Publications
Following publications have been announced by our Institute of Coastal Systems – Analysis and Modeling. For further information please contact Prof Dr Hans von Storch, author of the publications:
von Storch, H. (2023): Brief communication: Climate science as a social process – history, climatic determinism, Mertonian norms and post-normality. Nonlin. Processes Geophys., 30, 31–36, doi:10.5194/npg-30-31-2023
Abstract:
For ages, the topic of climate – in the sense of “usual weather” – has in the western tradition attracted attention as a possible explanatory factor for differences in societies and in human behavior. Climate, and its purported impact on society, is an integrated element in western thinking and perception.
In this essay, the history of ideas about the climatic impact on humans and society and the emergence of the ideology of climatic determinism are sketched from the viewpoint of a natural scientist. This ideology favored the perception of westerners being superior to the people in the rest of the world, giving legitimacy to colonialism.
In modern times, when natural sciences instituted self-critical processes (repeatability, falsification) and norms (such as the Mertonian norms named CUDOS), the traditional host for climate issues, namely, geography, lost its grip, and physics took over. This “scientification” of climate science led to a more systematic, critical and rigorous approach of building and testing hypotheses and concepts. This gain in methodical rigor, however, went along with the loss of understanding that climate is hardly a key explanatory factor for societal differences and developments. Consequently, large segments of the field tacitly and unknowingly began reviving the abandoned concept of climatic determinism.
Climate science finds itself in a “post-normal” condition, which leads to a frequent dominance of political utility over methodical rigor.
von Storch, H. (2023): Climate Dynamics: The Dichotomy of Stochastic Concepts and Deterministic Modeling. In: Mathematics Online First Collections. Springer, Cham., doi:10.1007/16618_2023_43
Abstract:
The quasi-realistic models of the dynamics of climate and of its subsystems atmosphere and ocean are in principle deterministic—but in practical terms they behave stochastically. In two introductory examples, the issue is explained, leading to the conclusion that given our inability to “understand” high-dimensional, multiple nonlinear systems, the stochastic Ansatz of Klaus Hasselmann, the “stochastic climate model,” is a suitable tool for conceptualizing and analysis. Randomness is an unavoidable component in such studies, independently if there is true randomness in the world or if it is mere a practical solution to something, which is intractable otherwise.
Stehr, N., & von Storch, H. (2023): Science in Society: Societies, Climate Change and Policies. World Scientific Publishing Europe Ltd, doi:10.1142/q0399
Description:
Hans von Storch and Nico Stehr, the authors of this anthology, reflect on the popular and scientific perception and construction of the phenomenon climate, climate change, climate policy and the impact of climate on society. In the early 1990s, the authors encountered notable resistance especially as they wrote about the urgency for societal adaptation to climate change. Something is wrong with our planet, and it is obvious that immediate action is needed to rectify the situation; the mankind activity that has been impacting on climate changes. However, the translation of scientific knowledge into society is not automatic or an autonomous force. Moving science into society is subject to economic, political, and cultural constraints and a central issue of the book.
von Storch, H., 2023: Mensch-Klima-Komplex. Was wissen wir? Was können wir tun? Zwischen Dekarbonisierung, Innovation und Anpassung, Dietz Verlag, Bonn, ISBN 978-3-8012-0659-8
Beschreibung:
Entscheidend für die Zukunft ist, wie viel wir über den menschengemachten Klimawandel wissen und was wir ernsthaft tun: Die Reduzierung von Treibhausgasen und die Anpassung der menschlichen Existenzgrundlagen an die Folgen der tatsächlichen Klimaveränderungen sind wichtig. Aber beides verlangt große Entwicklungsbereitschaft, so der Klimaforscher Hans von Storch.
