Climate Change and Other Global Challenges to Human Flourishing
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Welcome to Stories of Impact. I'm your host, Tavia Gilbert, and along with journalist Richard Sergei, every first and third Tuesday of the month, we share conversations about the art and science of human flourishing.

Today we're bringing you one of the most memorable sessions from last fall's Global Scientific Conference on Human Flourishing. The first ever Human Flourishing Conference from Templeton World Charity Foundation aimed to showcase the latest and most meaningful scientific advances in understanding how humans flourish across cultures and alongside innovative new tools and strategies to

And the conversation on climate change and other global challenges to human flourishing was one we haven't been able to stop thinking about since. We hope it's meaningful for you too.

My name is Philip Ball and I'm a science writer and author. And this is, I guess this is really a difficult time to be talking about human flourishing for many reasons, and perhaps that makes it all the more important to do so. We seem already to be facing the first consequences of the crises in climate and environment that scientists and others have been warning us about for several decades now. Just in the past year we've

We've seen temperature records broken in heat waves all around the world, accompanied by wildfires and drought, of which the current terrible crisis in Somalia is one of the worst. Lakes and rivers have simply vanished, and crop yields have been decimated and so forth.

And at the same time, there have been the kinds of episodes of extreme weather, like hurricanes and floods, that climate scientists have also long predicted. So if we've not already been directly affected by climate change, then surely we are soon all going to be in one way or another. And still...

As I think shown recently at the COP27 meeting in Egypt and the G20 summit in Bali, still there does not seem to be the political will that the world needs to truly address these problems. So how in the face of this do we not simply despair or just succumb to a kind of helpless apathy?

That, I think, is one of the biggest challenges facing those who are seeking solutions to the climate and environmental crisis. How can we mobilize these incredible human resources that surely exist to make a real difference to the planet and to society? And I'm delighted to have the privilege of hearing from a panel of experts who are looking at that question head on and, I think, finding real answers.

So let me now introduce them. We will first hear a presentation from Catherine Hayhoe. Catherine is challenging to introduce because she wears so many hats. She trained as an astronomer and then as an atmospheric scientist working on assessments of and predictions of regional climate change.

She's currently the chief scientist for the US think tank, The Nature Conservancy, and she's distinguished professor in the Department of Political Science at Texas Tech University. She's also a principal investigator for the Department of Interior's South Central Climate Adaption Science Center.

and the U.S. National Science Foundation's Global Infrastructure Climate Network. And beyond this, she's got a distinguished record of communication and outreach on climate and environmental issues. And her current research focuses on establishing a scientific basis for assessing regional to local scale impacts of climate change on human systems and on the natural environment.

After Catherine's presentation, we'll turn to our two live panelists for a discussion. So let me introduce the two of them now. David Testaino is a professor of psychology at Northeastern University in Boston, where he directs the Social Emotions Group.

His work examines the mechanisms of the mind that shape vice and virtue. And he studies hypocrisy and compassion, pride and punishment, cheating and trust. And his work continually reveals that human moral behavior is more variable than most might predict. He's also the co-author of the 2013 book Out of Character, surprising truths about the liar, cheat, sinner and saint lurking in all of us.

Dakela Chungialpa is the founder and director of the LOKA Initiative, an education and outreach program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for faith leaders and religious institutions.

Its mission is to support faith-led environmental efforts locally and around the world through collaboration with faith leaders and religious institutions on environmental protection, sustainable development, and global health issues. And Tequila also serves as the environmental advisor for His Holiness the 17th Karmapa, head of the Karmakagyu School of Tibetan Buddhism. So first of all, as I say, we're going to hear from Catherine Hayhook.

Hi, my name is Katherine Hayhoe and I'm a climate scientist. That means that I study what's happening to our planet every day. And the best way that I have to describe it is this: we are conducting a truly unprecedented experiment with the only home we have. As far back as we can go into the paleoclimate record millions of years ago, we have never seen this much carbon going into the atmosphere this quickly.

