The climate issue is the largest challenge of our time. It has few counterparts in human history and those that do exist have been very different, above all because they have been relatively specific, like pest or nuclear war. The climate issue is instead closely interlinked with post-war societal developments. As a matter of fact, it is a result of our fossil-fuelled prosperity and therefore challenges our life-style. The climate issue is therefore not only a challenge in scientific and technical terms but now above all a challenge for our societies, nations, companies and individuals.
In this course, we give an introduction to current and interdisciplinary research about climate change. We touch upon questions concerning the emergence of climate science. What we know and how we know it and how long we have known it are examples of questions that are discussed and answered. Which institutions have been created to try to counteract global climate change and how have they worked is another field we look at. We also discuss how knowledge about climate change has been received in society, how scientists have worked to communicate their knowledge and how it has succeeded and failed. Despite the fact that the knowledge today is broad and deep there is a resistance that does not seem to give in; we also dig into these issues that concern ideological patterns or what we today call cultural cognition. We also take an history of ideas perspective on the climate issue, particularly in relation to the view on resource exploitation and technical development.