5th & 6th grader questions about climate change

The following came up after my presentation, "What is global warming?" to 5th and 6th graders at the Stanley Clark School, South Bend, IN. Thanks to the students for being so attentive and for their great follow-up questions!

1. What state produces the most CO2?

Wyoming releases the most greenhouse gases per person. The next are North Dakota, Alaska, and West Virginia--all are big states for oil or coal production. In total emissions, Texas emits the most, followed by California--these are both big states with quite a lot of people. Indiana is the 5th largest emitter of greenhouse gases in total and 11th based on emissions per person. Indiana does not have a lot of energy efficiency in place and relies heavily on coal to produce electricity. Burning coal releases quite a lot of CO2. You can see all the state rankings for yourself at: http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z8cs5f2mcjthet_.

2. Will human civilization still be here in 20-30 years? Will climate change cause the end of the earth? Will the earth be too hot to live on? Will the world end, or will all life on earth die because of global warming?

A bunch of students asked this question, and it's a great one--and scary too. I don't think that global warming will destroy the planet. If you look back 2.5 (or more) million years ago, for example, you can find an atmosphere and a climate that is similar to the one that we creating today. So the planet will go on and some plants and animals that can adjust to the climate change will go on too. But that's not to say that climate change is not a big deal--it really is. We are creating an atmosphere unlike the one that has dominated for 800,000 or more years! And the threat of climate change is not to the planet but to us. It will likely cause many of the plants and animals that we use and enjoy to decline or go extinct (maybe 10-30% of them!). If we have a large amount of climate change--the amount that we are likely to get if we don't stop releasing greenhouse gases in the next 10 or 20 years--if will be difficult to feed all of the world's people and millions of people will loose their homes to rising seas. The question about global warming is: do we want to make it difficult for people around the world to feed themselves, to be happy and to be healthy?

3. What does you lab study at Notre Dame?

My lab studies the effects of climate on species and ecosystems, especially plants and insects. It is important to know how insects react to changing the climate because they play an important role in healthy ecosystems. We also study ways that people can manage species and ecosystems under climate change to try to preserve them for future generations. Check out our lab web page: http://www.nd.edu/~hellmann.

4. How much does deforestation affect global warming?

~15% of the greenhouse gases emitted that are causing global warming come from deforestation and forest degradation.

5. How long will it take for global cooling to come?

Global cooling isn't going to come for a long, long time, many thousands of years. The peak of the next ice age probably won't happen for about 80,000 years. The earth naturally goes in and out of ice ages based on variations of the earth's orbit. We are in one of the warm periods right now, called the Holocene, and we have been in this warm period for about 12,000 years. Interestingly, human emissions of greenhouse gases has pushed our climate way outside of the normal ups and downs that it experiences during and between the ice ages. So it's interesting question--one that scientists don't quite understand yet--if our changes to the climate will slow down or delay the start of the next ice age. When we talk about negative effects of global warming, however, we are usually thinking about how it will affect the next few generations of people, not our distant ancestors. 

6. Is there such thing as an ozone layer? How does it affect the environment?

The ozone layer is a really helpful part of the upper atmosphere where ozone tends to concentrate, and it helps to filter ultraviolet radiation that is harmful to living organisms in large doses. Some chemicals made by people, called CFCs, made their way into the upper atmosphere and broke down the ozone layer, creating the ozone hole. The ozone hole lets more UV reach the surface of the earth. Because many governments around the world passed laws outlawing CFCs, the growth in the ozone hole has slowed down. The ozone hole is a different problem than global warming, but the fact that we could stop growth in the ozone hole gives us some hope that we could also solve the problem of global warming. If society could just decide to take action through laws or other mechanisms, we can slow and stop the emission of greenhouse gases.

7. What causes acid rain?

Acid raid is caused by the release sulfur and nitrogen-based compounds from power plants and other things that burn fossil fuels. These compounds get in to the air and combine with water droplets to make the water acidic. So when those droplets fall from the air, they are "acid rain." The sources that make acid rain also release greenhouse gases, but these are different environmental problems. Learn more about acid raid at this EPA website: http://www.epa.gov/acidrain/what/index.html

8. If some of us start to stop releasing greenhouse gases, what effect will it have on the earth?

If some--or better yet many!--of us were to stop releasing greenhouse gases, we would slow down climate change. The more that the world emits, the more and the faster the climate changes. Eventually stopping emissions is the ultimate goal to stop the process of global warming. 

