Articles | Volume 2, issue 1
https://doi.org/10.5194/gc-2-95-2019
https://doi.org/10.5194/gc-2-95-2019
Research article
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29 May 2019
Research article | Highlight paper |  | 29 May 2019

Telling the boiling frog what he needs to know: why climate change risks should be plotted as probability over time

Simon Sharpe

Related subject area

Subject: Geoscience policy | Keyword: Risk communication
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Cited articles

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Humanity's situation with respect to climate change is sometimes likened to that of a frog in a slow-boiling pot of water. But are we telling the frog what he needs to know? Most climate science is communicated to governments in the form of predictions of what is most likely to happen. I argue it should instead answer the following questions: what is the worst that could happen, and how likely will that become as time goes by? The risks and need to act will then become much clearer to see.
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