Talk:Climate crisis

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 7 September 2021 and 23 December 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Vanessa Li (YYL). Peer reviewers: Abigailcampbell7.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 19:11, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Scientific argumentation why it's a crisis

This article currently lacks the reasoning why many climate scientists argue that we are in a climate emergency. Is is okay I lay out the reasoning first in the definition section and then in the second sentence of the lede, based on two scientific articles: the first BioScience article (primary source), which was used by Lenton's recent paper (secondary source)? I think this fits well within the scope of the article as it gives an explanation to why people changed the terminology from a scientific (instead of political) viewpoint. It is different from previous attempts at inserting argumentation for a crisis by just collecting alarmist articles about climate change. The argumentation consists of two aspect: there is little time to act left and the observed and projected effects of global warming are getting bad. Femke Nijsse (talk) 09:04, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

An important aspect of this question is whether we should consider 'climate crisis' and 'climate emergency' as synonyms. I think they are, but I'm open to suggestions otherwise. Femke Nijsse (talk) 08:51, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

@Femkemilene: You make very perceptive points. Generally, it has been a difficult task editing a neutral article about a term that is specifically adopted by many for its advocacy effects. To emphasize that there is scientific support (that it's not merely salesmanship), I added the Public Citizen quote box (prominently), and added to the lede that "Environmental and progressive organizations joined in an open letter[] characterizing climate change and human inaction as "what it is–a crisis".[]" You may find better summaries.

1. Re your first paragraph: I think a new section titled "Scientific basis" would be appropriate, though it invites forked/duplicated content from other articles (such as "Effects of GW"), and it would have to be forever monitored for advocacy-tinged content.

2. Re your second paragraph: true, "crisis vs emergency" is another difficult question. Based on my investigation in comparing terms for the new graph File:20200112 "Climate crisis" vs "Climate emergency" - Google search term usage.png (and my own strong impression from reading sources), I found that these two terms are exactly the ones most widely Google-searched, and as the graph shows, have usage patterns that have closely correlated for the last >year. Whether they are exact synonyms can be argued endlessly; significantly, I worry that opening the the floodgates to a first synonym ("emergency") would result in endless bloat for n>>1 other perceived synonyms; I have been able to limit that bloat to the "Alternative terminology" list section. Including "climate emergency" might require moving/renaming the article to clumsier titles like "Terminology characterizing GW and CC" or "History of nomenclature for GW and CC"—which would be difficult/impossible to gain consensus on. —RCraig09 (talk) 18:43, 13 January 2020 (UTC)

You cannot claim there is a scientific basis for calling it a crisis if you can't provide a reliable definition of crisis or emergency. There probably is no such thing in science as a crisis as science is focused on testable and untestable hypotheses. So we may need to look elsewhere for a helpful definition . Because of your personal bias against me, today you have both removed what is probably the best definition of a crisis/emergency available. Notagainst (talk) 01:26, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

I was not among those who removed some of Notagainst's latest edits (19 Jan 2020). However, I agree that Regina Phelps' definition of crisis—which was not even conceived in the context of climate change—is too abstract to be proper in this article's text and is therefore far from "the best definition" of climate crisis. Note that Mukheibir's climate-specific definitions remains in the article; at most, Phelps' words could be paraphrased within the Mukheibir footnote, merely to explain Mukheibir's reasoning. —RCraig09 (talk) 03:20, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Since I was the editor who most recently removed it, let me explain why it's too long and confusing. Here is the text I removed: She describes a crisis emergency as a situation where: The threat has never been encountered before, so there are no plans in place to manage it. It may be a familiar event, however, it is occurring at unprecedented speed, therefore developing an appropriate response is challenging. There may be a confluence of forces, which, while not new individually, in combination pose unique challenges to the response. Her first sentence suggests that if there are any plans to manage climate change, then it'll no longer be a crisis. So if some international agreement is in place, then it's no longer a crisis? Next, "occurring at unprecedented speed" may or may not apply. Didn't climate change occur even faster when an asteroid hit the earth 60 million years ago? The three sentences together bring in irrelevancies that confuse the issue. As pointed out earlier, Phelps is not talking explicitly about climate, so perhaps her definition makes more sense in a different context. NightHeron (talk) 14:12, 20 January 2020 (UTC)

