Betting on the best case: higher end warming is underrepresented in research
Open accessAbstract
Abstract We compare the probability of different warming rates to their mentions in IPCC reports through text mining. We find that there is a substantial mismatch between likely warming rates and research coverage. 1.5 °C and 2 °C scenarios are substantially overrepresented. More likely higher end warming scenarios of 3 °C and above, despite potential catastrophic impacts, are severely neglected.
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Climate modeling is often an exercise in 'betting on the best case'.
“Climate modeling is often an exercise in 'betting on the best case' (Geden, 2015; Jehn et al., 2021).”
From A Fate Worse Than Warming? Stratospheric Aerosol Injection and Global Catastrophic Risk (2021) · cites this paper as Jehn et al., 2021
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“Climate modeling is often an exercise in “betting on the best case” (Geden, 2015; Jehn et al., 2021).”
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- Authors
- Jehn, F. U., Schneider, M., Wang, J. R., Kemp, L., & Breuer, L.
- Affiliations
- Justus-Liebig-Universität Gießen (DE)
- University of Cambridge (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Jehn, Florian U
- Venue
- Environmental Research Letters
- Publisher
- IOP Publishing
- Published
- 2021-07-29
- Volume
- 16
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- 084036
- ISSN
- 1748-9326 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W3180297362
- Cited by
- 27
- References
- 12
- Citations by year
- 2026: 1 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 1
- FWCI
- 4.58
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Environmental Research Letters (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Apollo (University of Cambridge) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Apollo
- Funders
- Bundesministerium für Wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (57526248)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Climate Change Policy and Economics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate variability and models
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Climate Change Communication and Perception
- Keywords
- IPCC reports, research coverage, 1.5°C target, 2°C target, climate change scenarios, literature mining
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Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
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