don't believe it's sort of a tendency that we have the challenge was that people in Houston get rain and floods all the time and most people by the very nature of an event being an anomaly event haven't lived through an anomaly of it so they're basing their perceptions on what they've experienced so they experience flooding all the time they have not experienced 50 inches in 3 days flooding and so they just had no way of sort of calibrating their understanding right let's use another again example Hurricane Irma 2017 influenced are affected Florida one of the big challenges with Hurricane Earl anybody from South Florida I have family that lives in the South Florida area what part. [00:18:49] OK All right Miami OK 2 people that I want to talk about and I don't plant them I promise them there are people in Miami that evacuated Erma and went to Fort Myers. But both of them were in the hurricane zone but people's perception of the hurricane cone is that if it's not down the center that's not the forecast there they're wrong when in fact the cone of uncertainty or probability suggest that anywhere in that cone of uncertainty is a possibility for the storm and so when I saw people evacuating from Miami and Fort Lauderdale over to Fort Myers and Sarasota I think it's still in the combe but that's a perception issue that we face in meteorology All right here comes the grand daddy or grandmother of perception snow pocalypse Atlanta $2014.00 all all to auntie's of it all 2 inches of. [00:19:54] This to me that really caused problems in Atlanta created governors task force mayors task when I was on the Mayor's Task Force Mayor Reed put together a task force and one of the main reasons this event happened was simply because of a misunderstanding of winter storm watch winter weather advisory and winter storm warning because we were in a winter storm watch and as the National Weather Service models kept showing that snow was moving further and further north into the metro Atlanta area they started issuing a winter weather advisory that's the more serious of the 2 situations but people thought it was a downgrade and so we didn't take the same type of actions because people thought of the downgrade so trucks are still coming through and people are still that were in school so a simple perception now part of that is on us as meteorology community while using terms that people don't understand. [00:20:51] There are so many Here's an example my daughter was in Science a Libya a couple years ago they were at Kennesaw State competing in the science Olympiad and the question came up which is the more dangerous situation tornado watch or tornado warning now one of my daughter's teammates buddy who I know a tornado watch and I'm sitting there going why didn't you let the kid whose dad meteorologist answer them. [00:21:19] Because it's actually a tornado warning but I talked to her after said Dr Shepherd I thought tornado watch means you're watching the tornado and tornado warning means you're warning that it's coming that makes sense to me that actually makes sense all right so I've got the ultimate way of us never confusing those things again. [00:21:38] It elicits a chuckle but it's actually effective will help you remember this we have conditions for cupcake. We have cupcake. Cupcake watching cupcake warning you will never forget the difference in tornado watch and warning again will you or at least will think about cupcakes. So we have all these perceptions and weather in about messaging weather which is important and we have to understand the differences but those perceptions exist in climate as well because people think about the polar bears I like polar bears but it's no it's about kitchen table issues here's the change in sea ice in the Arctic over the last several decades and what you're going to see in sort of the wind is sort of the ice that should be there all the time so to speak and what you see as we come up into the 2010. [00:22:30] The whites going to go away so yeah that affects polar bears but it also affects our jet stream and it also has affects the feedback because we need that ice there because that helps to reflect some of the solar radiation that comes from the sun if it's not there the system warms and we get a positive feedback. [00:22:53] So we're up to 2002 and as you see the white is going away people sailing in the Arctic now and ships going through and all kinds of things that we haven't really seen and so it just illustrates this notion that though the polar bears up there we definitely care about there are also studies that suggest that by losing this sea ice it's affecting our jet stream patters creating something called Arctic amplification and that is leading to more intense drought and flood events and storms here where we live because see the Earth is connected as a system and when we don't have as much cold air in the polar regions we have loosened the gradient between the tropics and the poles and when we loosen the difference of the gradient between the tropics and the Poles the winds the jet stream patterns aren't as strong and when the with jet stream patterns aren't as strong they're more wavy and you get higher amplitude weather events or extremes and if that didn't resonate with you just think of Yogi and I read it back in the back of the room we're holding a rope and pulling it tightly it's the jet stream strong but if one of us loosens our grip the rope sags and you get amplitude to the wave thank you. [00:24:12] So it's about kitchen table issues one of the star Fortune 500 companies based in Atlanta is Coca-Cola and I like to use this article from 2014 because it talks about how executives at Coca-Cola talk about the threat of climate change to their bottom line issues Jeffrey Wright is no longer there he talked about the increased drought more unpredictable variability 100 year floods every 2 years are threats to their essential ingredients Coca-Cola owns Minute Maid they grow fruit juices Coca-Cola needs water for all of its products and so