Requested move 30 December 2020

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: Not moved (non-admin closure) (t · c) buidhe 14:17, 6 January 2021 (UTC)

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Climate crisis → Climate crisis (term) – Climate crisis is widely used by reliable sources instead of or alongside climate change (see below), and should redirect there. The current article deals with the term itself rather than the topic it refers to and should be moved to Climate crisis (term). ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 13:44, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

• Oppose. The key point is that "climate crisis" is used alongside "climate change" (as nominator notes). Significantly, the two terms are not synonymous: one is a neutral scientific description ("change") and the other is a value-laden characterization ("crisis"). In fact, the entire article is largely predicated on how activists and politicians and scientists distinguish the term "climate crisis" from mere "climate change". The effect of redirecting from Climate Crisis to Climate Change would bury all this content in an article that few readers would ever find. (16:43, 30 Dec) Moreover, the intro to this article states that "Climate crisis is a term describing global warming and climate change, and their consequences, clearly distinguishing the terms. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:53, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

Climate change also includes its consequences. The emphasis of the terms is undoubtedly different but the scope of the topics is the same. The list shows that "climate crisis" is commonly used in a factual context by a wide variety of reliable sources; the argument that common terms are inherently "value-laden" may be a reason to pick a more neutral term as the article title (as with pro-life) or have a section on terminology (as with illegal immigration) but not to dedicate the entire page space to it. A hatnote would preserve intentional pageviews. ─ ReconditeRodent « talk · contribs » 19:12, 30 December 2020 (UTC)

1. Properly defined, the term climate change does not "include" its consequences, especially consequences seen mainly anthropocentrically.
2. Accordingly, the scope of the topics is not the same, any more than COVID-19 has the same scope as its consequences.
3. Likewise, the article Climate change does not "include" its consequences; the "Effects" section not being the same as consequences.
4. To choose "a more neutral term as the article title" would subvert the very basis for the article's existence! The entire article is largely predicated on how activists and politicians and scientists distinguish the term "climate crisis" from mere "climate change".
5. Hatnotes would be ignored by many or most readers, especially if it's mixed in with the gaggle of disambiguation hatnotes already at the top of Climate change. (—20:13, 30 December 2020) It's also likely that consensus at the Climate Change article wouldn't even allow one more disambiguation hatnote on the reasoning that it would open floodgates to innumerable other hatnotes—thereby "burying" this article from view. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:24, 1 January 2021 (UTC)

• Oppose for reasons stated. In ictu oculi (talk) 21:33, 30 December 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose rationale for change is unclear, not need to dab the concept and the if the intended target is climate change, the links should be direct, Sadads (talk) 12:48, 31 December 2020 (UTC)
• Oppose per above.DMT biscuit (talk) 15:34, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose merging (merge proposal link comes here for some reason) as this article is too detailed to merge into the climate change article Chidgk1 (talk) 18:39, 3 January 2021 (UTC)
• Oppose as proposed. I can see the value of moving this article to Climate crisis (term) but not redirecting Climate change to this article's name. I could support Climate crisis pointing to a disambiguation page but for reasons discussed earlier in the life of this article, this should not be the primary location for the current Climate Change topic. Springee (talk) 18:46, 3 January 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Merge climate communication to here?

I am just wondering if it might be useful to merge climate communication to here, or to merge both articles together under a new title, as they are pretty much about the same thing. They are both about how climate change is communicated and the term "climate crisis", as well as all of its derivatives, like "climate chaos", "climate emergency" etc. are all different ways to communicate the issues to the public. Looking at the view rates for both articles, they both linger at low view rates since their creation. I think a combined article would make sense. (happy to be shot down in flames now ;-) ) P.S. the article climate movement is also closely related, but more distinct, I guess. EMsmile (talk) 01:30, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

• Nah. The articles are not about the same thing. "Climate crisis" as an 'urgent' term is much more specific and with a specific goal in mind (urging action); alternatively, "climate crisis" as a 'neutral' term can simply refer to climate change and its effects. In contrast, "climate communication" is concerned with the mechanics of conveying climate information. There's some overlap in content, of course, but neither concept contains or subsumes the other. —RCraig09 (talk) 04:28, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

