Your Brain On Climate

Lorraine Whitmarsh, Professor of Environmental Psycho and MBE, discusses behavior change in the context of climate change. Topics include the use of nudging, the role of social norms, the Austrian nudging experiment, and lessons from COVID-19 for climate change.

Try running for a few miles, and then a few miles more, and then several hundred few miles more. That's proper endurance that is, the kind demonstrated regularly by Damian Hall: ultrarunner, climate activist, author, and all-round lovely chap.  He's the holder of the men's record for the 268-mile Spine Race, so he knows a thing or two about keeping going when things look grim.   And when it comes to climate change, heaven knows we need a bit of that. What can running very long distances teach us about perseverance despite increasingly grim climate news? What has Damian learned about climate activism from running up mountains all day long? And is running REALLY as bad for the planet as Formula 1? (Spoiler: no).   Damian is the co-founder of the Green Runners. Run? Join. Owl noises: --  Race owls: 07:20 - the Spine Race;  19:38 - the Barkley Marathons. 20:29 - UTMB. --  26:37 - here's Michael Mann on Twitter, and if you want to hear Dave nattering with Katherine Hayhoe, you're in luck. -- 28:45 - herewith all of Damian's books. -- 36:36 - in case you missed it, what Rishi did. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted and produced by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

The climate crisis needs all the ideas and imagination it can get. But today's guest says that liberalism - the system many of us live in, which cherishes individual freedom above pretty much all else - is a straitjacket on our imaginations, and our ability to think and act big. If it really is harder to imagine the death of capitalism than the end of all life on Earth, does that explain why most visions of the future are so, well, crap?    Joining Dave this ep is Dr Christopher Shaw, author of 'Liberalism and the Challenge of Climate Change'.  Chris has a very large brain and tells us why the rules of the system we live in have a huge influence on how we think about what's possible. Follow him on twitter @kalahar1. Owl noises: -- 10.01: One of the people credited with the phrase is the late Mark Fisher in his very influential (including I bet on Chris) Capitalist Realism. -- 11.34: Not cheery, but here's more in Science about the transgression of six of the nine planetary boundaries. -- 15.47: Chris means Hope in the Dark, a book I commend to you in the strongest possible terms. -- 32.35: Freud and his repression. For plenty more on Freud, check out episode 11 with Dr Aaron Balick. -- 40:44: The shortcut to Chris's Twitter thread. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted and produced by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

Our ideas about climate change are filtered through layers of Stuff, and for us in the West quite a lot of that Stuff is inseparable from being gits to other countries for centuries.  We've nabbed land, exploited populations and perhaps most enduringly of all, seen the world as basically being for 'us' to do with as we want. That Stuff dies hard, and, this episode's guest argues, shapes how we think even about what climate change is, never mind how and in whose interests to solve it. Joining Dave this ep is Dr Ayesha Siddiqi, lecturer in human geography at the University of Cambridge. Ayesha's a postcolonial geographer, which means she 1) is clever and 2) understands how the impacts of things like climate change overlap with legacies of politics, power and security.  Most usefully of all for this episode at least, she talks warmly and accessibly about the need to decolonise research and the Western framing of climate change. So: learn stuff. Owl noises: -- 06:33 - the wet bulb test, and why it's scary. -- 40:40 - the Matthew effect of accumulated advantage, and why Matthews have it even easier than Daves. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

The death of everything: no ROFLing matter. Right?  Well probably yes. But can chuckles save the planet?  Does laughing at humans being silly confused bags of water help the climate fight or take the heat out of it? And just why is so much climate comedy, well, crap? Joining Dave this episode is a right proper comedy mastermind, Stuart Goldsmith.  Stuart's spent aeons both behind the mic as a stand-up, and peering at other comics via interviews in his legendary The Comedian's Comedian podcast. He's drunk heavily from the comedy well, and knows more about the art (science? craft?) of rib-tickling than just about anyone.   And - [applause, cheers] - Stuart now reckons he might spend the rest of his career doing comedy about climate change, such is his commitment to the cause. See Stuart's show  Spoilers at the Edinburgh Fringe this summer. Owl noises: -- 11:11 - The rule of three in comedy.  -- 12:33 - This really is a most excellent, warm and wise interview with John Lloyd from the folks at Rebel Wisdom. -- 13:23 - Here's a TED talk - Why We Laugh - off of Professor Sophie Scott. -- 27:24 - Ayana Elizabeth Johnson's climate Venn diagram. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

You can't handle the truth! Or maybe you can. But does the truth set us free, or bum us out? Do we all have a duty to say it like we see it - particularly on things we're not seeing clearly enough, like climate change?  How much honesty can our flimsy little brains bear? Joining Dave this episode is Dr Rupert Read.  He's an academic, author, agitator and activist, and used to be one of Extinction Rebellion's biggest thinkers and strategists. As well as a new book - 'Do You Want To Know The Truth - the surprising rewards of climate honesty' - he's launching the Climate Majority Project to help everyday people talk more honestly about the climate crisis. You can follow him on Twitter @GreenRupertRead. Owl noises: -- 18:09 - El Niño doesn't sound like fun. -- 32:58 - Rupert's call for a 'moderate flank'. -- 34:36 - Do check out the work of Larger Us. Cool stuff. -- 37:37 - A chewy chat with colossal-brained Daniel Schmachtenberger about the 'war on sense-making'. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