9. What is the strongest greenhouse gas?

Of the big three greenhouse gases, nitrous oxide is the most potent. Each molecule has ~300 times the heat trapping capacity of one molecule of carbon dioxide.  Each of the greenhouse gases, however, stays in the atmosphere a different length of time, so when thinking about the effect of each gas we have to think about how much we emit, how potent each molecule is, and how long it stays in the atmosphere. CO2 is the most important greenhouse gas because we emit so much of us and it stays in the atmosphere for a very long time.

10. How were there alligators in the Arctic?

In the early Eocene, about 50 million years ago, the Arctic was about 8 degrees C (or 14.5 degrees F) warmer than it is was before the humans started enhancing the greenhouse effect. At that time, northern parts of Canada had turtles, alligators, primates, and tapirs. Climate models tell us that if we keep on releasing more and more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, like we have been doing the last 100 years, the Arctic could be that warm again by the end of this century.

11. Can we stop global warming completely?

Yes, if when we say "global warming" we mean the influence of people on the climate, we can stop that. All we need to do is stop adding carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, methane, and other greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. To do that, we will need much greater energy efficiency than we have today--turn off those light bulbs when you don't need them and use energy-efficient appliances!--and we will need alternative energy sources that do not pollute the atmosphere, like solar and wind power.

12. Could the world ever be “fixed,” come back to its natural temperature?

If we could stop emitting more greenhouse gases to the atmosphere and take back the ones that we have already emitted, we could bring the earth back to the atmosphere that it would naturally have. It is going to be a lot easier to stop putting more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, however, than it will be to remove the ones that we already put in. So we likely will have to live with some climate change from the gases that we have already emitted.

13. Will the government ever do something about global warming?

I'm afraid that this is one is hard to answer, and particularly hard for a scientist to answer. I think that people must have information about problems in order to want to do something about them, and I see that as my role--to help inform the public about an important problem. But there seem to be factors other than information that are holding politicians back. Some people are working hard to make sure that the government doesn't do anything because they benefit from the industries that release greenhouse gases. The way our political system works, it is also hard for politicians to make decisions that affect people today for the benefit of people in the future. Politicians are often more worried about getting reelected in 2 or 6 years than they are worried about what the climate will be like in 50 years. The only people who can get them to change their mind about that are citizens like you! 

14. What will happen to the ocean under global warming?

Global warming will cause the ocean to rise. First, the ocean will warm as it takes up some of the extra heat in the atmosphere and this will cause it to expand. Second, ice at the poles that is on land seems to be melting at a rapid rate under global warming, and this water will flow into the ocean. More water in the ocean means higher seas. 

15. What areas does global warming affect the most?

The largest amount of warming under global warming will take place at the poles and over land away from large bodies of water. The oceans will warm too, but we expect the average temperature over land to increase--at least within this century--more than the air over the ocean. You can see the patterns of warming on this map: http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/syr/en/figure-spm-6.html.

16. Is it true that global warming will happen anyway so there’s no need to try to stop it?

No, this is not true. We can stop global warming if we want to by stop releasing greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. If we keep releasing greenhouse gases, we continue to make global warming stronger and more severe. Some scientists are working on ways of taking out of the air some of the greenhouse gases that we already released. These technologies are probably a long way away, but they are important things to study.

17. How much CO2 does the average car release?

According to the US EPA, the average care releases 4.8 metric tons of CO2 equivalents per year. (CO2 equivalents allows one to think about all of the greenhouse gases coming out of a car together in one calculation.) Check out the EPA webpage for more calculations: http://www.epa.gov/cleanenergy/energy-resources/refs.html. We recently had a speaker visit Notre Dame (David Archer from the University of Chicago) who explained that each gallon of gasoline that we burn in our cars traps thousands-of-times more energy in the atmosphere than the energy value we get from burning the gas in the first place. 

Reflections on science communication & outreach--part of a blog carnival

On April 30, COMPASS published a commentary a paper in PLOS Biology on the journey from science outreach to meaningful engagement. This post is part of a series of reactions, reflections, and personal experiences to expand the conversation. Track the conversation by reading the summary or searching for #reachingoutsci.