I can see there are differences but I just wonder if both such articles would linger with small amount of content and low view rates, whereas a combined article (with a different title?) might end up stronger and better. If not, then it would at least be useful if each article explains a little the concept of the other article. So far, they are not interlinking very well with each other even though they have something in common, i.e. they are both about trying to urge action. EMsmile (talk) 13:58, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

I see there is substantive mention of Climate crisis at Climate communication#History of global warming, and I've added a See also section there. In the present article, I've added to the hatnotes, "For climate communication in general, see Climate communication." Possibly, more content could be added, but I definitely think that a merge is extremely inappropriate because use of Climate crisis is just one example of one approach to climate communication. Moreover, I don't think that increasing view rates, per se, is a valid goal within Wikipedia principles and guidelines. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:31, 31 March 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for clarifying this. If it comes out more clearly now in the two articles that "Climate crisis is just one example of one approach to climate communication" then my concerns are alleviated (it's useful to know which article is the "sub-article" to the other one ). I have a somewhat similar problem with the two articles climate resilience and climate vulnerability. I am not proposing a merger there but the two articles are basically about the opposite of each other which results in overlapping content. Again, I feel they are not interlinking well with each other and should be streamlined. If you have time, could you take a look at my talk page comment here? Thanks. EMsmile (talk) 01:31, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

I think that the section Climate communication#History of global warming (which is transcluded from the heavily-watched and actively edited Climate change main article) implicitly-but-clearly describes how usingClimate crisis is one example of how many choose that terminology "to ensure that we are being scientifically precise, while also communicating clearly with readers on this very important issue" (words of The Guardian editor). Conversely, I think that resilience and vulnerability are essentially complementary expressions of the same general concept (I've added to the talk page that you linked at 01:31, 1 April. —RCraig09 (talk) 03:32, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

More participation needed in climate activist AfD

The AfD at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dominika Lasota has been relisted twice, with the hope of getting more participation by experienced editors. Boud (talk) 19:01, 17 November 2022 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I propose merging Climate apocalypse and climate endgame into this article. Not only is there a significant overlap between all three articles, but the current article is both small enough to accommodate the merge of all relevant information and is by far the best of the three, lacking the fundamental issues which plague the other two articles. It is also already featured on Template:Climate change, making it easier to find within Wikipedia than the others.

Climate endgame article is devoted to a single "perspective" paper (a peer-reviewed opinion piece from scientists, more-or-less, rather than fundamentally new research) and the article itself consists of only a handful of small paragraphs, so it can be merged very easily without losing anything.

Climate apocalypse is a bit more complicated. Several sections fully fit the scope of this article and can be merged with only slight edits and no meaningful loss of information - I'm thinking about "Etymology and usage", "Narratives of climate change" and maybe "Famous figures" (although that is a very messy section and it would be difficult to retain it while setting non-arbitrary criteria on just who is famous enough for it). Parts of those sections could also be moved to Climate change in popular culture.

Unfortunately, the rest of the article is a badly sensationalized version of Effects of climate change, where it effectively ends up either uncritically fringe narratives, misrepresenting more reliable sources or performing what amounts to WP:SYNTHESIS on a range of obscure sources.

I have previously wrote my detailed criticisms of that article over at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Climate_change#Climate_apocalypse_and_climate_endgame_articles, and I guess I'll go over them again.

• First paragraph of the lead: "A climate apocalypse (also called a climate dystopia and a climate-induced collapse, among other names) generally denotes a predicted scenario involving the global collapse of human civilization and potential human extinction as either a direct or indirect result of anthropogenic climate change. Many academics and researchers posit that in actuality, unless a major course correction is imminently implemented, some or all of the Earth will be rendered uninhabitable as a result of extreme temperatures, severe weather events, an inability to grow crops, and an altered composition of the Earth's atmosphere."

