Abstract
Geophysical models of climate change are becoming increasingly sophisticated, yet less effort is devoted to modelling the human systems causing climate change and how the two systems are coupled. Here, we develop a simple socio-climate model by coupling an Earth system model to a social dynamics model. We treat social processes endogenously—emerging from rules governing how individuals learn socially and how social norms develop—as well as being influenced by climate change and mitigation costs. Our goal is to gain qualitative insights into scenarios of potential socio-climate dynamics and to illustrate how such models can generate new research questions. We find that the social learning rate is strongly influential, to the point that variation of its value within empirically plausible ranges changes the peak global temperature anomaly by more than 1°C. Conversely, social norms reinforce majority behaviour and therefore may not provide help when we most need it because they suppress the early spread of mitigative behaviour. Finally, exploring the model’s parameter space for mitigation cost and social learning suggests optimal intervention pathways for climate change mitigation. We find that prioritising an increase in social learning as a first step, followed by a reduction in mitigation costs provides the most efficient route to a reduced peak temperature anomaly. We conclude that socio-climate models should be included in the ensemble of models used to project climate change.
Highlights
According to many ancient myths, humans did not invent fire-making de novo but rather learned it from personalities like Prometheus and subsequently spread the practice amongst themselves
Geophysical climate models rarely account for dynamic human behaviour, which determines the emissions trajectory, and is itself affected by the climate system
Steps to increase social learning surrounding climate change should initially be prioritised for maximum impact, making a subsequent reduction in mitigation costs more effective
Summary
According to many ancient myths, humans did not invent fire-making de novo but rather learned it from personalities like Prometheus and subsequently spread the practice amongst themselves. These stories reveal how ancient myth-makers already grasped the fundamental importance of social learning—the process whereby individuals learn new behaviours, values and opinions from others [1]. Climate projections depend strongly on the assumed trajectory of GHG emissions [12] This trajectory is determined by human behaviour and yet climate models generally do not incorporate dynamic social processes relevant to GHG emissions. These trajectories are constructed with socio-economic factors in mind, (see Representative Concentration Pathways [12] and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways [13] for instance), but are not coupled to climate dynamics and do not capture human responses to climate change in a mechanistic way
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