We’re playing “Russian roulette with a Luger”

That’s the explanation of the risk of extreme climate change (10%) and the world’s attitude to the risk from Stephen Schneider (wiki-bio), Professor of Environmental Biology and Global Change at Stanford.

Schneider and fellow Stanford colleague Thomas Heller discuss the politics and science of climate change and carbon trading in a very well done Google tech talk now available on Google Video.

Among the nuggets from the discussion:

• Why a probability density function is the best way to think about climate change (and the challenges of telling the Senate that)


• Why the real challenge is to answer the normative questions (how much is a polar bear worth).


• Why Kyoto is a political cul-de-sac.


• Why the wrong people are at the table for Kyoto (trivia: this year, China will add 70 GW of energy capacity, the same as the annual output of England).


• An alternative for establishing a carbon emissions market in the US in a politically saleable way.

So, this Wednesday, instead of getting suckered into another episode of Deal or no Deal (or debating the strategy), curl up with your laptop and a warm broadband connection and learn a little about what’s going on climate science and politics.