Mark Lynas

Mark Lynas (born 1973) is a British author, journalist and environmental activist who focuses on climate change. He is a contributor to New Statesman, Ecologist, Granta and Geographical magazines, and The Guardian and The Observer newspapers in the UK; he also worked on the film The Age of Stupid. He holds a degree in history and politics from the University of Edinburgh. He lives in Oxford, England. He has published several books including Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet (2007) and The God Species: How the Planet Can Survive the Age of Humans (2011, ASIN: B0055P36U6).

Main work and publications

In 2004, Lynas' High Tide: The Truth About Our Climate Crisis was published by Macmillan Publishers on its Picador imprint.^[1] He has also contributed to a book entitled Fragile Earth: Views of a Changing World published by Collins,^[2] which presents before-and-after images of some of the natural changes which have happened to the world in recent years, including the Indian Ocean tsunami and Hurricane Katrina, alongside a bleak look at the effects of mankind's actions on the planet.

In January 2007 Lynas published Gem Carbon Counter,^[3] containing instructions to calculate people's personal carbon emissions and recommendations about how to reduce their impact on the atmosphere.

In 2007 he published Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet, a book detailing the progressive effect of global warming in several planetary ecosystems, from 1 degree to 6 degrees and further of average temperature rise of the planet. Special coverage is given to the positive feedback mechanisms that could dramatically accelerate the climate change, possibly putting the climate on a runaway path. As a possible end scenario the release of methane hydrate from the bottom of the oceans could replicate the end-Permian extinction event.

In 2008 National Geographic released a documentary film based on Lynas's book, entitled Six Degrees Could Change the World.[2]

In 2010, Lynas published an article in the New Statesman entitled "Why We Greens Keep Getting It Wrong"^[4] and the same year was the main contributor to a UK Channel 4 Television programme called "What the Green Movement Got Wrong."^[5] In these he took a line similar to environmentalists such as Patrick Moore, Bjorn Lomborg and Richard D. North, explaining that he now felt that several of his previous strongly held beliefs were wrong. For example, he suggested that opposition by environmentalists, such as himself, to the development of nuclear energy had speeded up climate change, that proscription of DDT had led to millions of deaths and that GM crops were necessary to feed the world.

This latter position was attacked as patronising and naive by some developing world commentators, including one featured in a Channel Four debate after the programme aired. A number of experts also criticised Lynas's factual errors in contributing to the film. British environmentalist George Monbiot wrote in the Guardian that 'Brand and Lynas present themselves as heretics. But their convenient fictions chime with the thinking of the new establishment: corporations, thinktanks, neoliberal politicians. The true heretics are those who remind us that neither social nor environmental progress are possible unless power is confronted.'^[6] Since writing this, George Monbiot admitted in 2011 that he had changed his mind and was in favour of nuclear energy.^[7]

In July 2011 he published in the U.K. the book entitled The God Species: How the Planet Can Survive the Age of Humans, which will be published in the U.S. by National Geographic in October 2011 as The God Species: Saving the Planet in the Age of Humans. Lynas argues that as Earth has entered the Anthropocene, and as such humanity is changing the planet's climate, its bio-geochemical cycles, the chemistry of the oceans and the colour of the sky, as well as reducing the number of species. Based on the planetary boundaries concept, he proposes several strategies that are controversial among the environmental community, such as using nuclear power to reduce carbon emissions and geoengineering to mitigate inevitable global warming; or genetic engineering (transgenics) to feed the world and reduce the environmental impact of agriculture, etc.^[8]

See also

• Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet

References

1. ^ ISBN 0-312-30365-3
2. ^ ISBN 0-00-723314-0
3. ^ Collins, ISBN 978-0-00-724812-4
4. ^ Lynas, Mark (2010) Why We Greens Keep Getting It Wrong The New Statesman, 28 January 10, Retrieved 5 November 2010
5. ^ Lynas, Mark (2010) What the Green Movement Got Wrong: A turncoat explains The Daily Telegraph, 4 November 2010, Retrieved 5 November 2010
6. ^ [1], additional text.
7. ^ Monbiot, George Why Fukushima made me stop worrying and love nuclear power The Guardian, 21 March 2011, Retrieved 9 July 2011
8. ^ "Earthly powers - How we can save ourselves". The Economist. 2011-07-14. http://www.economist.com/node/18956026. Retrieved 2011-07-22.  July 16th print edition pp. 86,

External links

• Reviews of High Tide:
• www.marklynas.org - personal website
• www.collins.co.uk/fragileearth - Fragile Earth
• www.marklynas.org/books Collins Carbon Counter
• "How do I know China wrecked the Copenhagen deal? I was in the room" - article by Mark Lynas on negotiations in Copenhagen 2009

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Name	Lynas, Mark
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Date of birth	1973
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