So it's no surprise that temperature is changing faster now than any time in the history of human civilization on this planet. And that's why this matters. Because our entire society, how we grow our food, how we allocate our water, how we design and maintain our infrastructure, where and how we've drawn our geopolitical boundaries, the entire basis of our economy is predicated on the assumption of a stable climate.

And over the history of human civilization on this planet, the planet's temperature has been as stable as that of the human body. It's gone up and down by a few tenths of a degree, just like your body does over the course of a day. But today, we're more than a degree Celsius, almost two degrees Fahrenheit over where we should be. And that means that we're running a fever. Another way to look at it is this.

For all of the history of humans planning on this planet, we've been able to use the past as a guide to the future because climate was stable. That's similar to driving down the road looking in the rear view mirror.

That might sound ridiculous, but there is a circumstance under which that works pretty well. If you are driving down an empty, dead, straight road, then the past is a good guide to the future. But today, climate is changing faster again than any time that we've seen. We are on an unprecedented curve. Our wheels are already on the rumble strip. And in order to make it around that curve safely, we have to do something we've never done before.

and that is we have to look to the future, because if we don't make it around this curve, there is no way we're going to flourish. So you might say, "Well, what about all the other challenges we have? What about the growing distrust of science or political divisions? What about socioeconomic and racial inequality, poverty, hunger, and disease? Where does climate change rank with these global challenges?"

We often think of all of these issues as separate buckets, buckets that we put our time, our money, our effort into. But climate change is not a separate bucket to fill at the expense of the time and effort we put into other buckets. Rather, climate change is quite literally the hole in the bucket.

It is the hole that will make it impossible for us to fill any other bucket, whether we're working on poverty or inequality or hunger or disease. There is no way that we can successfully address these issues if we do not patch the hole in the bucket. And that hole is climate change.

Climate change is already exacerbating poverty. Since the 1960s, the gap between the richest and poorest countries in the world has increased, thanks to climate change, by as much as 25%. Climate change is compounding water and food shortages. It's impacting people's health. Even the simple act of burning fossil fuels for energy produces so much air pollution, it's responsible for 10 million premature deaths

per year. Climate change even drives resource scarcity that causes authoritative states to thrive and spawn civil conflict. Climate change is, as the U.S. military calls it, a threat multiplier. In other words, it takes all the other issues we're already concerned about and it exacerbates them or multiplies them. Unprecedented experiment.

Hole in the bucket. Threat multiplier. These are all accurate descriptions of climate change. But whatever description you prefer, we know it's urgent and we have to do something about it. Why? Because there is no pathway forward to human flourishing on this planet without it. Quite literally, climate change is what stands between us and a better future.

Because despite what you might have heard, it's not a choice between the environment or the economy, people or the planet. This planet will be orbiting the sun long after we are gone. We are the ones who depend on it and on all other life for all of the resources we have, the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we eat, the materials we use to make everything we have. So this fight we're in, it is quite literally not about saving the planet.

It is about saving us. And here's the good news. Climate actions aren't only actions to tackle climate change. They're actions to tackle all of the other problems we confront too.

Because climate solutions can give us cleaner air and water. They can protect us from disasters like storms, wildfires, and floods that climate change is supersizing, making worse. Climate solutions can give us better health, provide more affordable energy, reduce inequalities, create healthy ecosystems, protect our biodiversity, and give us a more stable world. So when it comes to climate action, the only question we have left is what are we waiting for?

Because to ensure human flourishing and a better future, we have to tackle climate change. We have no choice. To err is human. To forgive, divine. But what is forgiveness? When can it rightly be sought or offered? Can it be corporate as well as an individual? What role should forgiveness play in law, public policy, or even public health? How can we become more forgiving?

Templeton World Charity Foundation is a co-host of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health's Human Flourishing Conference, Forgiveness, Interdisciplinary Perspectives. On April 21st and 22nd, eminent scholars and practitioners from philosophy, theology, psychology, law, peace studies, and public health will gather together to consider forgiveness.