forth in 5 countries 5 companies by the way to catch cola. [00:24:54] So we've heard zombies in COLA say even said something about sports too but I got something else. So I guess the point I'm making is these are kitchen table bottom line issues yet we still have people come up to me and said out of shepherd you believe in climate change I'll say no my son used to believe in the tooth fairy though science is not a belief system so one of the things that I hope that you'll carry away from the talk of nothing else is never ask somebody if a scientist at least if they believe in climate change write to me that it's almost like saying Do you believe if you jump off the Bank of America building are going to fall do you believe in gravity science is not a belief system our challenge to confirmation bias done in Kruger effect and cognitive biases this is something that many scientists in the room face all of the time. [00:25:53] My colleagues at Yale and George Mason they surveyed the American population every year and what they've come up with is the 6 Americas study I'm showing you the $2014.00 data but they actually have data up to 2018 and you can see how American citizens break out on climate change no 10 percent dismiss or is it $10.00 to $13.00 it's actually down to $109.00 or 10 percent now. [00:26:19] They're small group but they're the loudest they're the ones that tweet me with all these theories and threats and challenges and a lot of that is steeped in people's what I call personal marinates how they grew up what their political beliefs are their religious or faith based beliefs and none of that really matters you can be of any political persuasion or faith and understand it climate change is the threat but we live in a world where everyone's opinions matters how many of you've heard of the dining Krueger effect my show of hands or a couple of you have it now everybody has. [00:26:56] The Dunning Kruger effect published by 2 psychologists David Dunn and Justin Krueger and they said if they cognitive bias in which unskilled individuals suffer from a loser is superior already mistakenly rating their ability much higher than is accurate and other words people think they know more than they do and we see this all of the time in science I can't tell you follow my Twitter side side or Kims or others you'll see people all kinds of theories out there and then I'll go and look up their atmosphere sizes the green is from Twitter tech confirmation bias we all somewhat are guilty of this we consume information that is consistent with our own core beliefs or perspective that's confirmation by now why does cap I am a professor at the University of Georgia I'm actually on the Georgia Athletic Association board but if you know me well a few people in a room do they know I pull Florida state of declared a state fan because I went to Florida State now because of that whenever football season rolls around I go to all the Florida state boards and read up on why we're going to win the game that's confirmation bias as we stunk the last 2 years. [00:28:20] But I'm consuming information that sort of consistent my own core perspective already so when the Farmer's Almanac comes out. Which I'm laughing because people actually believe the things accurate. Look at this look at this look at this look at this who said this Farmer's Almanac is calling for a very nasty winter particularly in Chicago one of our main hubs so as we speak our operating team is hard at work as to how to accommodate our passengers that's the C.E.O. of United Airlines. [00:28:59] Making logistics decisions based on the Farmer's Almanac when we have the know a Climate Prediction Center which issues seasonal forecast but our marinate in our confirmation biases of told us growing up that the Farmer's Almanac is real and it's accurate when in fact it's not a stretch to say it's going to be hot in July in Atlanta it's kind of a logical forecasting but that's what we do and then the ultimate cognitive bias to me is to. [00:29:37] Dismiss climate science but then come up to me and ask me what I think of the groundhog forecast that happens I have people actually question climate science and there are a lot of what you think you think you really got have an extended spring this year or whatever other No I think that's a rodent. [00:29:54] I really do. But as much as we're sort of making light of this this is our reality right now in science this is there are there is a congressman last year that stood in Congress and said that sea level is rising because more rocks are falling in the ocean. [00:30:15] And I'm making this not. There was another Congress a senator that stood in the halls of Congress and held a snow ball and said What do they mean global warming it's snowing here in D.C. today I think is winter right challenge 3 too many graphs too much coming now my scientists colleagues lane right now on this one we have to do a better job communicating the science if we know understand who our target audience is are in any given moment and where can we don't sort of target our messaging accordingly it's like throwing darts at a dart board with the lights off so the talk that I gave this morning was very different than the talk that I'm giving now because I knew I was going to have more public facing audience here when I go to a rotary club I'm giving a very different type of talk than I give when I go to the A.G.U. we have to understand our audience is I look I grew up pretty simple I'm a simple person I grew up in Canton Georgia pretty rural communities now suburbia and I use the on the local test when I'm talking to broader communities. [00:31:30] If my ot doesn't understand or my wife then you know I know that I probably should be using that when I go to Congress or when I go to the Rotary Club we throw around things like I all replacement cycle in P.D.S. and 40 percent by the way who knows that 40 percent chance or a means in the year. [00:31:48] Who's competent enough to understand completely what we mean when you see 40 percent