November 30 – Obama’s Warning at the UN Conference on Climate Change; The Psychology and Sociology of Global Warming Denial; Regenerative Agriculture Versus Industrial Agriculture

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with the United Nations conference on climate change at which President Obama warned the world leaders gathered in Paris that time is running out to deal with global warming before it is too late to reverse its catastrophic impact on the planet. Jody Freeman who served as Counselor for Energy and Climate Change in the Obama White House, joins us to discuss the critical role of executive action in the face of a Congress that is trying to roll back modest gains in clean energy for power plants which is the least challenging and most attainable goal compared to what a global regime to combat global warming will require.

Part 2

Then we look into the psychology and sociology of global warming denial that hit a six-year high in the U.S. in 2014 with 23% of Americans not believing in global warming and 53% not believing it is caused by human activity. Dr. Riley Dunlap, a professor of sociology at Oklahoma State University and one of the founders of environmental sociology, joins us to discuss why 53% of Republicans in Congress are global warming deniers, along with many of the Republican presidential candidates, and how much the public get their cues from political and media elites.  

Part 3

Then finally we examine the under-reported fact that 30% of the world’s carbon emissions come from land misuse and industrial agriculture and speak with Jeff Biggers, the founder of the Climate Narrative Project at the University of Iowa. We discuss his recent article at The New York Times “Iowa’s Climate Change Wisdom” and how the adaptation of wind and solar energy and carbon sequestration in soil makes Iowa an important example for the U.S. at the United Nations conference on climate change in Paris that opened today.