The conference will be hosted in Harvard's Memorial Church and is open to the public, but registration is necessary. To register, visit hfh.fas.harvard.edu forward slash forgiveness dash conference dash Harvard. We'll add the link to that registration page in our show notes. We hope you can join us.

I want to turn now to our two panelists who are with us live, David and Akilah. David, if I could turn to you first of all. Can you tell us what your work has taught you about how, including the varieties of how, we respond, people respond to a challenge like the one that we're facing with climate change? Sure. I mean, the first thing I want to say is, you know, you might be wondering why as a psychologist here I'm not studying the science of climate change, but

For all the wonderful technologies we have, it's people who have to make the decisions to use them and decisions to accept some sacrifices to ensure a better future. And so a lot of what I look at in my research is how people make those decisions.

And what we know about humans in general is we tend to discount threats in the future and we like immediate gratification. But solving the climate problem really requires all of us to accept a little sacrifice now for gains later. Maybe a little more money in terms of cleaner energy than we'd like to pay, maybe raising our thermostats so that we're not using as much to keep our houses too cool for our own comforts.

And what my research looks at is how do we get people to make those sacrifices, to work for the greater good instead of their own comfort or convenience in the first place? And one thing we found is that people's emotional states can have a huge influence here. The reason we often pay people back is we feel grateful to them. The reason we pay things forward and accept sacrifices to help others is we feel compassion for them. And so what we found in our work is that by cultivating these emotions,

people will make more environmental decisions. Let me just give you one quick example.

We have people in situations that are akin to the tragedy of the commons. So where there is, for example, a certain amount of finite resources and people can choose how much they want to take from that. Let's say we're going to use money. If you take little bits, the pool is replenished and everybody can do well. But if you start extracting too much, the pool depletes. So you can think about this in terms of like, you know, overfishing or taking too much

energy that causes a blackout, et cetera. And what we find is that when people feel emotions like gratitude, they make more sustainable decisions. That is, they're willing to take less for their own individual gain

leaving more for everybody else. So I may be willing to pay a little bit more to take a little bit less profit to keep the pool going, right? In terms of clean energy, et cetera. And so one of the ways that we've found how people make decisions that are sustainable is to have them cultivate these emotional states, which color our decisions and make us willing to value the future more than the present.

I'm curious about whether you think the same considerations apply. You've talked about individuals. So much depends on the decisions that world leaders are making with one another. Do the same considerations apply in terms of expecting sacrifices from a nation or a country rather than from the individual?

Well, I think they do. But the problem with a lot of our leaders is we live in a very short-sighted world. Everybody's worried about the next election and not about what's better in the long run. And when you're so focused on immediate gains, it prevents you from making decisions that lead to a more resilient world in the long run. But the other problem that you identify, Phil, is exactly that. Who wants to be the nation to sacrifice if others aren't, right? It only makes sense to sacrifice...

to pay more money for energy, to have higher costs, to fight climate change, whatever it might be, to give money to poorer nations to help them do so, if those around you are making the same sacrifices, otherwise you kind of feel like you might be being taken advantage of. And so the question for us is, how do we

create that level of trust among world leaders to make this. So it's not like the US or England or a certain country feels like they're doing something at a cost. And here, I'll be interested to see what D'Carlo has to say too, because spiritual traditions actually help us form these moral convictions and so do these emotions. And so I think if people can

cultivate these emotions, it changes the lens through which we look at problems. And it can change things. I think it can nudge us towards those types of more long-term focus decisions. Well, that's a great opportunity to bring you in, Tequila. And I wonder whether, first of all, you could simply tell us more about what the LOCA initiative is and what it aims to do. I'd love to. Thank you so much, David. That was fascinating.

So I created the LOCA initiative at UW-Madison after working with faith leaders around the world. I created a program called Sacred Earth at WWF, and I was trying to prove that working with faith leaders, no matter where, no matter what religion, would actually move the needle on conservation and climate issues. And that in many ways, it would help us get unstuck in the places we are stuck.

