One of authors behind Nobel Peace Prize-winning climate change report to speak at OHIO

Michael E. Mann, one of the authors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report that was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, will be speaking at Ohio University’s Templeton-Blackburn Alumni Memorial Auditorium beginning at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, March 28.

In a presentation titled, “A Return to The Madhouse: Climate Change Denial in the Age of Trump,” Dr. Mann will review the scientific evidence of climate change and the reasons people should care. Using humor and satire, Dr. Mann will recount the efforts by special interests and partisan political figures to confuse the public, attack the science and scientists, and deny that a problem even exists. Drawing from his third book, “The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial is Threatening our Planet, Destroying our Politics, and Driving us Crazy,” Dr. Mann will explain why he is cautiously optimistic that society will prevail in the battle to avert catastrophic and irreversible climate change impacts. 

Dr. Mann is a Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Science at Penn State University and is director of the Penn State Earth System Science Center. He is the 2018 recipient of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Award for Public Engagement with Science. The honor recognizes Dr. Mann’s “tireless efforts to communicate the science of climate change to the media, public and policymakers…. Mann has done more to engage with the public on science than most active scientist-communicators do in an entire career…. There is no scientist reaching greater numbers of people with such depth of communication as Michael Mann.” 

Among Dr. Mann’s many honors, he was the lead author of a chapter in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, for which he and his co-authors received the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. 

Dr. Mann’s presentation is free and open to the public. Major sponsors for this event are the College of Arts and Sciences’ Sustainability Studies and Technology and Society curricular themes.