I was a new assistant professor counting plants in the rain when I first truly realized that time was in short supply. The work was progressing slowly and my mood was soggy. I had to write a promised blog post for the class I was missing; I had a grant proposal due the next day that still needed to be routed through the research office; and I was having trouble with one of my field assistance who was going to need a heart-to-heart chat very soon. Don’t get me wrong. I had been busy and frantic before. Grad students are stressed; postdocs work hard; and I’ve never met an undergrad who hasn’t pulled at least one all-nighter. But I realized that this time constraint that I was facing wasn’t acute. It was chronic, and it was likely going to get worse because I only had more that I wanted to do.

One of the most important “more” that I wanted to do was engage with the people affected by my research. I realized that while standing in the rain, and I made a commitment to myself to try to be efficient and deliberate in my work choices. If I wanted to be accessible and relevant, for example, I might start by training someone else to stand in the rain counting plants. (Of course, every ecologists needs to spend at least some time in the rain to stay close to their study system.) My initial outreach and engagement attempts—once I had secured more field help—were initially targeted at the individuals who managed the land where we my students and I were performing research. I wanted to attend their planning meetings, have my grad students speak in their regional management conferences, and produce meaningful reports that helped them make decisions. I’m not sure that ever accomplished the latter, but we were able to draw regional attention to our research and the issues that we were studying.

Ten years later, my basic goals in outreach remain the same—help to make sure that what we are finding finds its way into the hands of someone who can use it and in a useful form—but the scope of my research has grown. Again, I’m faced with choices about how best to spend my time. I’m not so naïve to think that science by itself will change the world. In fact, if changing the world were my primary goal, I probably should have chosen another field. I chose to be an environmental scientist because I enjoy the mixture of discovery for the purpose only of knowing how nature works and the significance of those findings to society.

To achieve my outreach goals today, I have tried to implement a few things. First, I’ve tried to obtain more training, primarily through the Leopold Leadership Program and COMPASS but also through consultation with colleagues whose work in this area I really admire. Second, I’ve tried to kill as many birds as possible with one stone. For example, I’ve started using social media an outreach medium to talk about the scientific and science-social issues that I think are important, but I also use this medium to keep track of what is going on in my field and environmental news. In other words, I’ve switched from other modes of being informed to spend time in a place where I can also practice communication, accessibility, and transparency. And it’s quick. Third, I try not to let my worries take up too much of my time. I care deeply, for example, about the opinions of my peers and their evaluation of my scientific work. But that doesn’t mean that everything I do is intended for a peer audience, and I don’t need to continually fret about their opinions of my outreach and engagement (though I still do about promotion!).

I try to remember with some regularity that feeling that I had while standing in the rain. Over the life of a career, I know that I will feel that same sensation over and over again. But I’m trying to continually refine and redefine my priorities, make sure that my efforts are well-aligned with those priorities, and remember to seek help and assistance where my time and talents are not best invested. I’m grateful for a lab group to help me with all of this, and I hope that all of my students also have their rainy moment some day soon—and I hope that they become better scientists for it.

Science in the crosshairs: the public role of science and scientists--a reply

I delivered the following comments today as a reply to a conference presentation by Ken Miller (Brown University). Maybe these comments will stimulate thinking by others on the topic of science and public outreach. I'm not a scholar in this area, but I have spent some time thinking about how I plan to negotiate the public sphere as a scientist myself.

Conference: Public Intellectualism in Comparative Context

April 23, 2013

Miller's title: "Science in the Crosshairs: the public role of science and scientists"

Overview

I agree with Dr. Miller that many scientists shy away from the limelight implied by the term “public intellectual,” preferring that data carry the public debate over personality and sound bites. But I want to spend my few minutes suggesting that this disinterested view has serious short-comings, and I want to suggest another type of public scientist, one mentioned but not expanded upon by Dr. Miler. This other type of scientific public intellectual is one who has a seat at the table of democratic decision-making. Like Dr. Miller mentioned for role of scientific popularizer, I think this policy-engaged scientist has been undervalued or unappreciated by fellow scientists, by academia, and by politicians. I hope that this can begin to change, and there fortunately are several role models who are leading the way.

Definition of “scientist”

First, when I refer to “scientist,” I am thinking primarily of academics or government individuals with PhDs in natural science who pursue or oversee some original research in the natural sciences. This participation in the research process and in the scientific literature provides topical expertise. One can find scientists in other roles, of course, such as in non-governmental organizations, and my thinking may or may not apply to them, depending on the degree to which they pursue research and how much they advocate for particular outcomes.