You can see already see that this section is very vague and full of WP:WEASEL. It technically has 4 references, but one is a YouTube video and the other three are basically the same, consisting of this paper and two news articles about it. Moreover, these sources are hardly even congruent with either each other or the text, since the video is about a 5 degree scenario, which is never even mentioned in the paper. In fact, the paper also makes no mention of any part of the Earth being rendered uninhabitable, and nor does it predict any "inability to grow crops". What's more, its "Ecological Overshoot: Population Size and Overconsumption" section ends with an acknowledgement that the authors do not actually expect the human population to decline due to climate change during this century. (Which is, of course, the mainstream scientific position, as represented by the IPCC reports, where the only reason why human population might be lower in 2100 than it is today is due to declining population-level fertility from widespread access to birth control.)

• Most of the "Apocalyptic impacts of climate change and ecological breakdown" is basically the same as Effects of climate change, only briefer, less up-to-date and more editorialized/sensationalized. (I.e. sea level rise section immediately switches from one prediction of 2100 sea level rise to ultimate sea level rise from very long term ice sheet melt with no mention of the timelines.) Some exceptions include "Atmosphere" section, which makes extremely strong claims on the basis of two references that are nearly 20 years old, and "Mass extinction", which contains no up-to-date predictions of extinction risk from climate change and is just blatantly wrong with its paleo analogies (as in, the claim that "95% of living species were wiped out" during the Permian–Triassic extinction event is immediately contradicted by that very article.)

Lastly, several predictions at the end of the article are presented largely uncritically in a manner uncharacteristic (and unbecoming) of a Wikipedia article. Examples:

• The way "What if we stopped pretending?" is described suggests that the only criticism of that opinion piece was due to its tone, and leaves open the idea that it was controversial simply for speaking hard truths. It ignores that Franzen was also found to have explicitly gotten the science wrong multiple times by the climate fact-checker Climate Feedback.

• "The 2050 scenario" is presented completely uncritically and is used as a reference multiple times throughout the text. There is no mention that it was never peer-reviewed, that it wasn't written by scientists, or that it was also found non-credible by Climate Feedback.

In all, I suggest that we move every section to do with the communication of climate risks into this article (while also helping to put each one in its proper context: i.e. the sections on Franzen's piece and "2050 scenario" can stay, but only with their criticism from fact-checkers included), move the parts discussing popular culture to Climate change in popular culture, and just let go of the rest (mainly the poor version of effects of climate change) before turning that page into a redirect here, since there's no real value to salvage.

@RCraig09: as the primary author of this article.

@Ebenwilliams, Bluerasberry, Prototyperspective, and Alvarosinde: as the primary authors of climate apocalypse and climate endgame. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 06:26, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

• Strongly oppose: This article is about the term "climate crisis", a term that is widely used by reliable sources to characterize the physical phenomenon of climate change and its effects. As a characterization, "Climate crisis" is not an extremist term, or itself an extreme physical phenomenon. I've already added Climate apocalypse and climate endgame to the "Alternative terminology" section, which I believe is the extent to which they are relevant here. (I think the CE article can be converted to a redirect to the CA article, for reasons discussed at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Climate change.) —RCraig09 (talk) 06:42, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

I saw that post, but to me, it does not do anything to answer the most important question: why do we need to keep climate apocalypse as anything more than a redirect here? (And since you agree that these terms can be used interchangeably, redirecting those articles here would clearly make more sense than just deleting them outright.)

Yes, this is an article about the term, and it'll still stay that way after the relevant sections (the ones exploring terminology) are merged, and the rest are let go of. InformationToKnowledge (talk) 07:46, 18 January 2023 (UTC)

• Oppose: this article is about the term "climate crisis", how it appeared and why. I think that it is important to know that the same physical phenomenon has been given different names, the reasons for this, and the evolution. This can be traced more easily if Climate crisis, Climate endgame and Climate apocalypse are preserved as independent articles, with all the crossed references and rewritings that may be found necessary. Alvarosinde (talk) 11:02, 18 January 2023 (UTC)
• Mild support. I support this and I think ITK would be up for the task of doing a good merger. However, it might work better though if you, ITK, first cull and rework the article climate apocalypse. I think it would then become clearer how a merger with this article would pan out. Also first merge climate endgame into climate apocalypse, I would say. EMsmile (talk) 08:36, 18 January 2023 (UTC)