Climate Change and the Long-Term Future

After several successful installments, the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Groningen will host its yearly Winter School, aimed primarily at advanced undergraduate students and early-stage graduate students. The theme of the Winter School is Climate Change and the Long-Term Future. It will consist of 6 lecture tutorials where topics related to the theme will be discussed from different disciplinary viewpoints: Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE). To facilitate attendance by people from outside the Netherlands and Europe, the winter school will be held online.

Theme

Climate change is among the biggest challenges humanity faces today. How should individuals, societies, and humanity at large respond to climate change and other long-term challenges? Far from being a question for the natural sciences alone, a good answer also requires a ‘PPE perspective’, that is, a perspective that combines philosophy, politics, and economics. In this winter school, different researchers will take a PPE perspective in exploring climate change and our ethical and political obligations towards future people. The winter school starts with fundamental normative questions, such as: What are our moral obligations to future people? Do they extend to all future people and, if so, does this imply that our longtermist moral duties trump any short-term concerns? Climate change mitigation is typically seen as a collective action problem and calls for an institutional solution that facilitates widespread cooperation among individuals and countries. But what exactly makes for successful and sustainable institutions? And a social-psychological perspective will ask: what explains people’s attitudes and actions towards the environment and future generations and how can those be improved? How can democracies respond to wide disagreement around climate impacts and appropriate mitigation measures? And, finally, what are effective solutions to securing a sustainable energy supply? For example, should such a mix include nuclear energy? And are European carbon pricing initiatives on the right track?