Information deficit—a model debunked

To argue for my view of the scientific public intellectual, I first have to dispose of the passive view that science by itself can affect social outcomes. The view that information alone when presented to those who “need” it will catalyze change, innovation, or progress has been roundly disproven. Known as the information deficit model, it assumes that the public has insufficient knowledge about science and that public opinion would be swayed if only people were supplied with reliable and accurate information about nature. But more information often does not change people’s views because opinions are often formed by intuition, religious belief, personal experience, and other cultural and psychological factors. This implies a need from more steady engagement by scientists to interweave scientific information with these other opinion sources.

We can see belief in the information deficit model in much of science communication and science outreach, but many scientists do—myself included—dosee a more active role for science in social deliberations. In other words, it is not just that science is relevant and could be informative in the right hands but that science is a central and essential tool of public problem-solving. A variety of data suggest that some key scientific issues are underappreciated, misinterpreted or misconstrued, despite an abundance of data and countless reports written for policymakers. For example, recent public surveys by the PewResearch Center suggest that 70% of Americans believe that average global temperature is increasing, but there is a large partisan divide over whether there is solid scientific evidence that human emissions of greenhouse gases are causing modern climate change. 57% of Democrats think that recent climate change is caused mostly by human activity, but only 19% of Republicans think that. It appears that party membership affects one’s adherence to natural laws. Much more engagement, probably with a wider range of people, appears necessary to convince people about the state of scientific knowledge.

Politization of science

At the same time, science in policy feels dangerous to many scientists. The features that Dr. Miller described about science—uncertainty and unending progress—implies that science never really knows anything, and this makes it an easy political target. There is risk in saying “there is a 95% chance”—some interest group unbound by the necessity of revealing its assumptions and uncertainties can step in to fill a perceived certainty void. In addition, scientists are often poor competitors in the public sphere. For example, they often lead with the details instead of the main conclusions, and they don’t have much practice speaking in a non-technical language. Scientistsmust find ways to simply communicate but not mislead. This is hard to do in the era of the sound bite, dueling cable channels, and social media. Thus, being an effect participant in the social dialog on science takes time, training and practice.

Scientists as valued stakeholders, not “deciders”

In my argument for scientists as policy participants, I’m not saying that scientists should be the “deciders.” I agree with Dr. Miller that scientists have no more knowledge about right and wrong, just or unjust, than anyone else (and, in fact, they might be quite uneducated on some of these issues). But I do believe that science should have a seat the social table.

In other words, I am not arguing scientists should have the last word on climate change, the Keystone XL pipeline, or childhood vaccinations, for example. But I do feel that scientific insights, embodied by individual scientists that we might call public intellectuals, should be an integral part of social debate. The should engages not as outside consultants who pop in and out with their data—the information deficit model—but as knowledgeable experts, armed with a useful philosophical method—the scientific method—that has been shown to have social value for millennia.

In my view, the public intellectual should not craft or advocate for particular policies but offer a sustained voice that raises key issues and keeps an emphasis on scientific issues that affect the public interest. They also can help to analyze the efficacy of particular policy tools. The policy environments in which scientist can—and I think should—engage do not need to be highly charged, and they could be narrow or broad in scope. But the hallmark is engagement rather than consultation.

Necessary institutional change

To achieve my view of the scientific public intellectual, a couple of changes are necessary. I mention them briefly, but these changes are not easy or quick. First, engagement has to be rewarded by the institutionsthat hire and employ scientists. Engaged scientists also need institutional support so that they can sustain active research programs, because research directly informs and continually shapes their expertise. Second—and perhaps more importantly—we need some kind of political transformation that views science and scientists as something other than another special interest group, with knowledge and information that is just as good as the next voter or lobbyist.

Public intellectual role models

Many scientists used to worry about being called a Carl Sagan—someone more interested in TV ratings than pursuing scientific discoveries, an ego looking for public validation. But this negative view of public science figures is changing, particularly with the rise of more and more role models who show it is possible to mix science with public education and outreach. A few examples from my own field of environment and energy come to mind: JohnHoldren [physicist and science advisor to Pres. Obama], Jane Lubchenco [ecologist and former head of NOAA], Paul Ehrlich [ecologist, author, and public figure], Stephen Schneider [climatologist, author, and tireless popularize of climate change and climate science], and Rachel Carson.