It's all very well demanding that everything happens NOW, but we're actually going to do - or not - about climate change is all about negotiation.  What happens inside those fusty negotiating halls?  How does one negotiate well and get what one wants, whether on climate or things more domestic? And does the climate have the time for us to negotiate our way out of a paper bag? Joining Dave this episode is Camilla Born MBE. Camilla's been at more top tables than you've had hot dinners, and has been there for the crunchy bits of some of the planet's most important negotiations - not least when advising COP26 President Alok Sharma.  Find out how Camilla gets her way, and what she thinks about protestors demanding the seemingly impossible. Follow Camilla on Twitter @camillaborn. We don't talk about it in the episode but Camilla and I recommend this moving piece by Pete Betts, a legendary negotiator, reflecting on everything he's learned. Owl noises: -- 08:08: Anchoring bias explained over at the Decision Lab. -- 10:16: I should probably give due kudos to the thing that I read, which is these top 10 negotiating tips by the Harvard Law School's negotiation programme. -- 16:56: it really does matter whether we phase coal 'down' or 'out', and Carbon Brief explains why. -- 19:52: Professor Lee's thoughts on tactical empathy and much else - including more Camilla - in this Inside Science episode on negotiation. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

Yup, buzz-buzz-swat-buggers. Now, I can't guarantee you're going to come out of this one in love with flies (and fleas), but maybe you'll think a wee bit differently about 'em. About what we need to do to our brains to make small buzzing things our chums, not our nemesis. And why needing to do it is pretty dang essential for not wiping out everything that lives, including ourselves. Joining Dave this week is the legend that is Dr Erica McAlister, the London Natural History Museum's expert on all things dipeteric (flies) and siphonapteric (fleas). Never will you have been so charmed by one woman's protective affection for these unloved insects.  Owl noises: -- 08:07: if you want more secret sexy fly stuff, you perv, check out Erica's talk on Youtube.-- 29:52: an obituary of Miriam Rothschild who believed in God because fleas have willies. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

Yes you probably WOULD walk by on the other side, wouldn't you, and don't say you wouldn't, because you would.  Alas, a trio of brain wirings add up to the so-called Bystander Effect: our tendency to stand in a crowd of people watching someone flail in a canal, hoping it's not us that has to get our frock wet to jump in and save them.  In this episode Dave learns all about the Bystander Effect with Dr Gerdien de Vries from TU Delft. What is it? Why is it? And can working out what'll make us jump in the canal, make us more likely not to stand by and watch the world burn?  Check out Gerdien's excellent climate psychology talk here. Owl noises: -- 05:47: the sad story of Kitty Genovese and why as Gerdien says, it's not entirely right. -- 09:59: you really should know what cognitive dissonance is by now, but if not here's a primer from the always excellent folks at the Decision Lab. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.   

Time travel! No not like Marty McFly, but in our heads.  Backwards via memories, albeit imperfectly. And forwards, to make plans for the future and think about all the ways they could go wrong and then make new plans and then etc.  Foresight is profoundly human and completely innate to your brain: just try and sit still with your thoughts for a bit, and you'll see how often you think about what comes next.  Without foresight, no skyscrapers, art, podcasts or health service. No anything we call home, really. But also no climate crisis.  Because it turns out that just like our memories, our ability to see and guard against bad things in the future is distinctly imperfect - cf, the global pandemic - and that's got us into a whole heap of trouble.  What's to be done? Joining Dave to talk all things foresight is Dr Adam Bulley. He's a cognitive scientist and one-third of the authors of The Invention of Tomorrow: A Natural History of Foresight. Follow Adam on Twitter @adamdbulley.Owl noises: -- 06:41: A great New Yorker article about Elizabeth Loftus's pioneering work on memory.-- 12:54: More about the patient who was scared of shaking hands. -- 35:22: Hyberbolic discounting, via the superb crew at Decision Lab. -- 40:23: Hal Hershfield says you make better decisions if you see your older self. -- 42:37: An extract from Tali Sharot's book, The Optimism Bias. -- 47:31: The book is Premonition, by Michael Lewis, and here's a review. Your Brain on Climate is a podcast about human psychology vs the climate crisis: what we think, why we think it, and how it all adds up to a planet-sized emergency.  Contact the show:  @brainclimate on Twitter, or hello@yourbrainonclimate.com. Support the show on Patreon: www.patreon.com/yourbrainonclimate. The show is hosted by me, Dave Powell, who you can find @powellds on Twitter.  Original music by me, and I twiddle all the production knobs too. Show logo by Arthur Stovell at www.designbymondial.com.