chance of rain and look at all the people sitting on their hands. Man. All right let's pull out Professor Shepherd your 1st. Here's Atlanta here's a circle around Atlanta. Where's that red there is the probability of precipitation either it doesn't work. [00:32:16] This tribal and pop is equal to see times a canary I see that pop up probably a probably a person with a little to confident times area so is the confidence that a forecaster has times the area so true story I was up in hell and 2 being down the Chattahoochee River with my son one day ever to be even tubing that was blue and yellow tubes. [00:32:44] And a lady next to it started raining she's like see she's really mad she's like a little meteorologist they don't know what they're talking about it's raining and there was a 20 percent chance of rain the day she annoys me your office I was right next to it and I'm thinking well with 0 but more importantly we were elevated bad forecasts we just happen to be in the 20 percent of the area that would come from this going so if the forecast is 100 percent confident right that 40 percent there is going to rain is 4 percent chance of rain in the forecast as 50 percent confident that 40 percent of the area's going to get rain is a 20 percent chance of rain so there are variations on that but the point is rainfall is a problem is the we can't give you deterministic right forget the science isn't there so we have to do it on a probable istic manner and that's why we give it in that way. [00:33:34] Scientists we've got to be careful about jargon that we use a sort of really really good chart from Somerville and hassles paper in physics today because when I throw around the term bias in science you know I might be referring to a 2 degree warm bias in the thermometer I mean it's always warm by 2 degrees but someone of the public might think bias says devious intent to bias. [00:33:57] Positive trend in C O 2 carbon dioxide it sounds good positive is good right positive. Good are. Even geography Why am I showing this recent study show that about 50 percent of the population couldn't locate their county on a map why that's important is that want to meteorologist puts up a tornado polygon or a warning they often do it on county map right but people if they can't find their county What does that warning see where I'm going with that so we have to understand our intended audience is challenge for. [00:34:41] Climate literacy I used to think this was the big problem actually it was why we have so many people that don't understand or believe climate change so come I've come to the conclusion of my own this is not the only problem was a part of the problem we can can turn you to keep elevating climate literacy and people are still going to challenge us for very different reasons I've come to that conclusion as there are a lot of other things at play but still if we can up climate literacy It helps because invariably when it snows I get someone that tweets that to me. [00:35:15] Hey Dr Shepherd I got 20 inches of global warming in my yard what you guys talking about it's cute to eat it actually doesn't make me chuckle but it's so scientifically wrong I like to remind people and I say this often weather is your mood and climate is your personality so a cold day or snowy day doesn't say anything about climate change no more than your mood today necessarily tells me about your personality we have to understand that and by contrast just because of 85 degrees doesn't necessarily affirm climate change either well there isn't enough evidence on its own the climate is changing that we don't need to use today as an example another thing that I see in climate literacy is causation. [00:35:58] Let's talk about cookies. Here are cookies it's the weather of it now there are different factors that go into play in making these cookies so if we add 15 percent more flour or add all white sugar or different ingredients we get a slightly different cookie Well it's the same thing with weather events or hurricane hurricanes always happen naturally or heat waves or snow storms but different atmosphere combinations of conditions will produce different hurricane or a different storm. [00:36:35] So we have to be quite careful when we ask in the media is really bad about this was Hurricane Michel caused by climate change I actually don't like to frame it that way. This is a good way of framing this is a flooding event in Baton Rouge Louisiana 2016 and there was a study that came out these are called attribution studies this is a big new area of climate science that found that this storm was had a had a greater sort of likelihood of occurring because of climate change right so we know that certain weather events happened naturally and we also know that there is a human steroids on top of it and so better questions are are vents of this very becoming more or less likely because of climate change or to what extent was a storm more or less intense because of climate change because I can't say for certain that hurricane Michel was caused by climate change although I probably have a pretty good idea that it was influenced or and amplified by it I can't say that a homerun Major League Baseball's 457 home run was caused by steroids use but I can look at his overall statistics and see the influence of steroids how did O.J. get in the top. [00:37:57] During the former N.F.L. player is a very good running back. But I was thinking about this when they have no idea sometimes I just think about stuff for no reason at all so I was thinking about I think the O.J. Simpson trial has made climate scientists job more difficult where you go with that. [00:38:22] Remember in the O.J. Simpson trial some of you are too young even the Who remember this well those of us of a certain age remember there was a Simpson trial. Everybody learned about what reasonable doubt meant in a court case if you can establish reasonable doubt in a trial you can get the defendant off if you can just find a sliver of reasonable doubt you've got a lot of