And because of the overwhelmingly positive feedback I got and because the benefits were so tangible and measurable, I ended up wanting to create a platform that invited faith leaders to work with scientists on environmental and climate solutions. And so the LOCA initiative is this platform where I work right now specifically with three faith traditions, evangelical church leaders on creation care and climate change,

Tibetan Buddhist monastics in the Himalayas, which is where I'm from, and indigenous leaders, particularly tribal elders from Wisconsin Indian tribes, which is where Loka is based in Wisconsin. And what is really fascinating to me is that you can think of these three groups as extremely different, right? Very different theological groups.

sort of, you know, grounding very different ways of collecting and organizing in society. You can even argue that they have different sets of values. But what is really fascinating to me is how when you begin a dialogue that isn't about difference, but is about similarity, there are certain themes that emerge almost naturally.

It's not something that I have to guide. It almost sort of presents itself. And that really comes down to the language I use is interdependence and interconnectedness. Indigenous elders and leaders often use the word kinship. And so what I see when I work with religions and I work with faith leaders in particular is that

There is this natural understanding that the problems that you just described when you talked about climate change, that we are dealing with the impacts of systemic problems, that these are actually not individualistic problems. And therefore, what is required is that we become more collectivist in our approach towards flourishing, towards addressing these problems.

And here we have the largest group of organized people in the world. They literally are the largest stakeholder group. And their natural approach to thinking about problems is collectivist.

And so I think just picking up on what David was saying, this is a community where they naturally inhabit this language of gratitude and compassion, right? Where when it comes to whoever they identify as their self, whoever they identify as their in-group,

they really want to take care of. And I think the work that Loka does is partly trying to increase what that in-group looks like for some of our partners, and at the same time, trying to encourage what caring looks like as well. You know, how do we express that caring and what does that mean in tangible ways? You touched on something there that I wanted to ask about. Maybe we could expand on it. The fact that your focus is on faith communities,

that could be seen just as a sort of an instrumental approach, if you like, that it's just recognizing that actually faith is a motivator and a moral guide for a significant proportion, perhaps the major proportion of humankind. Or I wondered whether you feel there are particular and unique aspects of faith communities that can be mobilized here. So I think the answer is somewhat in your question when you say, you know,

I mean, is it a transactional reason to work with faiths or is there a more direct imperative? Right. I depending on the audience, I change my answer. I often in front of scientists give transactional reasons. You know, 80 percent of the world population subscribes to a faith. Right. Half of all the schools worldwide are run by faith.

Fates directly own 8% of inhabitable land. If collectively, Fates are the third largest financial investor in the world, the question I always put to scientists is, how is it that we have not been working with them up till now? How is it that we have not thought of them as this incredibly powerful stakeholder group? And of course, that comes back to our own biases.

But I do think there is a much deeper moral imperative for why we need to engage religious traditions. And that is because spiritual wisdom, and I'm actually paraphrasing Bill McKibben, but spiritual traditions are the one space that we have left where we do not calculate human existence directly.

in materialistic terms, where we do not say the sum total of a human existence, of human life's worth is actually money, right? It's physical success. Are all the trappings, the houses, the cars, and so on. This is still the space that is in some sense beyond neoliberalism, beyond this definition of how we decide what matters in human life. And I think

Spiritual wisdom provides a basis for emotional and social resilience that is often undervalued by science.

And when it comes down to it, faith leaders are so naturally suited to address the root causes of environmental degradation, including human greed and grasping, right? Including this sort of addiction we have to consumerism to fill this, you know, this empty space inside of us. Spiritual tradition actually allows us to get and deal with that space that we want to ignore, right? And so I see...

multiple reasons why we could be discussing with faith leaders how we address larger systemic problems, not just in a transactional sort of, you know, we need your clout way, but also to engage people

human beings in a dialogue that I think is much needed. There is a reason why chronic loneliness is such an epidemic in highly consumeristic individual societies. And so how do we talk about issues like that and connect it to climate change? I completely agree with what Tequila is saying. And I think we scientists, and I'm probably in the minority among my peers, but I'm working hard to change this,