But these models are more than just popularizers. They are more like medical clinicians, family doctors with information at hand and an established method for obtaining and interpreting that information. The doctor’s opinions should be adjudicated with other important voices, not just as a popularizer or a thought-provoker but as a useful stakeholder that improves the outcome of deliberation. 

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On this subject, see also a recent panel at the University of Notre Dame conference, Climate Change and the Common Good about science as a public interest.

Beauty and Benefits of Escaping the Ivory Tower

A group of Leopold Leadership Fellows are presenting at the AAAS meeting in Boston, February, 2013. We are looking to engage conversation on our general session topic and specifically on time-effective methods of engaging in environmental outreach (Hellmann & Williams below). Join us by tweeting your thoughts at #AAASbeit and #AAASmtg. See discussion questions at the bottom of this post.

The Beauty and Benefits of Escaping the Ivory Tower
Organizers: Dawn J. Wright & Elizabeth Hadly
There are many unresolved policy problems in society, such as high unemployment and economic competitiveness, oil and gas versus alternative energy, proper stances against nuclear proliferation, public health issues, climate change, and the loss of biodiversity, all of which increasingly revolve around science. And yet, less than two percent of Congress has any professional background in science. America remains inactive about the ramifications of critical societal challenges such as climate change, environmental hazards, and living sustainably. Environmental issues are local no more, and solutions cannot remain provincial. Scientists must become envoys of knowledge that is global: laws of physics, functioning of the atmosphere, and the cadence of waxing and waning of biodiversity. Indeed, science is now part of an unavoidable and contentious public discussion on these issues, and we need it to catalyze solutions. Increasingly, scientists who are communicators are moving into positions of leadership, engaging with society, and changing their academic institutions from within. The speakers, all early- to mid-career scientists and fellows of the Leopold Leadership Program run by Stanford University, will present research and case stories of effective communication of science to policy-makers and the public, including specific lessons learned and suggested paths forward to positively change academic culture. A special focus is on early-career scientists and graduate students.
AAAS session link

Jessica Hellmann & Jack Williams, Strategies for engaging outside the ivory tower and how to find the time to do it
Talk abstract:
Our world is rapidly changing, and society needs scientific insights to build a better world for ourselves and our children. Most people agrees that in principle, scientists at the cutting-edge of discovery and innovation can and should seek to engage beyond their classroom and lab. Yet, in practice, the demands on scientists' time can be endless; simply staying at the frontier of our research is a full-time job. We will discuss this challenge: how best can I engage, given my expertise, talents, and time? There are many answers to this question including campus and community leadership, science communicator, network-builder, informal consultant, and others. We will share experiences drawn from our lives as mid-career scientists and from other Leopold Fellows, all centered on the broader theme of strategic engagement in a time-effective way. Participants are invited to share their own experiences and dialog about this topic on Twitter.

Discussion questions (Tweet your thoughts to #AAASbeit!):
What percentage of your time would you estimate that you spend during outreach? This outreach could be related to research, teaching, or other; just provide the total time.
What method of outreach do you find to be the most time-effective (i.e., generates the most return for time invested)?
What method of outreach do you find to be the most effective (even if it takes a lot of time)?
Do you see any strategic overlap between time-effective and overall most-effective methods?

Share below or via Twitter what time-effective outreach strategies work for you.

More on writing a mission statements for a research lab group, thoughts from Elena Bennet

A while back I posted about writing a mission or vision statement for one's research lab and the idea was picked up by Nature magazine. I argued that universities and business do it, even centers and institutes. So why not a research lab? Having a mission can make people feel involved, help you decide about which opportunities to pursue and not pursue, and bring your research group together. 

My colleague, Prof. Elena Bennett at McGill University, give the process a go, following some of the advice that I gathered and blogged about here.

Here's what she had to say about the experience and the outcome:

"Here's our first draft. It is not at all edited and came straight from our brainstorming, so there are definitely things that need fixing, but I think it is not at all bad for a first try.

Ecosystems and their functions provide benefits that are necessary for human well-being. We believe that humans can interact with nature in a more sustainable manner through purposeful action guided by research and education. (Information and ideas about these interactions are needed to  bridge critical knowledge gaps that currently impair management) We study interactions between society and ecosystems at the global, regional, and landscape scales through collaborative research to improve ecosystem management. We foster critical thinking about environmental systems in a setting where dissemination of ideas to a diverse audience is valued. 

What did we do? 