dough and what I've noticed is that people think science operates that way if there's a little bit of uncertainty you've got to throw it out that's what some of the skeptics say the climate models have uncertainty in them well we're not uncertain we're not completely certain that the temperatures in the ocean are 35 degrees the or whatever but science doesn't work that way there can still be uncertainty but have plenty of usable information I told you there was an 80 percent chance of rain tomorrow would most me take an umbrella Probably so but that information contained uncertainty in it but I had a lot more usable information too so we have to erode this notion that uncertainty or reasonable doubt in science means that we can't trust the data now I've already introduced zombie theories remember zombie theories. [00:39:33] And in order to understand zombie theories you got to understand this quote from Upton Sinclair who wrote the jungle he said it's difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on him not understanding now if you understand the fundamental core of what he's saying in that quote you will understand a great deal of the misinformation campaign that has on been ongoing related to climate science and so it's not a mistake that we see certain people certain organizations certain grey literature publications sending out things to high school teachers with zombie theories or saying this publication carries as much weight as the peer reviewed literature. [00:40:24] I always point people to Skeptical Science dot com It's a very good side a couple of them like this out there real climate is not a word is another when they refute a lot of the zombie theories that we hear but they live on like zombies though you'll hear them they're out there on Twitter or they are in op eds or nother things like that so here's one that I saw on the Wall Street Journal the sea is rising but not because of climate change that's in The Wall Street Journal I went ballistic when I saw that and course I wrote a Forbes article to write the next day kind of refuting everything that was in the chat to be aware of that in the final challenge. [00:41:02] And this comes back more to the weather side of the house be ware of social media Rolla just and app most Spirit scientists this is the big one because look at what the data from 538 says most people get their weather information now from electronic sources whether that be their phones default weather app or weather site or an Internet search I mean I mean come on how many of us look up the weather on our app a lot of us do we're not tuning in the 620 on the evening news to get the weather which is what people used to do the problem is a lot of times and particularly in a rapidly evolving situations those apps are dead wrong because you cannot synthesize a dynamic weather event in the one pretty I come on and the word sunny. [00:41:57] The most recent event snow event here in Georgia we knew it was going to be you know raining most of that day then a cold front was going to come through and perhaps on the back edge of that cold front there was going to be snow in the northwest part of the state how you can after that hat on a little icon but yet I have people saying what my up says got me 47 degrees the day of like it is that 6 o'clock in the morning but by 130 it's going to be 34. [00:42:27] So we have to understand to be aware of the strengths and weaknesses of those as they're useful for some things but we've got to understand our limitations because this is to me the sort of poster child of what I'm talking about Miami Marlins a just opened up their brand new shiny baseball stadium brand new it had a roof that they can open and close so they could close it if it was going to rain. [00:42:56] The Miami Marlins general managers live up. And says it's not going to rain. It rains and they delayed opening day at that stadium about an hour they got a call that to disclose the roof. But they weren't looking at the correct information so just be aware of social media or ologists who promote and share mythical storms 30 days out and things like that because it's out there are models can't do that are so in closing. [00:43:29] I close with this picture of a farmer in South Georgia bell pepper farm this bell pepper farmer was one to many farmers in south Georgia that lost everything because of hurricane Michel this year their crop the cotton crop pecans peanuts poultry over $3000000000.00 in agricultural losses in the state of Georgia alone because of hurricane Michel So the reason I in with this is that I just think it's far more meaningful to your cousin at the Thanksgiving dinner or to a policy maker to tell that story than to show a trend line. [00:44:19] And saw in there I want to think that the race the Anderson Foundation all my colleagues because something is happening in the state that you all need to be aware of is a Georgia kind of project. Georgia Tech Georgia Emory and also partners from around the state are coming together with a nonpartisan science an issues based conversation around climate and they're going to be some more activities coming as well so I just want you to know that you are part of a collective that's thinking intelligently about how to address this problem of climate change because it affects us all every day thank you all it's great. [00:45:05] To know if we have time for a couple questions I'm happy to take some I. Got one right here behind you. Except a couple of quick questions how do you respond to your skeptics regarding. Whether war there and my 2nd question is how do you respond to this get to say that Florida is going to be underwater is over the next few years out all of those are at really 2 great questions because Yeah the weather warfare and Kim trails and harp and all that stuff these are these there are all of these sort of whether Titan zombie theories out there believe it or not there are people that when you look up in the sky and you see. [00:45:49] A cloud coming out of an airplane there are