We need to look to spiritual traditions, not to the theology, right? You know, science cannot prove that God exists. That's not a question we're equipped to answer. But for millennia, right, a lot of moral decision making, a lot of cooperation, which is what's going to be required to combat climate change, came from religion.

spiritual traditions and not just the belief systems, but also the practices. And I think Tequila is hitting on an important point there. When you engage in spiritual practices, it tends to cultivate these emotions in you. Prayer, blessings of gratitude, things that meditation enhances, compassion. We have research showing that. And to the extent that those emotions become more a part of a person's life, they affect the decisions we make. We bring people into our lab

And we can have them count their blessings either to God or to fate or whatever it might be. It doesn't matter. But when they feel that gratitude, they make economic and moral decisions that more value the other and value the future.

And put together, that's what it's going to take for climate change. It's going to take people willing to make decisions that say, I'm willing to sacrifice a little of my comfort, my profit, whatever it might be, so that I can ensure a better world for others around me and for future generations. And those emotions, when you feel them,

Color the mind's computations to make those outcomes more acceptable. And I think on a daily basis, the little things we do, if we cultivate these emotions, they nudge us toward valuing the future more than the present and make us make decisions about how we're going to spend our money, who we're going to vote for, what policies we accept more future-sided than what's in it for me right now, future-damned.

Well, this leads me to a question that I wanted to put to both of you, which is that there's one way of approaching this question to consider how to cultivate altruism, compassion for one another, interpersonal relationships. But there's also the other aspect that I think is certainly present in, as far as I can see, all of the world's major faiths.

of something more than that. It's something outside ourselves and outside the human, really a deep respect for the world that we're given. And I wonder whether you could both say something about the, if you like, the relative significance of those two perspectives, one being how we treat and respect and look at others, and the other, the wider view of what responsibilities we have, what respect we have for the natural world, for the world we're in.

Well, I automatically think about the Indigenous leaders I work with. So much historical trauma and burden from colonization. And yet it's amazing to note that 80% of biodiversity today is said to exist on Indigenous managed lands, right? And that really comes from a worldview that is rooted in interdependence and kinship.

And this coexistence, I think, between nature and people, you know, between the wild and tamed, right, between the spiritual and material, this is such a common theme for Indigenous culture. And it's very easy to other that. It's very easy to think of that as something that just exists in Indigenous cultures.

Whereas what I do see is that there is this, you know, and it's fascinating because often the space that I find the most promise for debate, even among faith leaders that let's say question climate science, is usually the space around debate.

I'd say theological literacy, where if you are willing to, if you have that curiosity to go back and look at what your theology says, sooner or later, you're going to find something that talks about the importance of nature.

And, you know, even when you think about, you know, the work I do with evangelical preachers, for example, there is often, you know, we know that the stats say that evangelicals, white evangelicals in America make up one of the largest climate denying groups. And yet I find working with evangelical pastors that there is this deep love for nature from their perspective because God created creation.

And God spent many more days creating creation than he did creating man, right? And so there was this, just in that space, there is a willingness to have this debate around, well, what does that mean in terms of responsibility? What does that mean for evangelicals in terms of responsibility? We just wrapped up a week-long convening where we brought 18 evangelical pastors to have this dialogue. And what was fascinating to me was,

David brought this up earlier. Almost every breakthrough happened from the space and from the conversation around gratitude. Almost every breakthrough that we had in this convening was because of the sense of gratitude they feel to the creator.

And then this desire to, you know, to respond, right? And it was fascinating because as someone who's been raised and who's trained in the Buddhist tradition, it was fascinating to see how what I'm actually seeing is what I would call this direct access to interdependence, right? Prajnaparamita is the phrase that we would use. And it really came because of that space of gratitude, right?

So I think when we think about how faith leaders can engage or how faith leaders can contribute, what would be fascinating is just increasing the number of conversations we have around gratitude and our planet, how none of us can exist without the planet, right? Even the oxygen we're inhaling right now comes from outside of us. And maybe that is the conversation we request all faith leaders to start leading with.

