Study Findings from University of Cambridge Provide New Insights into Climate Change (Re-framing the Threat of Global Warming: an Empirical Causal Loop Diagram of Climate Change, Food Insecurity and Societal Collapse)

2021 MAR 26 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Research findings on Climate Change are discussed in a new report. According to news reporting originating in Cambridge, United Kingdom, by NewsRx journalists, research stated, “There is increasing concern that climate change poses an existential risk to humanity. Understanding these worst-case scenarios is essential for good risk management.”

Funders for this research include General Sir John Monash Foundation, Cambridge Trust, UK FIRES.

The news reporters obtained a quote from the research from the University of Cambridge, “However, our knowledge of the causal pathways through which climate change could cause societal collapse is underdeveloped. This paper aims to identify and structure an empirical evidence base of the climate change, food insecurity and societal collapse pathway. We first review the societal collapse and existential risk literature and define a set of determinants of societal collapse. We develop an original methodology, using these determinants as societal collapse proxies, to identify an empirical evidence base of climate change, food insecurity and societal collapse in contemporary society and then structure it using a novel-format causal loop diagram (CLD) defined at global scale and national granularity. The resulting evidence base varies in temporal and spatial distribution of study and in the type of data-driven methods used. The resulting CLD documents the spread of the evidence base, using line thickness and colour to depict density and type of data-driven method respectively. It enables exploration of how the effects of climate change may undermine agricultural systems and disrupt food supply, which can lead to economic shocks, socio-political instability as well as starvation, migration and conflict.”

According to the news reporters, the research concluded: “Suggestions are made for future work that could build on this paper to further develop our qualitative understanding of, and quantitative complex systems modelling capabilities for analysing, the causal pathways between climate change and societal collapse.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Re-framing the Threat of Global Warming: an Empirical Causal Loop Diagram of Climate Change, Food Insecurity and Societal Collapse. Climatic Change, 2021;164. Climatic Change can be contacted at: Springer, Van Godewijckstraat 30, 3311 Gz Dordrecht, Netherlands. (Springer - www.springer.com; Climatic Change - http://www.springerlink.com/content/0165-0009/)

Our news correspondents report that additional information may be obtained by contacting J. M. Allwood, University of Cambridge, Dept. of Engineering, Trumpington St, Cambridge CB2 1PZ, United Kingdom. Additional authors for this research include C. E. Richards and R. C. Lupton.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-021-02957-w. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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