faction of people out there that think those are called Kim trails chemical trails and they're being used to for weather warfare in the control the weather they're actually. People that believe that Barack Obama caused Superstorm Sandy to affect the 2012 elections I've seen that out there so the best you can do is respond with science and fact based information but increasingly what I have learned is that people on the fringe and that 10 percent dismissive that I talk about you just have to ignore because by responding to them and engaging with them you give them credibility when someone tweets me back and starts getting that some Twitter back and do I call them Twitter tennis matches we've got going back and forth if I sit there and respond to some guy in the basement an Oreo cookies with his theory on climate change then I'm giving him an installment I'm going to look dude I'm sit here debate with Dr Shepherd. [00:46:49] Instantly giving them credibility so for the most part I just kind of be dismissive but if I understand or see that someone really just doesn't understand Iseman the time to try to share and add to the science literacy your 2nd question was about. Yeah I think that's another problem just in the sense that we have the extreme sort of views on climate change is a hoax and not real I think we also have to be a bit careful with the sort of hyperbole on the sort of pro side of this that as well I think that's a big challenge so that's that's kind of what I was alluding to a little bit you know one of the After all weather events I usually get a lot of media calls from the New York Times opposed to wherever and they're asking me for comment for story and they have a lot of times they'll mediately want me to say OK and they want me to say it was like OK this is caused by climate change and I'm not going to say that I said it's probably a detailed likelihood of the it's certainly impacted by climate change I can't say it's caused by now they're even colleagues on the on our side allegedly slightly disagree with me on that but more importantly what I will do is also out I'm happy to talk about the links between climate change and hurricanes but I want to get through the of it 1st because people are going to die tomorrow. [00:48:04] From Hurricane Michel so I focus on it in the immediate but then I'll circle back to the reporter I'm going to get into the to the science that yeah the science does say that we're likely to have more intense hurricanes in the literature it's not as clear cut on the frequency of them because a lot of times the reporter will come with a pretty biased misconception one of the things I get all the time but we're going to have more hurricanes more often because of climate change right now that's not what the science literature says the scientific literature suggests that because of the sort of Physics of the ocean likely to have more intense hurricanes when they happen it doesn't really say anything about whether they're going to happen more frequently but when they do they're going to be stronger and that's really what we're saying so we have to understand the nuances and so this is a lesson for many of the students in the audience out there you are the expert when when the media or when a policymaker comes to you for your advice right so don't let them steer the story always anchor in the science. [00:49:02] Other question. So I'm really glad you brought up the Dunning Kruger effect section my favorite kind of money. And so I just want to ask you question about the other side of this story is that encouraged by if there was a principle. You know the people who don't tend to know that much about it feel like they know more about it yes and they sound very competent in their search that is because I was coming at you in their message is climate change is a hoax it's a very simple message and so the people who know the most about it tend to give a more nuanced answer just like you said but then tend not to sound as confident as someone and a big struggle so you know my question for you is do you have any advice in terms of not knowing your audience before you're engaging with them where do you start such that you can still have this kind of confident message without it sounding like well you know under these conditions while I'm out I'm not that's a good question but I think today I mean I didn't give a heavily science climate talk today and if you saw my talk that I give on climate science the more want to one climate science type of talk that I give It's very much anchored in the science and I think you would come away clearly saying that there is a problem yet I'm very candid about the nuances and uncertainty but I guess in this particular talk my sort of a tip to address that question is by asserting that it's OK for information scientific information have uncertainty in it but have a lot more consumable useful information in it to death for example. [00:50:37] I just hate going to the my my doctor sometimes because he's a climate skeptic. I'm not sure why I still go this is the trouble with but I've been going to him for since I've been back in Georgia but he exhibits one of the most classic forms of Dunning Kruger I'm sorry of cognitive bias because it's a even educated individual He's very smart he's a medical doctor but because of that he feels like he knows climate science is much as I do and so you know I was joking my so you know I'm not going to tell you how to do my my procedure here so why are you telling me about it we have a joke about it but you know that's one of the things oftentimes one of the biggest challenges you see in cognitive bias is you have a very intelligent audience intelligent sort of person or persons that will convey a false information but it sounds good and correct because they're smart right and so it's important to be able to sort of deal with that but yeah you know I am did sort of come a circle about your question I'm actually Morse skeptical sometimes of people who speaks and speak in absolutes about