Yeah, I mean, we do difficult things sometimes because we think we should, but when we do them because we think we should, we often do them with regret or hesitance or trepidation. Sometimes we do difficult things because we feel we should. And when we feel we should, think about if you love a child or love a parent or love someone, how much you will do for them that involves sacrifice.

By cultivating those emotions, it just changes what we value. And so I was really interested to hear Dikula say that when people thought about gratitude, that's what broke through. That's what breaks down those defenses. I think oftentimes, especially in the U.S., there is this kind of conflation of religion and spirituality with politics.

And that can cause a problem. You go back to the text, as Nikila said, there usually is some foresight, some mention of interdependence, some focus on being a good steward, being a good cooperator, helping other people. But what cuts through the noise, it is really changing people's emotional states because that changes the lens through which the brain interprets facts. It just does.

And that is why many spiritual traditions can cause the changes in people they do, whether it's experiencing awe in the state of nature, gratitude for the things that you have, clean water, clean air. It changes the lens and it does it in a way that doesn't require us to have debate

debates in our mind about what does this politician say? What about this? Am I owning the libs? Am I fighting the conservatives? And so I think it's a more authentic change. And if something that you can cultivate, it becomes a habit and becomes more long lasting as a lens through which to make decisions in this world. Well, this sounds to me as though it has implications for the way we communicate, the way we talk about politics.

climate change and the environmental threats we face. And this is something that, as a science communicator, I struggle with, that the temptation is to say, look how bad things are, look at what the projections are for the future, how much worse they could get. This is really alarming, isn't it? We have to do something about it. And I think there has to be some of that sort of fact-based communication. But from what both of you are saying, that's not what is going to make the difference to the way people might choose to act.

Yeah, people, I mean, one thing we know from psychology is that fear appeals, as you're saying, look at these terrible things that are going to happen.

unless you give people a concrete route to deal with that, they kind of just shy away from it. But the problem with climate change is the concrete route to change is often something they don't want to do because it also involves sacrifice. It's not like here, take this pill or go get a cancer screening and you'll be fine. And so the question is, here's the strategy. How do we make it more acceptable to you? How do we make this sacrifice something that you're willing to accept?

And because humans like immediate gratification, no one likes sacrifice. And so you have to pair the fear

with something that makes the sacrifice more palatable. And I think that's where these emotions come into play because they make sacrifice more palatable to people. So if you can mix those at the same time, you're going to have a better outcome than just making people afraid and saying, well, the choice is to tune out and not think about the bad thing that's coming or this other option, which feels really bad and you don't want to do either.

And Tequila, have you seen, in the course of the work that you've done, have you seen perceptions and attitudes change, you know, in particular communities? And if you have, and I hope you have, are you aware of what it was that really precipitated that change? Mm-hmm.

I mean, when it comes to faith groups, so yes, definitely. I began working, I didn't mean to. My background was conservation. I worked for WWF. I just volunteered to work with one Tibetan Buddhist group in the Himalayas on my private time. And what emerged from that was this really powerful

What I saw, I created environmental guidelines for Tibetan Buddhist monasteries in the Himalayas. And what I got in response was an absolute clamoring for science, was this really deep desire from the monastics. And we were talking about all across the Himalayas saying, train us.

the guidelines are not enough. And so I ended up creating these trainings for them and they decided to self-organize into an association. And before I knew it, there was an eco-monastic movement in the Himalayas that I had no plans of setting off. But what I've seen just, it's been, you know, almost 14, 15 years now with that work. And what's fascinating to me is how

religious norms and cultural norms have shifted in monasteries that have decided to own this work.

So we have, they are self-organized under the umbrella Koryug, which means environment in Tibetan. And we're talking about 50 plus monasteries all across the Himalayas from Ladakh to Bhutan, for those of you who know the region. And when they initially started doing this work, their reasoning was really simplistic. It was the head of my monastic order said we should become better environmentalists. So here we are, right? Very simplistic.

And at some point, that work started becoming a source of pride for them because they were getting attention for it. But what was really fascinating too was that it ended up being a defining factor for them. So each monastery was choosing to define themselves as an eco-monastery. And there was this loop that was happening of positive reinforcement.