I showed a definition of a mission statement and a brief explanation of why I think it is valuable to have one. We had a bit of discussion on this. We then looked at McGill's mission statement. I used material from your poster to discuss what makes something a GOOD mission statement and we looked at examples (Southwest Airlines, Scouts Canada, a local nature reserve) and discussed whether these met the criteria for good. If they failed, we talked about how and why they were off the mark. We also looked at your mission statement as an example of how this might look for a lab group. We used your work on what a mission statement is (a short paragraph; use active verbs; avoid jargon, etc. - basically notes on how we were going to go forward) and invited conversation in small groups of 3 on the following questions:

1. What are the principles or beliefs that guide our work?

2. What are the opportunities or gaps we exist to address?

3.What are we doing to address those opportunities and achieve the reason we exist?

After each question, we came back together as a group and edited down to 1-2 sentences. I was really amazed at how much agreement there was among our group. Even working separately, we came up with remarkably similar statements.

We put all those sentences together to come up with the above. Now I will do some editing, we'll have a go-round by email, and then we will meet once more later in the semester to finalize before posting to our website." 

Four reasons to pursue science

I delivered the following lecture on Saturday, Nov. 10 to competitors at the Siemens science, math, and technology regional competition at the University of Notre Dame. Siemens competitors at high school students but my main points--that love of nature, sense of adventure, a desire to help people, and a n obligation to address grand challenges--apply equally well to undergraduates and young grad students. It's good from time to time to remember why you do what you do...

"You have had a long and exciting day today and a strenuous journey to reach this event. Congratulations to you for your achievements and for all of the accomplishments ahead of you. You truly are among the best minds we have in this country. And you occupy a privileged position, one with great opportunity and responsibility.

I want to close today with a big-picture question, a really big-picture question: WHY? I want to invite you to think about why you are here and how you are going to take your scientific aptitude and experiences and—as football fans say here at Notre Dame—move them down the field. Each of you has pursued extraordinary work, and you will do more excellent work in the future. But I’d like to invite you to think about why the science that you do is important and what motivates you to do it. To be a great scientist, you need brains and creativity, but you also need persistence, drive, and motivation. I’d like to talk about finding these motivating intangibles—pulling them out and giving them a good hard look.

So, my question for you: “WHY?” What is it all for? Why have you worked so hard at school, in the projects that have gotten you here today? I hope that the research that you have pursued was rewarding; I’m sure that it was. But I also know some of the other reasons that students give for studying science, math, and engineering, things like: to gain admission into one of the world’s best universities (like the one that you have visited here today), to get the highest grades in the class, to make your family and friends proud, or just because you’re good at it. Or maybe it’s to get a good job, earn a high salary, or launch some tremendously successful and lucrative company. Or perhaps the reason is the stuff we hear from politicians—that developing science and math leaders will rescue our economy and keep us from slipping in the great international competition of science and math test scores.

Well, I’m here to tell you, as someone who has dedicated her life to the pursuit of science that it’s not about any of those things, or at least it shouldn’t be. All of those things: college admission, pride, financial success, miraculous inventions that save our economy—they are all secondary. They might come to you, but if they do, they come only if you obey some deeper principles, if you pursue science for loftier, more personal and social reasons.

It is a deep and meaningful purpose that gets a scientist like me out of bed day after day after day, over the duration of an entire career. It’s hard for money alone to do that, and after you’ve graduated from college that getting-into-college bit wouldn’t be a good reason any more, and even being the super hero that saves the US economy isn’t enough stir the imagination for a lifetime of scientific work.

So what does? I’m going to describe four deeper reasons that speak to me—maybe some of them speak to you too. Let’s reflect on these for a few moments before we leave here today, before all of you head off to your next big accomplishment.

1) The #1 reason that I am a scientist is a fascination with nature, a fundamental desire in my soul to understand how nature works, so that I can appreciate its beauty, creativity, and value. I am inspired to find ways to foster nature, mimic nature, and protect nature. I fundamentally believe—and know as a scientist—that all human endeavors take place in and depend upon nature, so I want to use it wisely and protect it for the benefit of humanity. There is nature in molecules—in this is hemoglobin, for example. And there is nature in people living real lives outside of the laboratory. The earth, the universe, and all of the things that humans do in that universe are part of nature. Science is the study of nature, of our very being, and the stardust that we are made of. I find this fascination with nature to be a profound notion, one worth getting excited about each morning.