science particularly this particular right if I had a colleague to say that is definitely going to snow in someone so on Friday at 4 o'clock I'd be very skeptical because I just know the science isn't there to say that and I think there are some aspects of climate science that are just. [00:52:00] We're not there we were not there I can't ever say. Heat wave he waves actually we have a pretty good amount of fidelity that climate change is really affecting them but then we have heat waves you know before your 850 year we did but I think we have transitioned into an air work climate scientists like myself or camera others are more comfortable with attribute ing certain events to the influence of climate change whereas in the 4th think there was a lot more him and hawing and one of the reasons I think we're more comfortable I was a co-author of a national academy study 2 years ago that looked at current weather events to climate change and we said our bill you know sort of understand whether an event today is linked to climate change is related to how much the models can reproduced at a vet how much data we have long term about the event and our understanding of the physics of the science so those are the 3 pillars of the stool and there are some things that we have more confidence on than others in those 3 and so that's why certain extreme weather events if you go read that report ranked higher on our ability right Mel to attribute them to climate change. [00:53:10] Marilyn. Their recordings I think they want you know think you have a question about tipping point and how you treat the as in your effort to be as scientifically factual as possible. I'm always interested in what's the ultimate cost of all this going to be can get a sense if everything continues as is good approximation but for the possibility with hurricane Michel we had a 1st of a kind over land with winds we have had the possibility disgusted that there Mohela names. [00:53:51] Just to shut down maybe some big chunks of ACE dropping into the ocean and you know so what you say about what's what is your worst nightmare. Type of thing yeah that's a good question 1st of all for those that maybe don't understand what Professor Brown means about the tipping point you think about a rubber band there's a last disagree to the rubber band but if you stretch that rubber band it sort of breaches its point of elasticities where it won't stretch back anymore that's a tipping point and so for many years in climate science we talk about these tipping points these points where we can't snap the system back to its state and so there are some scientists that argue that in some parts of the system we've already surpassed tipping points it's really the basis for this 1.5 degree or 2 degree warming limit argument that you see we've got to keep warming below that amount that we're not in Paris agreement because there are many scientists believe that beyond that 1.52 degree warming globally we start really passing a lot of tipping points now to give you a lot of indication there's nothing necessarily magical about $1.00 or 2 degrees of warming in the same way that there's nothing naturally magical about point 08 percent blood alcohol content and you get a DUI but studies show that above that level a lot of really bad things start happening when people drive above that blood alcohol content level so as a benchmark and so that's what these temperatures are so for me the tipping point that I worry the most about I mean you hear a lot of people talk about things like the sea level rise the melting of the ice sheet if we lose if we melt Greenland ice sheet or the West Antarctic Ice Sheet you mean I'm not going to be able to rephrase that instantly That's a tipping point but the one that I worry most about in this a little more subtle than some of the ones you often hear is this changes in the jet stream. [00:55:48] If we are fundamentally altering permanently the Jets in again this is a bias with them year olds from but if the reason I actually am very worried about it is that we are fundamentally altering the jet stream amplitude that I mean if you take a meteorology course those units not to be all the course or the new year old the jet stream is really fundamental to our weather patterns wherever we live and so if we are fundamentally altering the amplitude of these jet stream patterns it ushers in a new normal of extremes and these extremes cascade on to society in multi-billion dollar weather events and lost lives and so that to me is a tipping point there's a bit more subtle than the one you often hear about the one that worries me the most. [00:56:38] Are and I think that's the stopping point. Yeah absolutely for sure. So you showed the photo of. Yes As one your final slides and in all said let's think let us talk about climate stories. And you said about that being a more effective way of communicating to people who don't understand the graphs as such but equally on the other side there's a lot of talk with social media about big skeptical about fake news and how easy it is to manipulate a photograph Sure so what is the middle line what you because you could put up photo up and someone to say OK I understand what that saying but someone else can say You mean it good photo or Sure yeah but you know I got Honestly if somebody is going to say that quote of photos manipulated that's probably in that 10 percent dismissive that you're not going to change their viewpoint anyhow and so that's what I tend to do I do you have this is a lesson in life lesson here on if your science is you cannot spend time and energy on the 10 percent dismissive because it's futile it will frustrate you and you're not going to change their perspective anyway so the most you can do if you think about that graphic I put up is spoken on those categories to the left of the 10 percent dismissive and create anough of an army of people who understand that the 10 percent dismissive in their basement with tinfoil on their head or understand thank you all so much.