And what I've seen over time is that as monasteries shift towards environmental behavior, they seem to, if anything, take a great deal of, I would say the word joy. We don't use that word enough, you know, in scientific surroundings. They take so much joy in not just being the leader, but also being the teacher. Right.

Right. So here, to give you a sense of what the context is, climate change is ravaging the Himalayas. Whether it's the price of onions, whether it's drought, whether it's electricity, every aspect of people's lives are affected by climate change.

And so all of a sudden, you have a group of people who've been told their purpose is religious and in a very specific narrow sector. All of a sudden, they're being told that they are problem solvers and that what they do affects the community in a tangible way. And they've really risen to that challenge. And I see this with every religious group I've worked with, that at some point it crosses that boundary of their own institutional sort of influence, right? It goes into society.

and the role they can play as moral leaders. And they sort of, there's a real thirst for that and a desire to take that space. To me, it's so obvious that they are our natural partner when it comes to climate and environmental issues for that reason, because they are self-motivated. And I cannot emphasize that enough, having worked with governments and corporations, that to have this powerful social entity that is self-motivated to do good

It does not need to be convinced, you know, does not make arguments based on GDP, does not need to be bribed, does not think about the ultimate criteria for success being monetary. Right. They really are focused on the well-being of society in general. So I think what I see is actually really positive change in religious institutions.

But one thing I do want to say also is that I see a great deal of hope in the fact that people's attitudes in America towards climate change has completely shifted. I mean, the Yale Climate Change Communication Center has shown this again and again, that what we're seeing is a very small section. I don't think it's even double digits that has not shifted on denialism, but everybody else has moved from what used to be moderately concerned to extremely anxious.

which we could argue is good and bad in many ways, right? Going back to what David was saying about what activates you to work on solutions. But I think that that is promising and we have to see that as an opportunity.

Well, we have just a few minutes left and Tequila, you've already addressed the question I wanted to put to both of you at the end, which is, is there ground for hope? And thank you so much for giving me some, at least. It is so good to hear that. David, I wonder if I could put that to you. Do you see grounds that something really can shift in the future?

in the way people think about these challenges? I think there is. I think the idea is changing. A good friend of mine, Subir Rangan, who's a professor at INSEAD in Paris, talks about exactly what Dikili was saying. For a long time, government leaders, businesses, they would make decisions by what are the probabilities X, Y, and Z are going to happen? How can we optimize our financial outcomes? Blah, blah, blah.

But when it comes to things like climate change, when it comes to existential threats, decisions is the wrong word. We have to accept choices. There are choices and choices require sacrifice, not just optimizing what's good in terms of GDP and profit. And I get the sense that there is a hunger for this and whether people are drawing on spiritual traditions or secular wisdom and cultivating these emotional states, I get a sense that there is a brewing concern.

And I just hope it keeps moving in the right direction. Thank you so much. Well, that brings us pretty much to the end of the discussion we have time for. I wish we could carry on because there's so much else I wanted to ask you. But thank you so much, both of you, David and Akilah, for the perspective you've given. And I do hope that others will have had the same response as I have to see that actually, despite these immense challenges we face, there are not only grounds for hope, but there are some very practical ways to

that we can start to change the conversation and start to improve the prospects that we have. So thank you very much, both of you, for that discussion.

Thanks to Dr. Catherine Hayhoe for her presentation and to panelists Dr. David De Steno and Akila Chungyalpa for lending us their expertise. I also want to thank moderator Dr. Philip Ball and join him in expressing my own feelings of hope after hearing this enlightening discussion on what can change hearts and minds in the face of the global challenge of climate change.

This has been the Stories of Impact podcast with Richard Sergei and Tavia Gilbert. Written and produced by TalkBox Productions and Tavia Gilbert. With senior producer Katie Flood. Music by Alexander Filippiak. Mix and master by Kayla Elrod. Executive producer Michelle Cobb. The Stories of Impact podcast is generously supported by Templeton World Charity Foundation.