2) Another reason I love being a scientist is for adventure. When I was young, I followed the career of the first woman astronaut, Sally Ride, very closely. Sally was a physics major at Stanford and flew in the space shuttle as a mission specialist in 1983 and 1984, right around the time that I was getting interested in science. I found her efforts to break physical and social barriers and her eagerness to visit the frontier of space highly inspirational. Because of Sally Ride, I flirted for more than a decade with a career in astrophysics, at least until I discovered ecology as a sophomore in college.

In my career now, adventure comes in the form of field research and an opportunity to study beautiful places and creatures. For example, my work takes me to the west coast of North America, to the shores of Vancouver Island, British Columbia, and to the beautiful oak savanna and dune ecosystems close to home here in the Midwest. Other ecologists study coral reefs, tropical forests, or the frozen tundra. What amazing places to get to spend time! For others, adventure might come at the bench of a genome sequencer or a nuclear magnetic resonance machine, but a sense of exploration is there regardless. In my opinion, scientists should strive to learn or experience something new every day, harnessing that youthful sense of adventure.

3) A third reason why many scientists, myself included, perform research is to help people. Science is the ultimate humanist endeavor because there are few issues that confront on our modern society that do not have a scientific issue, question, or dilemma at their core. Humans struggle to overcome poverty, disease, and injustice around the world, and science has tremendous potential to alleviate this suffering. For example, colleagues of mine at Notre Dame are studying the evolution of malaria that is resistant to cloroquine, a once-effective treatment for malaria worldwide, in an attempt to increase survival rates in drug resistant areas.

4) But the fourth—and most important motivator for me personally—is participating in a grand challenge, an issue of profound importance to many people and places—something that does not have an easy answer and requires the best and brightest minds to solve.

The grand challenge that occupies my time and attention is global climate change. This same grand challenge occupies thousands of scientists around the world and together—from our diverse perspectives and different disciplines—we are piecing together the implications of climate change and what we might do about it. I take great pride in the privilege to participate in solving one of the largest and most vexing issues facing humanity.

Lest politicians tell you otherwise, the consequences of climate change are all around us, and they are profound. Thanks to steadily increasing emissions of greenhouse gases from human activity and lack of progress to combat those emissions, we now expect warming of 7-11 degrees Fahrenheit, on average, around the globe by the end of this century, with some places experiencing warming upwards of 13 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s a world that within 100 years will be as different from today as today is different than the last ice age. A big deal; a big challenge.

Let’s just take two recent examples from close to home:

We know that climate change will influence the severity of storms, and sea level rise will increase the damage caused by storm surge, much like we saw less than two weeks ago with Superstorm Sandy. Droughts in the south and southwest US, predicted by global climate models, also set the state of Texas ablaze in 2011, across the entire state from east to west.

My own research explores how climate change affects our ability to use and conserve biological resources, from endangered species—like this Karner blue butterfly—to pollinators—like bees and wasps—to pests of trees and crops. I do this work because it stimulates my personal desire and professional obligation to make the world a better place by studying and revealing a grand challenge. My students and I have discovered, for example, reasons why species may not be able to track changing climate by moving closer to the poles; we have revealed strategies for ecosystem management that might reduce the vulnerability of some species to climate change; and we have shown where to expect non-linearities and surprises in species’ response to climate warming. These results will help us live better in the world and preserve it for the future. They also send warning signals that climate change must be confronted before it reaches disaster proportions, proportions so large that we cannot adjust to them or keep them from progressing and accelerating.

So, I invite you to consider the reasons why you are here today, why you have made it so far in a prestigious science competition, and the reasons why doing science will propel your forward. I urge you to think about where your personal fulfillment comes from and how to incorporate that in your studies and career.

I have given you four reasons that I have for being a scientist: a love of nature, a sense of adventure, a desire to help people, and the responsibility to address grand challenges. I feel the last of these is critically important, and I urge to spend your time and efforts on scientific issues of social significance. Fortunately, there’s significance in nearly every facet of scientific research, some value or benefit to society. The race to find the Higgs Boson is a grand challenge; reconstructing the structure and function of past life is a grand challenge; global climate change is a grand challenge. Figure out what grand challenge compels you; be able to explain to other people; and focus on that value to drive you forward.

When we all get out of the bed in the morning inspired to do great things, all of the other rewards will simply follow as a consequence. Best wishes to you in your future adventures. Be thankful for the good fortune and great promise that you all embody."